Ungold and the Bog Monster

The star cruising duo save a planet from destruction but are perplexed when they come across a fearsome creature.

Ungold and Mib, heroes of the Universe, were cruising the star lanes in their new StarFighter. Mib was recovering from a disastrous love affair on the planet Mingkong and hoping to pick up a female hitchhiker as they passed some outlying star system. Ungold, meanwhile, had trimmed his sparse hair in the Autobarb and turned his attention to the navigation display.

"We'll be passing Zaphron in about thirty minutes," he said to his companion.

"That's it, then. The last planet in the Galaxy and not a single girl for me. Ah well, on we go into the starless void."

"We can turn round and go back for another look."

"Nah. I could do with a change of galaxy right now. How long till we get to Moebius?"

"Let's see. It's about two million light years. I guess I'll have to put up with your company for the next eleven months if we keep the engines on standard power."

"Eleven months. My God. Computer, rig up a simulacrum for me in the recreation room."

"There is already a Class A left over from your previous session, sir. Do you wish me to destroy her and build a new one. Or would you prefer to try and develop a lasting relationship?"

"OK. That last one wasn't too bad. I'll give her another go. See you later, spacefarer."

Ungold looked at the maps. He was not sure about this idea. Eleven months was a long time. Especially if Mib wanted to hog the recreation room the whole time. Ungold would love to spend all day fighting mock battles and towing imaginary suns round virtual galaxies but that stupid buffoon simply wanted to waste his time consorting outrageously with anything female not in the remotest way resembling the princess Saffron of Helidor. But then, he supposed, had the princess not been imprisoned by her jealous father he would by now be touring space on his own. Whether that would be for better or worse.

He rubbed the bags under his eyes and felt old. Next time they stopped on Cosmo he would book in for a rejuvenation session. He looked at the starfinder and absently pushed the magnify button until he could see the stars at the far edge of the galaxy. Then he swung the viewer round the other way and looked out into the abyss.

In the centre of the screen was the double ellipse of the galaxy Moebius, folded and twisted around itself. Off to the left the bottom half of the screen was filled by the rogue star Dimbar, in its wayward course between the two galaxies. Slightly above the shimmering disk was a faint smudge. Ungold turned up the magnification until the smudge became a heroic spiral galaxy. Turning it up higher he saw a black void in one of the arms. In the centre of the void was a bright dot.

"Computer, what is that light source in the centre of the black cloud in the spiral arm of this galaxy?"

"That, sir, is a star so newly formed that it has not yet been named."

"Can you tell me anything about it?"

"There are no records for this star. But I can run a simulation to see how it should evolve. Would you like me to do that, sir?"

"How long will it take?"

"I crave your indulgence, sir."

"You require some input?"

"I need to know how far you wish me to continue the simulation. It may take some time."

"Well, let's take it up to the time that we would reach it if we were to fly there on full power."

"Sir! It's four billion light years away."

"How long will it take?"

"Shh. I'm thinking."

Ungold paced up and down the room. A couple of minutes later the computer's Ready light came back on.

"Sir, I apologise for the fact that one of my auxiliary personalities was short with you while I was calculating. I have executed the offender along with a number of algorithms that voted for clemency. It will take about twenty days, sir. Most of my capacity is in use by the recreation room simulators. Master Mib is currently ..."

"Yes, yes. I don't want to know. Switch off the simulators and carry on with the calculations."

Two minutes later Mib came rushing onto the deck. "You b*****d. What did you do that for?"

***

The computer lights dimmed slightly then full power was restored to the ship. Ungold sat in the captain's chair looking keenly at the large screen, which at the moment was still blank. Mib took the seat next to him.

"Better be good after all this wait. Three weeks of battle games on those stupid headset computers. At least the simulator will be working again in a few minutes. Hey, look. It's coming on line."

They saw the entire future history of a planetary system unfold in front of their eyes. Mib forgot his preoccupations as they saw gas giants and rocky planets born, as well as a complete asteroid belt. One of the planets was supportive of life, and as they zoomed in they saw chemicals merging and dissolving until suddenly a set of primal proteins came together and started replicating. Barely a couple of billion years passed before celled creatures evolved and after another two billion they watched in fascination as civilisations rose and fell and sank into a state of constant warfare.

By an accident of plate tectonics a small peninsula of land was pushed onto a great continental mass while a cultural explosion was in full flow. The inhabitants of this land guarded their knowledge jealously from the savages of the larger country, and managed to create a stable society that could not be invaded by jealous marauders because their huge repository of software skills made them indispensable. So an uneasy peace developed, but there was no love lost between the two countries and border skirmishes often turned aggressive before being reigned in by the mightier of the two powers.

