Mown clenched his little fists and stood his ground. 'Firstly, the dust filter must be broken in here, Prostetnic, because my pores are filling up. Secondly, I meant this is not right as in it is not by the book.'

Jeltz's wattle wobbled. 'Not by the book, you say? Not by the...' He swivelled towards the com post. 'Record this, would you? I may have to explain the execution to his mother.'

Mown forged ahead with his explanation, as his only other option was to lie down and sob for the state of his race. 'Our order was to eliminate all Earthlings.'

'I do hope your argument improves, because so far...'

'These people bought a planet from the Magratheans.'

'Ah. I see where you're going, but the Galactic Government does not govern the Magratheans. They have their own little republic which is a terrible example for the colonies, if you ask me.'

'You are correct, Prostetnic. Of course, you are, but the Magratheans are a registered business with the government. They have a trade agreement.'

'I suppose.'

Mown ran to the nearest consol, neglecting to mask his agility. 'Look!' he said, quickly pulling up the planning application from the new worlds' office in Megabrantis. 'Nano's planet status has been approved by central planning.'

'It is difficult for a Vogon to find paperwork irritating, Twinkletoes,' said Jeltz drily. 'But I confess that unless you arrive at a point soon...'

'Point on the horizon, Prostetnic. The central planning office approved Nano as a tax-paying member planet of the planetary union, as governed by the Galactic Government.'

'Are you just saying the same thing in a different way? Is that why I sent you to university?' Jeltz picked up a microphone and shouted into the PA. 'We still need to eliminate the Earthlings.'

'Look down here, the last paragraph. Megabrantis, as a matter of routine, also blanket approved the citizenship applications of the planet's owners.' Mown felt his swelling subside, and steam drifted in wisps from his pores, whistling gently. He was talking law now, and no Vogon would argue with the word of law. 'Legally, the Earthlings are no longer Earthlings: they are Nano-ites. Or maybe Nanoshians or Nanolings? I'm not sure. But I am sure that if you zap these people, you zap a nice group of high-band taxpayers who have never filed a return. Imagine, By-The-Book Jeltz frying citizens who owe back tax. Wouldn't Hoopz the Runaround, your old Hall of Kroompst Kroompst buddy, love to hear about that?' buddy, love to hear about that?'

At this point Mown's own supply of kroompst kroompst was completely exhausted and he stumbled backward into the monitors, his body temperature sending a rainbow arc flashing along the thermo-reactive gas screens. was completely exhausted and he stumbled backward into the monitors, his body temperature sending a rainbow arc flashing along the thermo-reactive gas screens.

'Wow,' said Jeltz, and it was not a word he used lightly or often. He winched himself out of his chair and allowed his abdominous torso to lug him forward. 'Constant Mown. You have scuppered this mission.' The Prostetnic loomed above his remarkable son, casting an amorphous shadow on Mown's olive, pale face.

'I did what had to be done.'

Jeltz reached out his hand, though this was more for the gesture than the actual practicality of grabbing on to it, as he may as well have tried to hang on to a rubber glove full of dairy-based spread. 'You have seen the truth of the word. And through the word comes order. Stand, my son. Come stand at my elbow.'

Mown, who was expecting to be a splat sc.r.a.per on the next hull detail, stood on wobbly legs and coughed up a quart of fluid and two of the symbiotic hairless flaybooz that all Vogons carry around in their bile sacs to break down concretions.

'Oh, no. Poor Hanky and Spanky.'

Jeltz brushed the sopping b.a.l.l.s aside with the side of his foot. 'Forget those parasites. We have millions in the waste recyclers.'

He activated a bungee pulley from the bridge ceiling, one of several set into the gantry for just such Vogon falling-over emergencies. Mown still had the spark of craft left in him to pretend he needed it and hoisted himself erect.

'Turgid would have been all over this,' Jeltz confided to his son. 'I wouldn't be at all surprised if he's monitoring communications back in Megabrantis, waiting for me to make a boghog's ear of this mission. There's nothing worse than obliterating...'

'The wrong people?' offered Mown.

Jeltz chuckled wetly at his subordinate's little joke. 'The wrong taxpayers taxpayers, Constant. You need to watch that sense of humour other crew members don't have as many levels as we do. Your sarcasms could be mistaken for actual sympathizings.'

'Oh,' said Mown, a handy non-committal syllable to have around when you haven't the first clue as to what you are feeling.

Jeltz plopped backward into his seat. 'Old Turgid was expecting me to arrive back at base with a big bagful of c.o.c.k-up. Instead, thanks to you, we return heroes, with a G.o.d's scalp under our belts and a heads-up for the tax office.'

'Everyone wins... except Thor.'

'What did I tell you, son?'

'No... em... jokes.'

'Precisely. Now squeeze on to this chair beside me and we shall enjoy the false hope of hypers.p.a.ce together.'

Mown's head spun and his hands shook. He had come to the Earthlings' defence and somehow that had become a good thing.

