h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

U230968
A1078463
Friday, June 13, 2003 12:14:13
Here's a bit of fiction that fell out of my head. I kinda like the character's I've made and think I'll go somewhere with it. This is my first attempt at writing any fiction so I have no pride, ego or anything else that could be damaged by criticism.

Please feel free to contribute, reply, critique or ask questions. I'm going to keep this going based on what you out there say.

Josiah, Marta and the river
The river looked bad. Something upstream must have burst and leaked into the water. Josiah sipped his tea and watched the dull yellow mist rise from the surface. Sulphur? Chlorine? Who knows? There's so much stuff in that river he's ceased to be surprised at what he sees every day.
"Bit nasty today, eh Luv?"
Josiah turned and saw Marta pouring herself some tea from the pot and squinting through her glasses at the river.
"I don't suppose you'll enjoy yourself today," she said.
"Hm." said Josiah.
"'Hm.' he says. Sometimes I wonder if you ever learned to speak proper" said Marta shaking her head.
She shuffled out onto the porch and squinted at the river some more. Josiah looked at her out of the side of his eye. She must have been a stunner as a young woman. Josiah had no idea how old she really was and Marta wasn't telling. Not that Josiah asked much.
She was slightly bent and she rarely walked without her stick. Josiah had seen her skip from the dock to a dinghy as nimbly as a girl and suspected the stick was for show. Her hair was the most noticeable thing about her and the most striking. Brilliant silver waves of hair cascaded from her head to her waist. She often wore it up to keep it out of her way but when she slept, she let it down. She hadn't put it up yet this morning. Her face was wrinkled and pinched as if from squinting all the time. She seemed to do that a lot. Her glasses were thicker than any Josiah had ever seen and she often scrunched up her face to get a look at things.
How an old woman from what was England ended up here was beyond Josiah to fathom. She fished him out of the river 5 years before and he's been staying ever since.
"Big lad like you keeps the uglies off me doorstep. I suppose you'll have to stay, eh?" She had said when he finally woke up
"Hm." said Josiah.
The porch faced west to the river so they rarely saw the sun come up. That was a good thing. the sun, when visible, was an ugly thing in the morning. Ochre, red, sometimes purple but never in the colors that were pretty. Josiah remembered pretty sunrises. "Hm."
With the rise of the sun, the breeze picked up. It was from the northwest that morning. A good wind to clear the fumes. Josiah didn't go out when the wind was from the south. That wind brought up the bad air from the old navy base and made the river choppy. The mountains to the northwest were relatively clean and the air that came down off them was refreshing, especially in the hot season.

Marta's place as improved by Josiah.

Marta lived in the remnants of a brick house facing the river on what was once a military housing complex. Just behind the house is an old cofferdam for power and sewer access. 18 feet deep, it made a fine shelter for Marta when the winds blew in the radiation from the south. When Josiah was strong enough he began to improve it.

Josiah built a windmill generator and took batteries from all the old cars and machinery around the place. Tying that into the house gave them power they needed to run the water purifier, and some basic appliances.

Josiah took to the cofferdam right away. He Plugged up any holes and sealed the whole thing against groundwater intrusion. The then put in a forced air filtration system as it tended to get quite muggy and close in there after an hour or two. Marta was delighted that he could make one out of a few fans and 5 rolls of toilet paper. Strangely enough, toilet paper was in plentiful supply. There was an entire shed of it that had been untouched. He wired in an electric light and installed a periscope to be able to survey the outside.

One of Josiah's biggest finds was a bunch of Dosimeters in their original packing and a geiger counter. He kept the geiger counter in the house to let him and Marta know when it was time to go to the shelter. When going into the shelter, he put the geiger counter on battery power and set it in front of the periscope so they could tell when it was safe to go outside. Marta had suggested a piece of string on a stick to enable them to see when the wind shifted and Josiah installed a windsock he found at an old helipad on a pole next to the house. They could see it very well from the shelter periscope and from the house. Josiah, kept a wrapped dosimeter with him whenever he went out on the river or ventured far from the house. He would unwrap it and wear it when the wind looked like it was going to shift or if he was exploring around some "Hot" sites.

In the cofferdam was a crack in the concrete at foot level. Josiah opened it and found that the soil at that level, about 20 feet down, was not irradiated and hadn't been soaked by toxic groundwater. Josiah expanded that area about 15 feet in, and widened it, He then re-parged the walls and ceiling with concrete. All the soil from the dig was used to make grow beds. He and Marta were able to grow vegetables in the shelter without them becoming poisonous.

Captain America (Goser, The Priest of the New Truth)

The sound of footsteps on the path drew Josiah's attention. Coming along the narrow berm of dirt that hadn't been flooded by the river was a scrawny and nervous man. His bald pate was decorated with intricate designs that appeared to be made with permanent marker. He wore an old American flag like a poncho folded over with a hole cut for the head and a mismatched pair of loafers. He called himself Goser, The Priest of the New Truth but Josiah's name for him was Captain America because he always wore the flag poncho.
Captain America was one of the only people who lived nearby who managed to avoid being killed by the uglies. Marta thought the Uglies were afraid of him because he was so crazy.
"Child of the truth, Goser greets you and blesses you with the vision of the truth!" he said as he approached the gate. He waved a bent spatula in the air as if giving a benediction to the house and all in it and finished by looking at Josiah throught the slats of the spatula and whispering, "Truth in my eye, truth in your mind!"

Hi there,

I'm going to set up these three postings as a single entry and link to it (them) in the June19th issue of CAC in .


~jwf~

It is a little confusing that A1078463 has the first one with a posting below it containing the third installment from here but not the second...

Perhaps you could click on the 'edit page' button of A1078463 and add the other two installments yourself in the proper order. I'm just not sure I've got it all straight. And then I can link to your copy and you will still have editorial control over it and be able to add more as you suggested in the opening.

Let me know. I'll cobble it together as best I can if I haven't heard from you in a day or two because I'm facing a deadline Monday.


~jwf~

Ok,

I was worried the entry would be too long. the order doesn't matter as, at this point, they are not connected.

All is set in one entry.

Thanks!

-maddog

I have linked to your entry A1078463.

~jwf~