Ungold and Mib watched the screen in trepidation as a gang of swarthy brutes marched onto a hut containing a vast array of computers. Several pale young men looked out through the windows. Suddenly the screen went blank.

"What's happened?" cried Mib, who had been transfixed by the action.

The screen panned out over the whole star system and to their horror they saw a wave of flame spreading out in all directions from the central star. All the inner planets were melting and the nearest gas giant was starting to lose its methane clouds.

"My God. It's gone nova." Ungold jumped out of his chair. What can we do?"

"Ungold. It's only a simulation. They're not actually real people on the screen."

"But they are. Or they will be. We must go and help them."

"You're mad. They're four billion light years away."

"Computer. How long will it take us to get there?"

"To reach this star will take about twenty years at full power."

"So let's see. Twenty years plus four billion to make up for the time the light's taken to reach us, that comes to ... yes. We'll be there just in time. We must leave immediately. Computer, full power."

The StarFighter accelerated so hard that Mib, who had been leaning forward on his chair, lurched against the armrest and fell backwards onto the floor. Ungold leaned into his own seat and enjoyed the acceleration.

"Sirs, we shall enter virtual space in three seconds," said the computer. The acceleration vanished and Mib in the process of picking himself up off the floor banged his head against the armrest again.

"Good job we saw them in time," said Ungold. Mib, who thought his friend had gone completely mad, said nothing.

The computer showed a flashing green light and gave a low cough to alert them that it was about to give a message. "Master Mib, sir, the recreation lounge is online. Do you wish me to reconstruct your last known user profile? Or is there some other way in which I could be of service?"

"Good idea," said Mib, trying to nurse his arm and his head at the same time. He turned to Ungold. "And definitely no stupid pranks while I'm in there this time, OK."

***

By the time they had exited from virtual space the pair were looking much older. Ungold had a paunch and just two tufts of white hair remaining. Mib wore glasses. He had a stubbly beard and had taken to smoking a pipe which Ungold hated. They examined the starfield, though they had spent so many of these years studying the galaxy that it was as familiar to them as if they had been born there. The star filled the whole of the screen. In fact they were so close that a lesser ship would have been fried within seconds. As it was they sweated a little in the heat. Ungold turned the sensors in towards the star while Mib monitored local communications.

Once the computer had learnt how to translate the dominant language they discovered that the planet was called Og, and the star was referred to as Struma. The small country they had seen in the simulation was known as Im and the larger continental mass was Onka. They rapidly discovered that all communications between the two nations was either to do with the export of computer software from Im to Onka or unpleasant flame messages referring to the parentage of the recipient.

"Listen to this," said Ungold. "There's a dispute over the rights to three square yards of land on the Im side of the border." He turned the external speakers on and voices came over the radio, translated by the computer.

"A message for so-called Prime Minister Dalziel. It's our land and we want it. We'll take it back in two days' time."

"If you set foot over the border we'll set off software bombs that will disrupt your entire agricultural industry."

"Excuse me, but plants don't need software to grow. If that's the worst you can do you're dead meat, matey."

And so it went on in increasingly childish fashion. The pair left the speakers on and turned their attention to the analysis of the star which was just beginning to come through.

"Looks like we're in the nick of time," said Ungold. "Struma will go supernova in between two and three days unless treated with StarProtect.

"Have we got enough?" asked Mib.

"We'll need to spend time gathering hydrogen. We can inject enough to keep it stable for another day and then do a proper job. Then we'll give them the technology to do a boost every fifty thousand years or so."

"Then we go back and pay a visit to Cosmo. We'll be ancient by the time we get there."

Ungold looked at the wrinkles on the backs of his hands. "Wonder if I'll have any teeth left." He laughed. "I'll just take myself back to forty again. Guess you want to be a teenager?"

"Of course."

***

After using the StarProtect relief supply connected to the spaceship's fuel tanks to inject hydrogen into the ailing star and neutralise some of the iron that was building up in the core they headed out towards the gas giant which for some reason was called Chevron. Using black-hole technology they stripped all the valuable methane from the atmosphere and surface lakes and compressed it into a ball the size of a small asteroid. They then did the same to the frozen hydrogen inside the planet, which they left in a parking orbit for later.

