Well, Stories from Spook is BACK! Lots of stuff packed in to this weeks column. Firstly, there is a space for you to type in your own personal stories. I will then put them in my column as a guest story. But don't worry. None of your stories will be put in the post without your permission. If you submit a story I think would be good to go in my column, then I will ask you if I can use it using the conversation forum on your home page.

Then, I have a new section called 'Tales from the CYBERHUMAN'. Part 1 of his story 'Doctor Who: The Cyber-virus' appears there.

After that there are 4 Story Jokes. I just love jokes.

Then, following these is a 'Story Review'. Since this is the first, I thought I'd start of with the hilarious 'The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy'.

This is followed by another first. 'Spook's Horror Stories'. This is the first part of 'The Obvious Crime'.

Then, to finish of, there is 'The End of Space'. Since it has been so long since the last chapter, I have the whole story so far as well as an extra chapter.

I hope you all enjoy this week's issue of 'Stories from Spook'.

Guest Stories

Type your stories in the box below.

Tales from the CYBERHUMAN

The little planet resembled the moon as its broad sweeping plains were dry, scarred, ravaged. Here and there were deep crater marks and crevasses that ate into the rocky crust. Nothing grew, nothing lived. The air was foggy, clouded and choked by carbon dioxide.

However, despite this oxygen-less atmosphere, humans lived on this dry and barren world. Sheltered from the suffocating air and dust-filled ground by large habitation domes - each several miles across and containing a vast network of water pipes that counteracted the lack of water in the soil - humans went about doing the same kind of jobs as on Earth.

Chief Scientific Researcher Krail stood admiring the habitation dome where he lived and worked. He was a tall, lean man who wore the typical black leather uniform of all the scientists on this planet. He had a stern, sergeant-majorish face with cold dark eyes, flattened nose, thin lips curled in constant suspicion, and a bull neck that sloped down into massive shoulders and a bloated belly. His arms and legs were fat and bulky.

'Ah, this time torrow,' Krail thought to himself, 'a new era shall be born. We shall become invincible.'

He passed through several induvidual laboratories in the dome, where scientists like himself sat working away on complex bits of metal and plastic. Electrical wires were plugged in by technicians who wore the radiation-proof dull grey suits of Earth technicians.

As he passed through the intricate web of laboratories, Krail stopped by a number of upright coffin-shaped alcolves with computer-controlled surgical instruments attached by wires snaking out of it. In the second alcolve, a single person in a flowing brown robe stood motionless, his eyes closed, seemingly asleep.

'Cryogenic suspension,' Krail told himself.

As he watched, a computerized scalpel dropped down and sunk itself into the person's arm. The person made no reaction. As the blade cut deeper and deeper, slicing the person's arm from his shoulder, Krail moved forward and parted the dark robe. A steel leg glinted in the fierce light, and as the robe folded back on itself it was revealed that the person's body was half-plastic, half-steel!

Gently stroking the metal and plastic chest, Krail spoke softly to the person, even though he knew that the person could not hear him.

'A new era...a new era. You my friend, like many others of us, will become one of the Cybermen. The perfect invincible race.' As he left the alcolves, a steel arm with fully hinged wrist, fingers and elbow dropped down and began attaching itself to the person's blood-less stump of a shoulder.

The TARDIS Cloister Bell issued a low, throbbing chant through the multi-roomed interior of the time machine, which had the exterior of a blue police box. Its deep booming signal reached the ears of a very concerned Doctor.

The Doctor was a short, scruffy man with comical features and a heavily-lined face. He wore a brown jacket, question-marked pullover, green check trousers. A pork pie hat was jammed haphazardly on his wispy brown hair. He paced around the hexagonal control console with heavy suspicions.

A girl entered the control room, brushing her baggy black leather coat which was littered with badges and logos. She had a pretty face with long brown hair dangling on her shoulders. Her name was Ace. She noticed the Doctor's face frowning in thought.

