29. A GIANT STING

Glen Mower was assigned an office in the thick walled citadel. He felt as dense as the structure itself and rather daunted that he was being expected to learn, so it seemed, about holograms and their possible shortfalls.  But, he had gathered he had been given the gig simply because of his special talents in the field of history.

Glen was introduced to Miles Carpentier a former Fleet Street hack who had stumbled upon the secret of the Hologram Defense Program, or rather it had literally stumbled upon him. A slightly intoxicated hologram of the notorious Cold War spy Kim Philby had befriended him a while back in a hostelry and spilled the beans about what was going on.

‘They…I mean we have made a hologram of a traitor?’ Mower asked incredulously. ‘Surely, that’s asking for trouble!’

‘Yes, once I knew, I was soon collared by the Security Forces and given two options to keep me quiet,’ Miles explained. ‘Death or join the organisation. That turned out to be an expensive drink I shared with Philby.’

‘But how can a hologram pick up a physical drink?’ Mower pondered.

‘Oh, he drank light ale.’ Carpentier responded. Mower didn’t know if he was being serious or not as the erstwhile reporter didn’t crack a smile. In fact he barely gave anything away. Always maintaining a deadpan expression like he was either carefully guarding a scoop or severely depressed. It reminded him of the old silent comedian Buster Keaton and appropriately Glen came to feel, from an early stage, like he wanted to slap him with a stick for all the help he was.

‘We will have to send back holograms to sort out Florence Nightingale and Boudicca,’ he announced in a perfunctory fashion. Mower was aware of the heightened concern regarding the famous nurse through the windowless house and the Tennyson poem’s new slant. And was there at the top table when Boudicca’s case got the paddlegirls in a tizzy.

When Mower enquired about why holograms were considered such a dangerous thing to deploy his attention was drawn to a memo. It was about the very first hologram of a talented personality to be sent back in time. Arthur Askey the music hall comedian and entertainer celebrated for his jolly japes and humorous, catchy songs was launched towards early-Victorian London in 1838, armed with the task to cheer up the working-class and destract them from the emptiness of their hard and bleak existences.

Fairly harmless as enterprises go. Unfortunately, a miscalculation led to him turning up in 1770s North America, meaning there was the distinct and alarming possibility that General George Washington, a noted beekeeper, could at some point be assailed by a 5 foot 2 inch buzzer singing about the glory of being a healthy, grown-up, busy-busy bee.

The consequences to history of the man who would lead his forces to victory in the American War of Independence being instead carted off to the funny farm were considered too dire to contemplate.