Exit Interview
by Terry Kidd.
Johnny Jones had finally made it to the moors. All day and everyday he spent his life battling the taxman and the Health and Safety Inspector. At last, it was good to get away from it all.
Johnny was a big man and he was finding the long haul up Sheep Fell hard going. There was a pulse hammering in his temple and he was feeling short of breath. Up ahead he could see one of the granite slabs that the retreating glaciers had left behind a hundred thousand years ago. He wondered about the misty weather, hoped it would lift soon. Today was sure to be a memorable day.
He lowered himself down to the hunk of granite. A breather wouldn’t hurt. He closed his eyes and there came a voice. "Hello, Sir. Hello Mr. Jones, I've one or two questions for you."
Johnny opened his eyes. The speaker was a young man behind a desk.
"Just a few questions, Sir. Then you can be on your way."
The young man was a smug-looking fellow wearing a blazer with shiny buttons. He was an unlikely type for the moors. But wait, something had changed; now they were in some unadorned corporate office.
"On my way?” Johnny said. “What, where to? Who the hell are you?"
"Don't mind me, Sir. I'm just a minion. You're the important one here. A few quick questions; please choose one answer. Has your life been A -- Most Satisfactory, B – Satisfactory, or C -- Not Satisfactory?"
"What?"
"Sorry, Sir. Is something wrong?"
"What ex actly is this?"
The young man consulted a computer before answering. It took a second or two, and then as if reading from a script he continued. "This a discretionary subject survey Mr, err Jones. You are under no obligation to answer. If you prefer not to be detained you can be on your way immediately."
"On my way? Where to? Where to specifically?"
"Well, oblivion of course, Sir. You're entitled to get there as quickly as possible, if that is your wish."
Johnny gaped at him. "Oblivion! You’re telling me I'm dead?"
"Spot on, Sir. Dead as the jolly old dodo."
Johnny took a minute he started patting his pockets in search of a cigarette.
"What's it to be then, Sir? A few questions or straight on to nothingness?"
"A few questions."
"That tends to be the case Sir. Now: Most Satisfactory, Satisfactory, Not Satisfactory..."
"Stop! Wait. Does everybody have to go through this?"
"No, Sir. Just one tenth of one percent of all subjects and then only if they want to."
"Who gets the information?"
"The creators of course, Sir."
"Did you say ‘Creators’?"
"You are correct in noticing the plural Sir but with a small c."
"Who are the creators?"
The young man consulted his computer. There was a short delay, then came the familiar purr of a printer. The young man handed over a list of twelve unpronounceable names.
"Your creators, Sir." With the hint of a sniff, he said, "They appear to be some kind of artists’ cooperative."
"Are you telling me that the whole of creation is the work of an artists’ cooperative?"
"No Sir not the whole of creation, just the whole of your particular universe. That's the practice with competition entries."
"Competition entries?"
"That's what I said, Sir." The young man was starting to wear a rather pained look, perhaps it was the look of a man tired of having his words repeated back to him.
Johnny was struggling with this, he still hadn’t found his cigarettes but he didn’t quite have the energy to stand and check his trouser pockets.
"So,” he asked, “Is this where the survey comes in, are my answers to be part of the judging?"
"Oh Lord no, absolutely not. You are a caution, Sir, too funny," the young man said dryly.
Then he corrected himself. "I apologise, Sir. What I meant to say was No, they are not part of the judging. These questions are standard procedure.”
The young man took to his script again. “In cases where universes have been created and sentient beings have been fashioned, this is routine monitoring. To identify any pain and suffering due to environmental, social or other conditions.”
"Hmmm, what then? Do you intervene and change the laws of physics, or what?"
"Well, obviously we can't do anything about your universe, it’s run its course, but we can include safeguards to protect subsequent creations."
"What do you mean? 'Run its course'? You're talking as though this is it. This is Judgement Day."
"Sir is very perceptive, nail on the head again, Sir.”
"Look," Johnny said, "I've had enough of this. I want to talk to your supervisor. I demand to speak to someone in authority."
The questioner held out his hand and a telephone handset appeared. He started speaking into it.
"Yes Sir… He’s very insistent. No, he hasn't got the first clue. That's right Sir, the post atomic, pre-interstellar era.” He paused aga in listening, then, "Yes Sir… That universe… Yes, the artists."