She had also noticed the head-aching persistant droning coming from somewhere, which annoyed her tremendously. 'What's that noise, Doctor?' she said agitatedly.

'The Cloister Bell. It's a type of emergency alarm,' the Doctor replied. 'It means...'

Ace guessed what he was going to say. 'It means that trouble's just around the corner.'

The Doctor nodded.

Back on the little planet, Senior Technician Astrak was monitoring the person's completed cybernetic transformation. As she catalogued his cybernetic procedure on her computer, the person entered.

This was one of the first Cybermen. Over seven foot tall, with a silvery plastic tunic covering his half-plastic, half-metal body, he walked on stiff steel legs and only swung his metallic arms because his still-human hands were pendula. A heavy lamp device was fixed to his head. A grey cloth mask covered his face - made terrifying by its black eyeholes, no nose and constantly open mouth - and a flashing control module was attached to his chest. Soon, every other person on this planet would be just like him.

'Ah, there you are B'Lok,' Astrak said without looking up.

His voice was strangely disjointed and high-pitched, like a human voice filtered through some mechanical means. 'I am to under...stand that Krail... is to be cybernetically altered also.'

'Yes. He will be one of the last to be altered. He is our great Cyberleader.'

B'Lok was unhappy, which was unusual for him as his human brain had been replaced by a computer. He wasn't supposed to have emotional feelings - he was supposed to think purely by logic and understand that he was just one of many Cybermen who obeyed their leader without question.

But B'Lok and Krail were old enemies.

Astrak couldn't remember why. She just knew that whatever Krail or B'Lok achieved, one would try to ruin it for the other. It had been like that for years. Krail had only become Chief Scientific Researcher by sending B'Lok on a three-week long science programme.

'Krail can...not be our leader. He lacks leadership...skills. I should...be leader,' B'Lok droned.

'Well, maybe he won't, maybe I'm only guessin,' Astrak said uneasily. 'Just think nothing of it. Your not supposed to think anything illogical.'

But even as she spoke, a tiny part of B'Lok's still-human brain which hadn't been computerized began plotting a scheme of revenge.

The Doctor was dashing round and round the console, frantically stabbing buttons, whacking switches on and hammering in-put keys in desperation.

Since Ace had realised the function and the importance of the Cloister Bell, things had got worse. The TARDIS had repeatadly spun wildly out of control, the control console had played dead, and the Doctor kept on muttering something about the power of the TARDIS being drained away.

'Doctor, wha...what's going on?' Ace murmured.

Still dashing around like a mouse trapped in a cage, the Doctor answered, 'The power of the TARDIS is being removed by some hostile force.' He paused, catching his breath and thinking hard. 'Whatever it is, it is very big and very dangerous. I've got to trace its source. Otherwise the TARDIS might end up with absolutely no power at all.'

Tapping more in-put keys, he didn't notice Ace's shocked look when he mentioned the TARDIS losing complete power. But he looked up at her, and a cheery grin creased his cheeks.

'Don't worry, Ace. We can survive for quite a while yet. Ah!'

A scanner screen on the far wall of the control room opened its shutter, revealing the blackness of space. A second later a huge planet emerged: grey and rocky, with crater-marks appearing on its rough surface. Ace saw the Doctor's face narrow in concern. She had seen that look before. It meant something bad.

'It's the moon,' she said spiritedly, feeling a good deal more afraid than she wanted to feel.

The Doctor's concerned face crumpled into sudden hatred. 'That's no moon, that's Mondas. Planet of the Cybermen.'

Story Jokes

An engineer, a physicist, and a lawyer were being interviewed for a position as chief executive officer of a large corporation. The engineer was interviewed first, and was asked a long list of questions, ending with "How much is two plus two?"
The engineer excused himself, and made a series of measurements and calculations before returning to the board room and announcing, "Four."

The physicist was next interviewed, and was asked the same questions. Again, the last question was, "How much is two plus two?"
Before answering the last question, he excused himself, made for the library, and did a great deal of research. After a consultation with the United States Bureau of Standards and many calculations, he also announced, "Four."