It was the law, he realized. The law saved us. From now on, I must use the word The law saved us. From now on, I must use the word.

He stood sh.e.l.l-shocked, arms raised, while two deck swabs greased him down for the chair.

Jeltz indulged in a moment of semi-fondness, which he permitted himself twice a year. Look at my son, all wide-eyed about his first time on the captain's knee. I had thought that it would be better to send him away, but after his performance today, that boy stays at my elbow. He will be one of the greats. A destroyer of worlds. A confounder of pet.i.tioners. Some day my son will truly be an Utter b.a.s.t.a.r.d. Look at my son, all wide-eyed about his first time on the captain's knee. I had thought that it would be better to send him away, but after his performance today, that boy stays at my elbow. He will be one of the greats. A destroyer of worlds. A confounder of pet.i.tioners. Some day my son will truly be an Utter b.a.s.t.a.r.d.

Nano The stereotypical depiction of a sentient species under threat of destruction from a hovering alien s.p.a.ceship usually sees them running around panic-stricken, clutching their most treasured household appliances close to their b.r.e.a.s.t.s and arranging their automobiles in neat jams on bridges. (Except in the case of the Hrarf-Hrarf movie d.o.o.s.hing of the Red Plong d.o.o.s.hing of the Red Plong, where everyone is quite relieved just before complete annihilation because their lifespan flows backwards through time, so from the Hrarf-Hrarf point of view, they have just survived one humdinger of a d.o.o.s.hing unscathed.) There was no running about on Nano and very few household appliances. The inhabitants stood in John Wayne Square, swaying slightly like reeds, their mouths open as they waited pa.s.sively for death from above.

All except Aseed Preflux, who sat on a bench gorging himself on a tub of cottage cheese.

'I was so wrong,' he sobbed between fistfuls. 'So utterly wrong. To understand the Cheese, the exercitant must consume consume the Cheese.' the Cheese.'

Hillman Hunter stood in the shadow of the statue, trying not to attract too much attention to himself in case people decided to blame him for all their woes. Some things may flow downhill but blame flows to the top, and Hillman preferred not to be in pain until the big pain arrived, which he fervently hoped would be relatively painless.

'See you soon, Nano,' he whispered.

Not just yet, said Nano's voice in his head.

While Hillman was contemplating this mysterious and hopefully prophetic phantom voice, a thrown blob of cottage cheese slopped against the side of his face, plugging one ear hole and dripping underneath his collar.

'Nice work with the G.o.d, moron,' called Aseed Preflux from across the square.

This could get ugly, thought Hillman.

A couple of rose shears were drawn and Hillman was sure he saw a letter knife.

Why is there always someone with a blade?

Fortunately the Vogon Bureaucruiser decided to absent itself from real s.p.a.ce in a charming display of blue hyper-engine pyrotechnics. One second it was there, and the next whizz pop bang whizz pop bang it was gone, leaving nothing but a short-lived cloud of exhaust plasma in its wake. it was gone, leaving nothing but a short-lived cloud of exhaust plasma in its wake.

'Awww,' chorused the crowd.

Zaphod, with his innate sense of the theatrical, chose this moment to clamber atop the statue pedestal.

'The Vogons have been vanquished,' he called from the crook of John Wayne's arm. 'Thor has saved you.'

'Thor saved us?' said Hillman, puzzled. 'Which Thor? The dead, disappeared one?'

Zaphod threw him a look which asked Hillman just how stupid he was exactly, and when Z. Beeblebrox thinks a person is stupid, then that person is by implication more stupid than Zaphod himself, which is very stupid indeed, but then again probably too stupid to interpret the look, or be insulted even if he did.

Hillman was not stupid, just momentarily demented and the moment had pa.s.sed.

'Of course!' he cried, the first syllable a squeak. 'Thor has saved us.'

Zaphod googled his eyes. 'Yes. About time. Thor has saved us all.'

Hillman mounted the pedestal. 'And he will come again when he is needed.'

'Now you're getting it,' said Zaphod.

'The Lord Thor will communicate with his people only through me!'

'I can pretty much guarantee that. Whatever Hillers says, that's what Thor, who saved us, wants you all to do.'

'And if we don't?' asked Aseed.

Zaphod frowned and ballooned his cheeks as if the very idea was ridiculous. 'Then Thor would be most unhappy. And so would his hammer.'

Hillman squinted at the crowd, hardly daring to hope that anyone would swallow this slapdash s.p.a.ckle of religi-babble. He was surprised to find not a single garden or household blade headed his way. Aseed had his hand in the cheese bucket, but even he was holding off for now, thinking about it.

They're not going to kill me, realized Hillman. 'Thanks be to G.o.d.'

'Not G.o.d,' said Zaphod pointedly. 'Thanks be to Thor.'

Hillman smiled, then went for the big finish.

'Nano called for a sacrifice,' he said, balancing on the pedestal. 'Nano called for a f.e.c.kin' martyr...'

The word 'f.e.c.kin" was subsequently bleeped from the video record of this little speech because, after Hillman's martyrdom, everything he had said during his first life suddenly became infinitely more important and laden with wisdom.

