Whatever Next....

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Here is the next entry in the modestly anticipated series called... Well I never actually came up with a catchy name for it. Anyway, if you need to see the rules or any explanation, see May I Conduct an Experiment?. The series will be ten episodes long, so bear that in mind with plot development and such. The entries referenced in this episode come up as linked entries wherever your skin usually puts them, and the Post Team have included the next five entries to be used to continue this story at the end. The first person to follow up by adding their name will take on responsibility for the next episode.

Please keep up the challenge of...

Whatever Next...

Episode Six

'Professor Garbinstein? I think they might be on to us.'

'Oh Craig, my boy, don't talk such utter poppycock. You've always been convinced that THEY might rumble us, and misrepresent our valuable work to a gullible and puerile audience. I refuse to countenance such a fate. I mean, my good fellow, we've taken all precautions, what? Didn't you assure me that the camerascope was cunningly concealed within some of the structural gubbins of the gymnasium? Wizardry in its own way, don't you think!'

'Professor, we've lost the pictures - I've just been checking from my blackberry. I think someone's found the camera. And I have a hunch who it might be, too.'

'Your blackberry? Don't tell me you've managed to hide one of your electronic devices inside a piece of fruit now! Why, dear boy that's dashed ingenious!'

Craig shook his head and stifled a snort. He was working on his evil laugh, but it wasn't quite perfected just yet.

'Look, I'll contact you later, when I've found out a bit more info.'

Craig pressed the off key and sighed deeply, leaning back in the driving seat of his car, where he'd escaped to make the phone call. His boss was in some ways frighteningly intelligent, but in others disappointingly naive. Let's get real for a minute, it was going to be down to muggins here to carry on this task. It felt a bit like having to push a snowball up hill, with the end prospect consisting of nothing more enjoyable than damp shoes and numb fingertips, and a forlorn looking carrot lying in a puddle. Shit. He reached into the glove compartment of the Porsche for his bar of Emergency Chocolate, only to find that all that remained of it was a scrunched-up piece of purple foil paper. Double shit. At the back of the compartment his fingers found a shiny gold coin, with the image of a young woman on it. He clasped his fingers around it and closed his eyes.

His mind went back 10 summers, to the Bucyrus Bratwurst festival, where he'd first met the decrepit and distinctly out-of-place old academic. Garbinstein had been giving a guest lecture at Ohio State University on the significance of the American Primary system of elections in 20th century Eastern Europe, and had somehow found himself being dragged along to the fair by his hosts to experience a bit of local color (sic). Craig had been earning a few extra dollars at the fair, tending a stand serving steaming mettwurst in buns, cooked on a swinging broiler suspended over red-hot charcoal. The greasy smell of roasting flesh curled through the crowd, just like in the Bisto ad, and drooling customers stood three deep around the stand. He'd stood up straight to wipe the sweat from his brow when he'd spotted the fetching young woman who'd been crowned this year's Bratwurst Queen. She'd tossed her long brown curls over her bare and freckled shoulder as she looked in his direction and his world stuttered into slo-MO as she waved regally. He'd noticed that she'd caught the attention of the doddery old professor too, to the extent that the catsup and mustard from his hot-dog were dripping onto his tweed jacket - Craig had reached him a napkin before following his gaze. It seemed to hone in with laser-like precision to an unusually shaped birth-mark on the young woman's torso.

Garbinstein had offered to buy Craig a beer, to thank him for saving his best jacket - the only one he'd brought with him for the lecture tour. Over a couple of cold frosty ones they'd enjoyed a rather varied conversation, encompassing how scandals led to missed opportunities in politics , the decline in moral standards, and the search for eternal youth. 'The company of youthful intellect halts the decay of the elderly mind!' Garbinstein had quoted as they clinked beer mugs, before they reached the subject of Craig's fledgling medical career, and how difficult it was going to be to advance it on a sausage seller's meagre wages. There was something about the older man's intensity and passion that hypnotised Craig, and he agreed to have dinner with him that evening. Over grilled lobster Craig had flirted in his usual fashion with the waitress, and his elderly companion had taken an unusually keen interest in the fact that Craig had managed to wheedle her phone number out of her before they'd ordered dessert. Apple pie, he remembered, the filling so hot it had blistered the roof of his mouth. A symbiotic relationship, Garbinstein had said over coffee, fixing him with a piercing gaze, before making him a clichéd un-refusable offer.

