Brenty Four 2013 - Chapter 3

[Lissa]

The drill began boring into my leg, its chilling whine reverberating through my half numbed body. As it bored deeper and deeper into me I began to feel like the room was melting away. At first I thought it was a side effect of the metal bit being driven into my shattered bone but when the ultra-modern theatre of the twenty eighth century began to give way to the austere drabness of the twenty first I slowly realised that it wasn’t a futuristic drill boring into my leg – it was Francois Devine talking to me.

“I’d be terribly grateful if you could, Dennis Brent. Or at least give me a satisfactory explanation, with commensurate apology by return of post, if you are unable to do so. Dennis Brent? Dennis Brent?”

“I must’ve dreamt the pastel shades” I babbled as the mists cleared.

“Excuse me?” asked Francois Devine.

“Where am I?” I slurred.

“Ho ho ho – you owe me one boiled sweet or confectionary of equivalent value for such a clichéd question, Dennis Brent” he informed me.

“Where is Captain Maitland?” I demanded. “I want to speak to Captain Maitland.”

“Hold hard, Dennis Brent, you’ve become insensible. Captain Maitland is a fictional character. We sensible telehistorians do not talk about fictional characters, even ones with such responsible haircuts, as though they are important or real.”

“What? I was just talking to him” I protested but by now reality was beginning to assert itself. “I was dreaming wasn’t I?”

“Doctor Dempsey did warn you that your painkilling medication was liable to cause you hallucinations and/or extremely vivid dreams.”

“So he did, Francois Devine, so he did” I agreed. “I dreamt I was on board the SS Pioneer in the twenty eighth century.”

“Chuckle” said Francois Devine. “You’ll be attempting to use that as a primary source next.”

I gave him a hard look. I didn’t need to remind him that I was the first – and only – doctor of telehistory in the entire world (the universe so far as we knew) and as such I might be trusted to know the difference between a primary source, such as a memo or camera script that one might find in the written records archive, and an opiate fuelled dream I had after landing myself in hospital following some messy business or other that I wasn’t willing to talk about.

“When I am in possession of Lola Whitecastle’s entire collection of papers" he continued, "and write not only her autobiography but a series of well received papers on the production history of Adventures into Space, you will have to make do with scraps of paper I accidentally leave lying around communal areas of Brent Towers, internet hearsay and anything else that may come to you in – chuckle, my apologies – a dream.”

Francois Devine has a smug face at the best of times – he’s been asked to leave at least three funerals by grieving relatives who felt his face was insulting the memory of the deceased – but here he looked particularly pleased with himself. Ever since my stellar thesis earned me my doctorate (any discussion about buying titles on the internet having ended when I paid Francois Devine an ex gratia payment of two hundred pounds and agreed to fit a sushi restaurant style conveyor belt system between the kitchen and dining room) he’d been looking for a way to trump my achievements and clearly believed that Lola Whitecastle was his ticket to success. But he was up against a formidable foe. Namely, Doctor Dennis Brent.

“I hardly think Lola Whitecastle would choose to place her valuable archive – not to mention her reputation in print – to one such as yourself. You are, with all due respect, a pedestrian hack with no critical faculties and an inability to present even the simplest technical information with any degree of scholarship” I said wittily.

“Well you – Doctor Brent – clearly have no idea what you’re talking about. I am by far the better regarded telehistorian. My six volume series on rehearsal rooms was described by Doctor Who Vortext – sic – as ‘the final word on the subject’.”

“I think you’ll find that was their ecstatic comment about it being the last volume in the series rather than any compliment or statement of definitiveness.”

“Hurumph” he cursed. “You may well be misremembering events but I am not a vain man – unlike someone in this room (who I could mention) that has an entire wall of their home dedicated to positive press cuttings. This person that I won’t name was extremely cheesed off when someone else – identity never proven – accidentally covered them all with a small leaflet about bin collection that was pushed through the letter box. My credentials speak for themselves and do not require the popular press to speak for them.”

“Let’s hope Lola Whitecastle doesn’t read the popular press. That bit about you in the disgusting Nathan-Turner book which was satirised in cartoon form in the Daily Mirror would put anyone off hiring you or letting you touch their papers.”

“We agreed not to speak of that… book… until my solicitor had secured me an apology, a cash settlement and the dismissal of both the cartoonist and the editor responsible.”

At this point, Francois Devine’s voice had become raised owing to his lack of sensible emotional control, and a nurse came in to see what was going on.

“Are you two arguing again?” she demanded.

“No sister” I said honestly.

“No sister” added Francois Devine deceptively.

“I heard you both shouting at each other. Is that what caused your injuries? Did you have a barney?”

She pointed to my legs – encased in plaster, the only bit of my drug fuelled dream that was actually true – and Francois Devine’s arms – also encased in plaster from biceps to finger tips – and all but accused us of having inflicted the injuries during a common brawl.

“We are not responsible for these injuries” I began.

“No no – Dennis Brent is quite right – we are not to blame for my broken arms and Dennis Brent’s cosmetic fractures.”

“Then who is to blame?” asked the nurse.

I looked at Francois Devine and he looked back at me. Then we glanced over to the third bed in the room where Melba’s head was set in plaster like a bowling ball with holes for his eyes and a feeding straw. The matter was a confidential one but I felt sure the nurse was not intelligent enough to use the information either for her gain or to our detriment. As one we answered her question (Melba’s reply being very muffled but we’re fairly confident he said the same as we did).

“Lola Whitecastle” we exclaimed bitterly.

[SiHart]

Dammit! It's not one big crossover after all.

Or is it?