The next thing Hillman said was: 'Hurrkkkaarrrkshhhhhhh,' though the 'shhhhhhhh' at the end may have been escaping gases, for at that moment a nose-cone of torpedo debris, that Thor had evidently missed, tumbled from the sky, striking the Sean the Boxer statue a glancing blow on the noggin, loosening the screw treads around the waistline of the two-part sculpture and sending the left glove spinning clockwise to deliver a devastating roundhouse blow that literally cut Hillman in two.

'Oh, b.a.l.l.s,' grunted Hillman, followed by the last words of his current lifespan: 'Coming, Nano.'

Historians deleted the first phrase but kept the second, which was misinterpreted so many times that fifteen thousand years later a third-grade student misspelled it and accidentally arrived at the correct meaning.

12.

There is no such thing as a happy ending. Every culture has a maxim that makes this point, while nowhere in the Universe is there a single gravestone that reads 'He Loved Everything About His Life, Especially the Dying Bit at the End'. Rollit Klet, the Dentra.s.sis independent film director-c.u.m-chef says in his memoir, Fish or Film: The First Cut is Mine! Fish or Film: The First Cut is Mine!, 'What you think is the happy ending is actually a brief respite before the serial killer that you thought was dead gets back up and butchers everyone except the girl with the biggest b.o.o.bs, who dies first in the sequel the following year.' Or as Zem of Squornsh.e.l.lous Zeta succinctly put it: 'The mattress never stays dry for long.' However, the number one most over-used quote on the subject of endings, happy or otherwise, comes from an old man who lived on a pole in Hawalius who said simply that: 'There is no such thing as an ending, or a beginning for that matter, everything is middle.' The quote ends on a more rambling note: 'Middles are c.r.a.p. I hate middles. Middles are all regretting the past and waiting for something interesting to happen. Middles can go zark themselves, as far as I'm concerned.' Generally, the pamphlet people only tend to print the first sentence, with perhaps a picture of a nice whale-toad in the background or maybe a couple of sunsets.

Barely a week had pa.s.sed since the aborted Vogon attack and already people had forgotten how lucky they were to be alive, and were back to worrying about the big issues of the day, like wasn't there anything that could be done about the late afternoon haze that drifted in from the ocean and why hadn't anyone thought to bring more peanut b.u.t.ter from Earth and what was that sharp smell outside the creche and maybe it would be nice to have a larger planet because this artificial gravity was making some of the old-timers ill.

Hillman Hunter sat at his desk reading through the day's complaints, wondering why he bothered hiring a G.o.d in the first place. A lot of these bin-fillers were supposed to be settled with fire and brimstone or hammer, whatever the case may be. Hillman could see the very real benefits in having an absentee G.o.d who only communicated through his representative, but did Thor have to martyr himself so soon? Couldn't he have spent a few weeks on civil service duty before making the ultimate sacrifice?

That's not to say martyrdom did not have its advantages. Since Hillman had been brought back from the dead in the Heart of Gold Heart of Gold's medi-ward, everyone had been a whole lot more willing to accept that he was Thor's representative on Nano. The new legs helped.

Hillman was doing his best to be pious and wise, but every minute of every f.e.c.kin' day dealing with red tape was driving him out of his mind. Plus the scar tissue around his middle was itching worse than a bull's a.r.s.e.

I am Hillman Hunter, Nano. I am a Christopher Columbus-type figure, with the colony founding and whatnot. I can't be stamping forms and sorting out domestics.

His intercom buzzed and a hologram of his secretary inflated on his desk.

'Yep, Marilyn. What's the story?'

'The story is that your first appointment is here.'

Hillman was almost relieved. Arguing with real people was marginally better than getting upset with sheets of paper.

Might as well get the steamers on the shovel, he thought.

'Okay, Nano. Send them through.'

Marilyn frowned. 'Sorry, Hillman. What did you call me?'

f.e.c.k, thought Hillman.

'For Nano!' he said hurriedly. 'It's the new official slogan. What do you think?'

'Good. Yes, fine,' said Marilyn, in a tone of such insulated boredom that Hillman was surprised she had heard him misspeak in the first instance.

That's two lines I've sold people in a week. First the Thor thing, now this.

Arthur Dent and his daughter, Random, came into the office and of course the girl sat down without waiting to be asked.

That girl even sits sulky, thought Hillman. But she's a smart one. But she's a smart one.

'Sit, Arthur, please.'

'Thank you.'

'For Nano!' barked Hillman, thinking he'd better throw one into the conversation every now and then.

That's the thing with bulls.h.i.t, his Nano used to say. You have to keep piling more on. You have to keep piling more on.

'Pardon?' said Arthur, bemused.

'It's our... ah... new slogan. Rally the people and all that. For Nano!'

'When would you use it?'

'I don't know really,' huffed Hillman. 'Collecting the crops, crossing the ocean, that kind of thing. Heroic stuff. What do you think?'