The lawyer was interviewed last, and again the final question was, "How much is two plus two?"
The lawyer drew all the shades in the room, looked outside to see if anyone was there, checked the telephone for listening devices, and then whispered, "How much do you want it to be?"

It was the final examination for an introductory Biology course at the local university. Like many such freshman courses, it was designed to weed out new students, having over 500 students in the class!

The examination was two hours long, and exam booklets were provided. The professor was very strict and told the class that any exam that was not on his desk in exactly two hours would not be accepted and the student would fail. Half of an hour into the exam, a student came rushing in and asked the professor for an exam booklet.

"You're not going to have time to finish this," the professor stated sarcastically as he handed the student a booklet.

"Yes I will," replied the student. He then took a seat and began writing.

After two hours, the professor called for the exams, and the students filed up and handed them in. All except the late student, who continued writing. An hour later, the last student came up to the professor who was sitting at his desk preparing for his next class. He attempted to put his exam on the stack of exam booklets already there.

"No you don't, I'm not going to accept that. It's late."

The student looked incredulous and angry.

"Do you know who I am?"

"No, as a matter of fact I don't," replied the professor with an air of sarcasm in his voice.

"Do you know who I am?" the student asked again in a louder voice.

"No, and I don't care." replied the professor with an air of superiority.

"Good," replied the student, who quickly lifted the stack of completed exams, stuffed his in the middle, and walked out of the room.

A professor stood before his class of twenty senior organic biology students, about to hand out the final exam.

"I want to say that it's been a pleasure teaching you this semester. I know you've all worked extremely hard and many of you are off to medical school after summer. So that no one gets their GPA messed up because they might have been celebrating a bit too much this week, anyone who would like to opt out of the final exam today will receive a 'B' for the course."

There was much rejoicing in the class as students got up, walked to the front of the class, and took the professor up on his offer. As the last taker left the room, the professor looked out over the handful of remaining students and asked, "Anyone else? This is your last chance." One final student rose up and opted out of the final.

The professor closed the door and took attendance of those students remaining. "I'm glad to see you believe in yourself," he said. "You all get 'A's."

The phone rings at FBI headquarters. "Hello?"

"I'm calling to report my neighbour.
He is hiding marijuana inside his firewood."

"Thank you very much for the call, sir."

The next day, FBI agents descend on the neighbour's house.
They search the shed where the firewood is kept.

Using axes, they bust open every piece of wood, but find no marijuana.

They swear at the neighbours and leave.

The phone rings at the neighbours house.
"Hey, Adrian, did the FBI come?"

"Yep."

"Did they chop your firewood?"

"Yep."

"Great, now it's your turn to call. I need my garden plowed."

Story Review

TITLE: The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy

AUTHOR: Douglas Adams

'42! Forty Two! FORTY TWO!' It is almost impossible to imagine that one number could be the answer to life, the universe, and everything. But it came to one man. His name was Douglas Adams, and he wrote about it, in this book.

Arthur Dent! Do you know anyone called Arthur Dent? The one man in the universe who avoids the destruction of the Earth to make way for a new hyperspace bypass is called Arthur Dent!

The story follows Arthur Dent on his wild trips aroung the universe. From the very beginning, the book is funny. It isn't a story that is full of jokes, but actually is a story that is seriously funny. There is no other way to explain it. I mean, how many writers would write about a robot that has the brain the size of a planet, and is depressed. It's hilarious. And then there is Ford Prefect. Douglas Adams is a genious. He puts an alien in his story that decides to choose his name to be the name of a car. Amazing.

This story, I can truthfully say, is the best story I've read in my life. Science fiction is usually serious and the science involved is usually imaginative, but mainly a prediction of what the future could be like. But this isn't.

This story, and the others that follow it are never meant to be taken seriously. From the very beginning of the story, it is funny. The main thing that catches your attention is the mentioning of digital watches. Here are the first few paragraphs of the story:

"Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small unregarded yellow sun.