The phone disappeared and he continued. "My supervisor is in a meeting with his superior, but he's authorised me to answer all your questions. Where do you want to start?"
Cripes, thought Johnny, where to start? Might as well get the full story, it wasn't as if he was in any rush to get on to the next stop.
"How about starting with Judgement Day?" Johnny said. "Are you telling me that the world, that the universe, came to an end on the day I died? That’s pretty bloody interesting."
"When I refer to your universe, I don't speak of your personal one, Sir. Sorry to deny you a little bit of solipsism but, in fact, the universe you were occupying did not end when you did. It carried on for at least a hundred years after you pegged it."
"So, where have I been, in limbo? One minute I'm on the Yorkshire moors, next thing here.”
"No not limbo. Time as you understand it means nothing outside your own universe. It’s all part of ‘The Fabric’. When a universe gets put together that means Time AND Space."
"So, when someone dies they drop out of their universe and come here?" Johnny asked.
"No, Sir. You are a special case. When you ‘passed over’ we grabbed your consciousness, that particular network of neurons, electrical potentials, and pH values, and saved it. And here you are, and so it was with all the other sample subjects, minus a couple of hundred that got lost through excessive network traffic."
"What happened to them?"
"Straight to oblivion of course. Now, Sir," the interrogator said briskly, "any more questions? I really would like to get on."
"Yes,” Johnny snapped. “Yes, I do have more questions. What about MY universe, what happened to it on Judgement Day?"
"Gone Sir. All wound up and decomposed back to its original components ready for future projects. Along with twenty or so other universes that were part of the same competition. Now, you are from the post atomic era? You HAVE heard of the multiple universe theory?"
"Yes, but nothing was said about universes being created and destroyed at will."
"Somebody has to will it, don't they?" he said.
"I don't know; I suppose I thought that ‘The Universe’ had just happened."
"Just happened! Oh dear, did you even stop to think about it? I thought you were looking for answers. Seems to me that you are just playing for time. Wasting my time to prolong your time," he produced the telephone handset again.
"No, wait,” Johnny said. “I was always curious, I just didn't know where to look."
"Did you try religion? Those chaps were always claiming to have the answers."
"They were, but I was sceptical."
"Were you? But did you study any of them in depth? There were enough to choose from," he consulted the computer, "the Buddhists, the Mormons, the Scientologists-"
"Hell, no. I never expected any of that lot to know anything about anything. But I do know this much; none of them ever prophesied a bloody universe fabricated for a competition."
"Maybe so, Sir. So what did you study? Anything at all?"
Johnny stared at him. Not only was he a bureaucrat, a species that Johnny particularly despised, but an unctuous, argumentative little tyke to boot.
"I was always too busy.” Johnny snapped back, “I had a job, kids, several wives; not all at the same time mind. I did try and keep up with science, turns out I knew less about reality than a pet goldfish knows about the Great Barrier Reef.”
"That's very true," the young man said. Now that Johnny was wound up he seemed to have decided to show just how reasonable he was. He steepled his hands like a bank manager dealing with some feckless customer with an overdrawn account and continued. "I suppose that's not entirely your fault, universes are made only as large as they need be. The trick is judging just how much science the subjects will master, and then only creating as much universe as necessary. A rather non-industrious species such as yours turned out to be easily satisfied. By the time your universe was recycled, you'd barely got beyond Mars.”
"The best ones,” he continued, “the current record holders, made it to the moon in the time it took your lot to develop gunpowder. The universe makers there had to call in emergency backup to tailor an IQ specific plague, an earthquake, and a charismatic warlord to knock them back to the dark ages. Otherwise they'd have flown to the limits of reality and seen that all the other galaxies were merely painted on the inside of the boundary sphere."
"What? Are you telling me that these fabricated universes are not all they seem to be?"
"There's no reason they should be, right? No point in making a bunch of suns and worlds that no one is ever going to take a proper look at. That's just not cost effective."
"I'm astonished. What other flummery do these creators resort to? Don't tell me they fake up evolution as well?"
"No, but there are a few shortcuts. It would be a bugger to wait all those eons for life to evolve from the primordial soup if the most highly developed creature turned out to be a newt.”