A week later, Craig had managed to track down Mary-Jo, the beaming Bratwurst Queen, and use his well-practised and chillingly effective charm to entice her to his flat. The papers naturally picked up on her mysterious disappearance the next day, but by then Craig was on a plane to Heathrow, his fitful dreams punctuated by birthmarks shaped like cats, and fingers running through silky brown hair, while his right hand clenched a gold coin bearing the image of a Bratwurst Queen. The story fizzled out over the following months, consigned to the recycling pile like so many before it and since.

He'd been horrified at first by what Garbinstein was hoping to achieve, but the temptation of running his own set of clinics, seeing his name in lights and in respected science journals - well, that would show his know-nothing bozos of high school teachers, wouldn't it! Now, he accepted that he was in too deep - there was no way to free himself from the putrid web of nastiness that had accreted about him, though he clung to any small remaining semblance of normality in his daily life. The influence and power wielded by Garbinstein and his mysterious coterie was strong, and he was petrified of what gruesome fate might await him should he baulk at the tasks he was assigned. No, much easier to quash any misgivings, rationalise the greater good they were working towards, savour the pleasant parts, and dream of how future generations would revere him. No way was he going to end up as a dodgy entry awaiting citations on Wiki-bloomin-pedia, that's for sure! A full page New York Times obit, with photo, that's what he'd expect, when the time came.

He dragged his thoughts back to the present, and threw the coin back into the glove compartment, snapping it shut with grim determination. Lisa, he'd have to continue to work on her. He thought he'd seen a certain something in her eyes when she smiled at him, and he knew it was time for him to turn his charm-offensive up a notch. He made his way back into the party, now buzzing with chatter and jostling with jovial guests. Where was that darned girl - she couldn't still be in the rest-room! Mention of cosmetic surgery usually got the full, undivided attention of ladies - thank f*** for the inate vanity of the female of the species - there was always some little perceived flaw that they'd agonise over and wish didn't exist. He remembered the delicious thrill he'd felt when he'd spotted Lisa's third nipple while studying the camera downloads in detail. He couldn't resist a sly sideways smirk as he reflected on the perks of this job - all those soapy young bodies in zoomable, freeze-framable, digital format - he'd have preferred glorious Technicolor to the grainy black and white, but still...he was here in her flat wasn't he? He scanned the room to locate the bookcase in the corner, walked purposefully over to it, and began perusing the titles.

The usual suspects were there - Men are from Mars, What Not to Wear, The Da Vinci Code, as well as a good selection of French literature: Victor Hugo, Simone de Beauvoir, Marquis de Sade, The Story of O...his left eyebrow involuntarily raised and he breathed in sharply, as he pulled out the well-worn copy and allowed himself a momentary fantasy, a frisson of anticipation knotting his stomach. As he replaced the book, which had been disappointingly full of academic notes in the margins, he dislodged a weighty Guide to National Trust properties in the UK from the bottom shelf. It fell open at a picture of Plas Newydd, Angelsey, and he found himself drawn enviously to the peace and tranquillity of the castle and its serene watery setting. He knelt down, and his fingers gently stroked the silky smooth photo page as he traced the outline of the ancient building.

'Beautiful, isn't it?' said a voice behind him. He recognised the vanilla-laden scent of Angel, before turning to find himself looking up into Lisa's clear blue eyes.

'Quite stunning, I'd say', he replied, not taking his gaze off hers as he rose to his feet. And then he smiled, slowly, carefully, revealing a row of expertly polished white teeth.

His voice was a breathy whisper as he continued, 'Quite, quite stunning'.





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