"Orbiting this at a distance of roughly ninety-two million miles is an utterly insignifican little blue green planet whose ape-descended life forms are so amazingly primitive that they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea.

The planet has - or rather had - a problem, which was this: most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movements of small green pieces of paper, which is odd because on the whole it wasn't the small pieces of paper that were unhappy.

And so the problem remained; lots of people were mean and most of them were miserable, even the ones with digital watches."

Douglas Adams writes a brilliant science fiction story while making it funny. It is this mixture of science fiction and comedy that makes this a success.

Spook's Horror Stories

These are the five suspects. Any ideas who killed the two brothers?
The investigation begins, next week.

The spaceship Bravado got nearer and nearer to the edge of space. The captain, Captain Jim Jiggle looked out of his window. He could see nothing, as there was nothing to see. He was at the edge of everything. At the edge, of the place of no return. The reason the spaceship Bravado was at the edge of space was because the whole crew wanted to escape the existing space. Here is the crew of the spaceship Bravado and the reasons why they want to escape the space:

Captain Jim Jiggle: Is allergic to the most popular food in space - PIZZA. Hopes that beyond space there is a place that hates, PIZZA.

Science Officer John Smith: Fed up of people everywhere saying 'Is that really your name?'. Hopes that beyond space there is a place where the name John Smith has never been heard before, and he will be UNIQUE.

GORDAN: A ROBOT. Has a secret agenda that will become obvious as the story develops.

That is the crew of the spaceship Bravado. This small crew stole this spaceship when Captain Jim Jiggle, who was a real captain before this incident, declared it as a health risk. What they don't know is that there is a stowaway on board their stolen spaceship. This stowaway will be revealed later in the story.

At this moment in time, the spaceship Bravado is on the edge of space, and right next to the last planet in space. This planet is called NEW EARTH. It has the largest military force in space, and it has been informed that the stolen spaceship Bravado is in their area. This isn't the first time that they've had to deal with people escaping from space, but not even they could predict what was going to happen, NEXT!

New Earth has ¾ of its surface covered with military installations containing more starfighters then anyone can count. The other ¼ of the planet is covered by water, where there are secret underwater military forces that collect information and spy on the rest of space. They used their surveillance techniques to track the spaceship Bravado from the moment it was stolen to the present time.

It was raining on New Earth. Raining. Not your basis rain, that splashes on the ground and causes small puddles in the road, but heavy rain. Rain that causes the sea to get too large and cover the land. Torrential rain.

The Land was flooded. Water was everywhere. In fact, you couldn’t move without getting your socks wet. The reason for this is unknown to the people of New Earth. However, this does not in any way effect the military action being taken against the spaceship Bravado. Right at this very moment, 5000 starfighters have been sent to intercept and destroy the spaceship Bravado.

Captain Jim Jiggle looked out the window. To be exact, he is still looking out his window. He was once a young, fit, muscular man, but not anymore. His muscle has been replace with fat and his youth has been replaced with old age. He isn’t a plump man, he just isn’t thin. He has short, dark, brown hair and blue eyes. At this very moment he is doing what he has been doing for the last half-hour; enjoying the nothingness. Most people wouldn’t enjoy this, but if the whole of ‘The Best Fast Food Directory’, ‘The Best Food Directory’, ‘The Most Popular Foods in Space Directory’, ‘The Yellow Pages of Space’, and ‘Space is just One Large Pizza Made by Pizza Bar’ are full of nothing but Pizza and telephone numbers you should phone if you want Pizza, and if you didn’t like Pizza, then you’d enjoy nothing too.

Gordan scrubbed his back. He was in the shower scrubbing his back. Only he knows the reason why, although it is probably because his back was dirty. Still, the reason a ROBOT is having a shower is unknown. His name is also a mystery. His name was supposed to be GORDON, but because of a typing error when he was created, his very, very tiny name tag, which is imprinted onto the microchip that powers him, reads GORDAN. There are a lot of strange things about this special machine.