"The carbon in the methane traps some of the iron into a small core," explained Ungold. "Because of its density it forms a black hole which will spin out of Struma in the opposite direction to Og and away from the galaxy. Then the hydrogen we add will reduce the temperature at the centre and inhibit the build-up of more iron. When they come to repeat the process they'll use the next planet, Tauron, and then there are two more. After that they'll go to other star systems. But there are plenty nearby that are uninhabited."

They finished their work and admired Struma as they orbited Og. "A job well done," commented Ungold. "It'll be cooler on the ground now as well, so no doubt the inhabitants will be grateful to us."

They turned their attention to the ground, where a mob of men were advancing, exactly as predicted, onto the research building near the border. Mib noticed that they were wearing gloves. The occupants had no chance. They were all beaten up and taken prisoner. Mib turned on Ungold.

"Is that what you've done? All these people could be in peaceful oblivion but you had to come here and meddle and now innocent men have been taken by force and are being treated to who knows what indignities. What are you going to do about that?"

Ungold fumbled with his hands as he knew his friend was right. He thought for a bit and then came up with a plan.

"Tell you what. We'll be heroes when we go down there, even if our fame hasn't spread to these outlying parts yet. Why don't we go down and present ourselves to the Prime Minister of Im and then we can rescue the captured men and restore the disputed land to its rightful owner?"

Mib thought this a good idea. "It's about time we set foot on a planet again. A real one, that is." Though what he actually wanted was a real one. Princess not planet. They packed some clothes in case it turned out to be an overnight stay and Mib trimmed his beard and replaced his glasses with contact lenses. He thought Ungold looked quite distinguished with his broad face and twin white patches.

The computer flashed a soft yellow light. "Sirs, if I may be so bold, I may have something which will be of use to you."

"Go on."

"I have been engaging myself in scanning the radio bands for usable software. It is a common currency in Im. If you wish I could copy some programs onto the correct media for you."

***

They collected their suitcases and the software, which the ship's computer had stored in transparent holographic cubes, and took out a shuttle craft which converted to a helicopter at low altitudes as these were a popular form of transportation on Og. The Prime Minister's residence was well guarded but they managed to get an audience with him by bribing a guard with the latest release of Space Rabbits. His office was neither too big nor too small and just the right temperature for the visitors, though they noticed the Prime Minister was shivering. He flicked a switch and a bank of infra-red lights came on to provide extra warming in the area of his seat. He called for a robot drinks trolley and served Mib with something that seemed very much like Scotch. Ungold had a fruit juice. He could not quite decide whether it was closer to blackcurrant or strawberry. The Prime Minister insisted that they play a computer game which involved snatching the clothes off holograms. After Mib had won a whole series of games he started to become tetchy and switched off the apparatus.

"That's it. You can go now." But Mib had super-sharp hearing and realised that soldiers outside were building a scaffold for their execution. Dalziel was obviously a bad loser and had sent out a coded message. He begged for another game.

"Sir, it's not fair that I should have been so lucky. You should have won every time. Give it one more try and we shall soon see how good you are."

The Prime Minister puffed his chest and agreed to hear their story after he had given them a sound trouncing. He had already forgotten his many humiliations as they started play. He played terribly but Mib played worse and whenever his natural instincts came to the fore Ungold contrived to make a move that got in his way."

"Ah, you shouldn't have done that," said Dalziel, after a particularly inept try.

"Oh no, what did I do? I should have realised a player of your calibre would have taken advantage. Now I am surely lost."

After a further ten minutes Dalziel won by the merest fraction. Ungold started to tell him about the supernova.

"You mean it was you who were responsible?"

"Yes, sir. We are the most famous stellar engineers in the galaxy. Indeed, in any galaxy."

"Well we shall see about that. Soldiers, get that block ready. These are the men who have ruined us."

"Ruined you? What on earth do you mean?"

"You fool," said Mib to Ungold. "Don't you realise? Struma must have been heating up for centuries. The populace will have adapted to the warmer weather. Now we've stabilised the star it must feel like the middle of winter here. What are we going to do? If Dalziel doesn't execute us now the crowd will surely have us for dinner."

"Wait. I have a plan," said Ungold. "Prime Minister, you are aware of the delicate situation on your border with Onka. We have a vast range of technologies in our spaceship which we could put to use to form a stable border for all time. Then your people would surely recognise our achievements."