“As a rule,” the young man continued. “The typical competition universes start from a standard: same solar system, same physical constants, same genetic parameters. In your contest everyone started from the same ancestral baseline, with the entrants only manipulating a few key genetic constants, the ones that make your particular species different from the higher prim ates.”
"So, you are telling me that the human race was 'engineered' by a consortium of artists, for the purposes of a competition?" Johnny said.
"Very well put. Spot on in fact, Sir. Now perhaps you’ll cooperate and let me get my job done. If I don't fill my quota I'm in big trouble."
"No," Johnny said. " I want to see your supervisor. I insist. "
The young man reached under the desk and pressed a button. Another figure materialised. He was an older man, dignified, and sporting an Eton College tie. He was immaculately dressed aside from a napkin tucked into his collar, which he hastily snatched away and tucked into his pocket.
"Now, Sir, can we please have a bit of cooperation. I've been monitoring this conversation and I'm quite sure that we've done everything possible to make this interview a pleasant and fulfilling one," the newcomer announced.
"You may very well think so, but I'm not happy. I absolutely insist on another chance," Johnny said.
"Another chance? Sir, what can you mean?"
"Another chance, another life. You can arrange that I'm sure," Johnny was fishing, but needs must when confronted with oblivion.
The newcomer gave Johnny a cold look. He had a whispered conversation with his colleague.
At length he continued. "Assuming it were possible to grant you another life, why do you think you are entitled?"
"Well,” Johnny said, “Things have n ot gone as well as they might. Given another go I would do better. Just send me round again. Next time I'll study more, keep fit, watch less TV, and get a decent degree. All the stuff I meant to do the first time."
"But why? You've done fine, you’ve had children, and grandchildren. For the most part you’ve had work you enjoyed. You didn't do too bad on the romance front either, better than some, that's for sure."
"I think I deserve a bit more time. I could have contributed something to history if I'd have started with my art sooner."
"Possibly so, but it's a all a bit academic now. All the canvases are about to be scraped clean, all files erased, disc reformatted, slates wiped-"
"Okay, Okay. I get the message." Johnny was feeling desperate; he had to come up with something.
"Look here,” he said. “This is a pretty pass. Picked up by aliens on the moors and then fed some cock and bull story about competitions and multiple universes."
"Sir. Firstly, we are not aliens, nothing so mundane. In fact we are as close to supreme beings as you are ever likely to get. Secondly, we have been absolutely truthful in everything we've told you. If you are incapable of accepting that your existence, that your entire universe has had no more purpose than this, too bad. We have work to do. Now pull yourself together and face your future with a little dignity,” he paused, “Sir."
"Supreme beings, you two?" said Johnny. The irony of it all, Judgement Day and he’d encountered a pair of bloody civil servants. But it gave him an idea. He’d finally found his cigarettes and with them inspiration. His years in the haulage business hadn’t left him totally unequipped. He knew a thing or two about dealing with bureaucrats.
"I want to record an official complaint,” Johnny said. “Please facilitate this immediately. This appraisal might be a Friday afternoon rush job for you two, but for me it’s definitive.”
The two interrogators looked at each other, there was more whispering, then the older man disappeared and the first man spoke again.
"Now, Sir,” said the interrogator adopting an amiable tone. “I'm sure it doesn't have to come to that. I’m sure theirs something we can do to make amends? Supposing I drop you back again. I can leave you at any time or place. What's your preference old boy?"
Bingo! Johnny smiled. "The same as before will be fine, I just want the opportunity to do it properly this time. Same body, same brain, same time, same place."
"Certainly, Sir. 1950s’ England, a very good choice if I may say so: rock music, jet planes and tight jeans. Plus a refreshing absence of plague, pestilence and war, a vintage era."
Johnny beamed; victory snatched from the jaws of defeat. He'd known the day was going to be memorable one. One up for me, he thought.
"So, if you'll just brace yourself, Sir." The young man said. "You can be on your way directly.”
“Just one thing," a broad smile had returned to that smug face. "If you would have thought to have asked for it; you could have gone back with all your current memories intact. Tough luck Sir, have a nice trip."
“Oh BOLLO…” said Johnny