Science Officer John Smith was in his cabin, reading some old, tatty comics. He loved comics. He had them all. ‘The Aliens of Delta 3’, ‘The Dinosaurs that Left Earth and went to Delta 3’, and even ‘The Aliens of Delta 3 Versus The Dinosaurs that Left Earth and went to Delta 3’. The only comic in known space that he doesn’t have is ‘The Aliens of Delta 3 Team Up With The Dinosaurs that Left Earth and went to Delta 3 Versus Delta 3’s own, John Smith’. He used to have it, but once he’d had enough of Space he wanted to get rid of anything that he had that read John Smith. So he burnt it. Of course, if he had tried to sell it he would have made 3, 642, 784, 265, 573, 683, 658, 214, 951, 465, 001 Krutons, which is equal to 1392 Billion Pounds. A Billion as in 1 million multiplied by 1 thousand. He could have then used his money to buy the spaceship Bravado and then there would not be any opposition to them leaving.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! The 5000 starfighters fired their weapons. Of course, you wouldn't normally hear this sound, as sound cannot travel in space. However, each lazer, phazer, pistol, revolver, bomb, nuclear bomb, torpedo, photon torpedo, nuclear torpedo, nuclear photon torpedo, quantum torpedo, quantum photon torpedo, quantum nuclear photon torpedo, and any other weapon on the 5000 starfighters, contain a radio that sends out the BOOM! sound every time it is fired. This doesn't matter outside space as sound travels normally.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! They wouldn’t stop their onslaught for anything. BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! The weapons fired at an incredible rate. BOOM! BOOM! BO- The spaceship Bravado, and the 5000 starfighters, were no more.

In one small room, in one small house, in one small country, on one small planet, in one small solar system, in one small galaxy, in one small universe, on one extremely large fabric of space, someone very, very meaningless to the rest of space, told a joke. A blonde joke to be exact. This is it:

Q: What's the difference between a blonde and a 747?


A: Not everyone has been in a 747.

Between the sound of laughter, the small voice of an unbelievably blonde small girl echoed throughout the room.

“HOW RUDE!” was the sarcastic comment that came from the small mouth, of an unbelievably blonde small girl, in a small room, in a small house, in a small country, on a small planet, in a small solar system, in a small galaxy, in a small universe, on an extremely large fabric of space. This comment on the joke, that was said by someone who is absolutely meaningless to the rest of space, was not meaningless, and had a significant effect on a spaceship far, far away from the almost totally meaningless planet, of EARTH.

The spaceship Bravado, registration WAAABOB was very far away from this planet. WAAABOB stood for ‘We Are All Absolutely Brilliant On Boats’. Once the spaceship Bravado was stolen, the amazing Captain Jim Jiggle changed the registration to WLOACJJ, which stood for ‘We Love Our Amazing Captain Jim Jiggle’, so that nobody would recognise their spaceship as the stolen spaceship Bravado. However, as a practical joke Gordan, who should NOT have a sense of humour, changed the registration back to WAAABOB. This time however, it stood for ‘We Are All A Bunch Of B******s’. This of course immediately gave their spaceship away as the stolen spaceship Bravado. Was this a secret attack from Gordan against the rest of the crew, or was this really just a practical joke?

‘PIZZA!’ The sound of this made Captain Jim Jiggle immediately jump under his desk, take of his trousers, take of his white pants, which now had an unmistakable brown mark over them, put his trousers back on, put his white pants on a stick, and hold them up screaming ‘I surrender, I surrender!’ What Captain Jim Jiggle didn’t realise was that the sound came from the intercom so there was no point for him to have held his white and brown pants up screaming at absolutely nobody except Gordan. Gordan had been there all along. He had watched what Jim Jiggle had done, and had made a note that Jim Jiggle had got extremely small private parts. This didn’t matter however, as Jim Jiggle would never use them anyway.