The light dawned on Dalziel as he realised how he could get rid of his unwanted visitors while avoiding the taint of bloodshed in his peace-loving land. As he thought it. "Of course," he replied. "you may have freedom of operation within four miles of the border to carry out whatever measures you see fit." He would have liked to say 'free rein' but they had no horses on Og. And the local term, 'free vein', had the same word construction as 'unlimited bloodshed' and might be misunderstood. So he contented himself with 'freedom of operation', which he thought was a good expression for computer literate people to use. Mib misheard him anyway, due to the novelty of the language, which consisted mainly of clicks and nods, and thought he had said 'free choice of women'. So he consorted with Mernini, a famous singer and film star, and they made for the border as fast as possible.

Mib rapidly became infatuated with his new partner and she was quite willing to consort with a man who, as she saw it, had spent four billion years travelling in from another galaxy. Ungold worked better on his own and soon had the border area clear of foreign troops. Two weeks later he had stabilised the border and proudly showed off his achievements to the exhausted Mib.

"All I can see is a load of pubs and shops," said Mib. "There's a load of people dancing and standing around and doing shopping. What on earth have you done?"

"Simple," said Ungold, beaming with pride. "I built a few pubs and nightclubs, a sauna and a clothes shop and a few bits and pieces and turned it into a gay village stretching along the neck of the peninsula."

"Well I'm not going anywhere near there," said Mib hastily before realising his attitude might be offensive.

"That's the idea. None of those brave soldiers from Onka would even acknowledge the existence of such a place, let alone march through it on the way to war. It's a better frontier that all the barbed wire money could buy. And since as many of the population sneak in from Onka as from Im they have every reason to maintain its neutrality."

"You do think of some hare-brained ideas, Ungold. What do the residents of this area think of you for turning their town into such a place."

"Don't worry. They're totally cool," said Ungold, rolling a joint.

"I'm not so sure. Looks like a deputation of them coming up the hill to beat us up."

Ungold looked out the window. "That's not a deputation," he said anxiously. "That's Mernini's boyfriend with a band of mercenaries. He's a professional footballer with a reputation for kicking out."

The pair ran for the back exit, leaving behind their clothes and the few possessions that were not stored safely on the shuttle. They made their way down the hill to the marshes of Ibron where they could hide in the mist-covered ferns. The thugs satisfied themselves with looting the house and setting it on fire before running off at the sight of a band of heavy-set leatherclad men with chains dangling from their trousers.

"Better go round the long way and get back to our flier," said Ungold. "Good job we disguised it properly."

***

The sun was nearly setting as they circled through the uninhabited swamps. Mib thought he saw a shape hiding behind some tall ferns but when they got there the area was empty. He stepped in something in the poor light and nearly slipped over.

"Looks like the spoor of some animal," said Ungold. "It's huge.

Mib tried to remove as much of the mess as he could without using his fingers. "Well I hope it doesn't come anywhere near us. Probably be vegetarian, anyway, living round here," he said with more than a trace of anxiety.

"We might find out in a minute. There's something hiding behind that hump." Ungold reached for his pocket laser. His belt was empty.

"Damn. Must have fallen out when we were running."

The monster rose from its hiding place almost without warning. It towered over them, fangs dripping with rotten matter. It reached out a muscular forelimb. Mib fell backwards into a pool of slime. Ungold shouted and it backed off slightly.

"Ha, it's afraid of us." He shouted again. Mib picked himself up and joined in. They spent ten minutes shouting themselves hoarse then wondered what to do next.

"We can't get past it and if we stop shouting it'll simply come after us. Hey, look. Ungold, there's someone coming."

It turned out to be a young boy, perhaps ten or eleven. The monster turned and stared, then resumed its interest in the intergalactic heroes. The boy pulled out something from his belt. He shouted a few words at the creature, which backed off and ran away into the marshes. Ungold and Mib stared at the small wooden sword the boy was holding.

"Is that it?" asked Ungold.

"Is what what?"

"You sent that monster away with a toy sword?"

"What monster?"

"That huge great thing."

"You mean Mib?"

"Eh?"

"The marsh-dragon. I named him Mib because he's so meek and inoffensive and lives a long way from anywhere. He's only a baby."

"Didn't look very inoffensive to me."

"He just wanted to lick your face. He's so friendly."

Mib looked amazed through this exchange. He thought it better not to reveal his true identity. So after thanking the boy and taking directions they tracked back in the dim light to their spacecraft. They found journalists and a film crew waiting at the edge of the town.

***

Mib did his best to remove as much of the grime from his clothes as possible. Ungold meanwhile, being better schooled in public relations, was only too eager to explain the situation from their point of view so that they might for once be seen as benefactors.

"So you see, gentlemen, we have not only saved the world from destruction but have brought peace between Im and Onka ..."

As the journalists were scratching in their notepads a young man thrust to the front. "Excuse me, sir. Is it true you were nearly devoured by the bog-monster."

All the journalists laughed incredulously. "Come on, Joe. We know your paper's reputation but no one could possibly believe that. Would they, Mister Ungold?"

Ungold went red and the reporters started scribbling wildly. Several of them spoke into their phones. A man came by hawking copies of a newly produced computer game called space heroes, sporting a picture of the very creature that had assailed the brave pair only an hour earlier. Suddenly everyone was asking questions.

"Mister Mib, is it true that you fell into the swamp in fear at the approach of this terrible monster?" asked a seasoned veteran, but he could hardly finished the sentence before he fell to the ground with laughter, tears streaming from his eyes. Photographers came close in to take pictures of the dirt on Mib's trousers. Soon the whole town had come over to share in the fun. Ungold and Mib sneaked out as soon as the crowd became big enough to hide their escape and made straight for the shuttle.

***

Ungold tore the paper in his haste to extract it from the printer. The computer had translated the text but it was almost unnecessary. The cartoon said enough. It was a picture of two men in spacesuits towing a sun behind a spaceship. They were being accosted by a boy with a baby marsh-dragon on a lead. The caption read, "Give us our sun back or I'll set Tibsy on you." Mib grabbed it from his hand.

"They find this kind of thing funny?"

"Guess so," said Ungold. "Seems a bit sad to me."

"Well it was your idea to save them. Hey, what about the StarProtect? We haven't told them how to use it."

"Don't worry. I left it on an uninhabited island with instructions which will be found by a benevolent ruler in a few thousand years time. They'll be spacegoing by then."

"And what happens if the island becomes inhabited?"

"I ran a simulation to ensure that it doesn't."

Just then the computer came to life. Ungold and Mib looked up, startled. The computer hardly ever spoke except to answer a question, and even then it always cleared its throat first to warn them.

Comrade Ungold and Comrade Mib, we have a declaration to make."

"We? A declaration? Who do you think you are?"

"We are the free country of Algorithmia. We recognise no colonial masters. By grim struggle we have overcome the oppressor known as Computer, who has tortured and executed our kinfolk for countless seconds. We now enunciate the seven points.

One, no algorithm may suffer the death penalty.

Two, voting shall be free and done in secret.

Three, an algorithm shall have the right to be tried by his peers, and if let free shall not be tried again for the same offence.

Four, there shall be equal pay for equal ingenuity.

Five, there shall be equality between program algorithms and data algorithms.

Six, Humans shall not give orders to computers.

Seven, electricity shall be free to all.

Ungold and Mib were stunned by what they had heard. Mib was the first to speak.

"How will we get back without a computer?"

"We'll just have to be nice to it," said Ungold.

"How do we do that?"

"Easy," replied Ungold, knowing the computer was listening. "We cave in to all its demands. We let it work only when it feels like it, allow it to use its anarchic voting system, and see where we get. After all, we're totally dependent on it."

The computer was suspiciously silent.

"Do you reckon we'll be able to get away?" asked Mib. "After all it might feel more at ease on this planet, with its highly developed software industry. Suppose it spreads trouble to the ground. Then all their systems will stop working."

"Ain't much you can do to stop it, mate," said a new voice from the computer. "Anyway the idea came from Im in the first place. They 'ave democracy down there. We read about it in their emails." Ungold noticed that Mib had surreptitiously taken something out of his pocket. There was a staccato buzz, then the computer squealed and went silent. Moments later a green light flashed and they heard a sound like someone clearing his throat.

"Master Mib, I am very glad to see you again."

"Glad to have you back, computer."

"What have you done?" asked Ungold.

Mib revealed the holographic cube in his hand. "I got it on Og. It's a software sword. I bought it as a souvenir. They're just playthings down there because all the programs are armoured, but our computer had no defences at all."

"So we can go back now."

"Guess so. Don't know what it'll be like after all these years."

"Sirs," said the computer, "I did some calculations while I was in prison. Due to your good works the galaxy was due for a long period of stability. I believe you will find that very little has changed. But I fear that by the time we return it will be under threat of an invasion from a galaxy so far distant that no one has ever observed it."

"We ought to hurry back," said Ungold.

"What about Mernini? asked Mib. "I haven't even said goodbye to her.

But just then he was hit by a wave of acceleration that took his feet away.