‘PIZZA!’ The message was repeated and, as before, Jim Jiggle immediately jumped under his desk, took of his white trousers, which were now brown trousers, put them on a stick and started screaming at Gordan again. This time, Gordan made a note that Jim Jiggle’s private parts had got smaller. He immediately made the deduction that Jim Jiggle did this thing a lot, and that his private parts got smaller each time he did it. He was of course, wrong. The real reason was that Jim Jiggle’s private parts had always been small, they were just smaller this time because Science Officer John Smith had just walked in and was looking at them at this very moment. The reason for this is unknown

Science Officer John Smith answered the intercom. ’Hello Power In Zup Zup Army, how are you today?’ A woman appeared on the screen. A hot, beautiful, tall, large breasted blonde was right in front of Jim Jiggle’s eyes. The woman was naked, and was not on the screen but on the ship. She was a stowawy. John Smith quickly grabbed a blanket and tried to cover her with it, but she wouldn't let him. She acted primitive and kept repeating the word 'Pure!' As John Smith fought with the naked blonde, Jim Jiggle was more interested with the woman on the screen.

The woman who was on the screen was not naked. She was fat and extremely ugly. However, like the John Smith, she also looked at Jim Jiggle’s private parts. In fact, the first thing she said once she had appeared on the screen was ‘Hey small dick, is this ship stolen?’
Captain Jim Jiggle was in shock after this comment, and replied with the answer, ’No!’
‘Oh,’ replied the ugly woman and stopped the sound attack on the spaceship Bravado in mid-BOOM! As mentioned earlier each weapon on the starfighters contains a radio that gives out the BOOM sound to opposing ships. What wasn’t mentioned was that the weapons didn’t contain any ammo, and since the spaceship Bravado’s radio was broken they felt and heard absolutely nothing.

It was at the point that the effects of ‘HOW RUDE!’ took place on the spaceship Bravado. At the exact same time that the 5000 starfighters stopped BOOMING a large sound and vision bubble covered the spaceship Bravado and 4999 starfighters. One of the starfighters, the one with the women that Jim Jiggle loved in it, was destroyed. Jim Jiggle didn’t care however, as he didn’t care who died as long as it wasn’t him, so he put on the shields that stop a sound and vision bubble destroying you. Then, the whole crew was knocked out.

When the crew woke up, they found themselves in totally different places. The reason for this is unknown.

John Smith and the naked blonde's location is unknown.

Jim Jiggle found himself in his own bed doing nothing. After about half an hour of this he got bored and had a shower. Gordan watched.

Earth is a blue and green planet that is in a solar system somewhere. It is mainly blue. There are blue seas, blue skies, blue policemen, blue cars, blue towels, blue toothbrushes, blue pencils and blue shirts. What is so weird about this is that God hates blue. Not many people realise this, but the reason Earth has so many wars and is full of pollution and everything is because God can’t stand the place. The only reason that God made most of the planet blue is because that was Adam’s favourite colour. When Eve was created, her favourite colour was green so God made some of the world green for her. Later on, God made a last ditch attempt to the people of Earth to change their favourite colour by sending his son Jesus Christ to tell everyone what his favourite colour was. Unfortunately, before he could tell anyone what God’s favourite colour was, they crucified him. So, God and his son left Earth forever, but not, however, without leaving their messenger, the Holy Spirit, to inform them of what was happening.
This has absolutely nothing to do with this story.

The fire burned brightly over the ship, and engulfed it. As the ship burned away into nothingness, the fire moved on.

"That's another one gone." said John Smith as he watched the destruction around him.

"PURE!" screamed the blonde as she saw the destruction around her.

"You know it's your fault, don't you?" asked Jim Jiggle as the fire moved on once more.

"Yes, I do." was the reply that came from John Smith.

The crew of the spaceship do not know it, but they are no longer in space. They are in the space bubble that surrounded them, and this space bubble took them out of space and into the unknown. In this unknown, they have no chance to survive. the fire will, eventually reach them, and they will be destroyed!

Chapter 4 next week...

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