STARSHIP OF FOOLS - (C) 1986 Jerry Kindall and Rex Crossley

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

"If I were dead, I would be the last to know."
                                                     - Paul McCartney

     I woke up.  Since I was dead, this was quite a surprise to me.
     I considered passing out again, but decided not to.  This might be
my last chance.  If you die and then suddenly wake up, it's not
something you should throw away by passing out again.
     "Matt Baker," said a vaguely familiar voice beside me.
     I opened my eyes and was blinded by the intense light.  I blinked a
few times and waited for my eyes to focus on my surroundings.  They
didn't.
     Everything around me was a sterile, disorienting white.  I looked
to see what I was sitting on and was horrified to discover that it was
nothing.  Just white.  For a moment I contemplated going crazy, but I
rejected this.  It would be a poor way to spend the rest of my life --
or should I say afterlife?
     "Matt Baker," said the voice.  I looked to where it seemed to be
coming from.  On close inspection, I saw that there was an off-white
area in the midst of the whiteness.  With a start, I realized that this
off-white spot was the source of the voice.  With another start, I
speculated upon whether or not this was Him...
     With yet another start, I wondered if I, too, was destined to spend
eternity as an off-white patch in an endless whiteness.
     "Matt Baker," said the voice impatiently.
     "I can't see you!" I shouted at the off-white blur, near panic.
     "Oh, I'm sorry," said the blur.  "Let me turn down the lights."  A
thin patch of off-whiteness reached out and touched some sort of a white
thing and the white vanished.
     While my eyes adjusted, I heard the rustling sounds of someone
moving around.  Finally my vision cleared, and I saw that I wasn't in an
infinitely white room; I was, instead, in an infinitely untidy office. 
I hauled my body up to a sitting position, ready to face whoever sat
behind the immense desk.
     I looked directly into a pair of size 13 sneakers.
     "Have a seat," said the shoes.  Looking around, I found a plush
easy chair right behind me.  I got up off the floor and plopped,
shaking, down into it.  "Sorry about the lights," said the shoes.  "I
use them for reading; my eyes aren't what they used to be."
     The shoes vanished from the desktop and planted themselves on the
floor behind the desk, and the chair above them swiveled up to reveal a
person I knew well.
     The Oracle of Oorlon.
     The Oracle smiled.  "Glad to see you, Matt Baker."
     "Uh," I said, stunned.  "Aren't you dead?"
     "Well, I'm supposed to be, but who's going to know I'm not?  Just
before Jordann destroyed Oorlon, I managed to transfer myself to the
astral dimension."  He smiled.  "People don't have a choice about coming
here when they die, but I came voluntarily.  I have some influence here,
so when I heard you had arrived I had you brought here immediately."  He
smiled again.
     "So I'm dead, right?"
     "Wellllll... technically, yes.  But you are the Chosen One.  We can
bend the rules a little.  Your work in the physical dimension is not yet
finished, so you must go back."  He smiled.
     "Does this mean that every time I die, I get to go back?"
     The Oracle looked confused.  "Of course."  Then he smiled.  "The
only time you don't get to go back is the last time."
     "Oh."
     The Oracle continued, smiling.  "Since your physical body was not
destroyed, it will be simple to send you back this time.  If your body
had been destroyed, a new body would have had to have been ordered, and
the paperwork would have been atrocious."
     "So I just get to go back?"
     "Yes," he smiled.
     "When?"
     "Now."  He stared into my eyes, smiling, and tapped a few buttons
on his computer terminal.

                                 * * *

     FILBERT's scanners pinpointed Jordann walking down the hallway, and
the lasers tracked him precisely.  The time was right.  He activated the
trigger mechanism, and a deadly crossfire of laser bolts failed to
appear.
     In the deepest part of FILBERT's programming logic, he could not
inflict harm on a sentient life form.  Through a programming flaw,
FILBERT's programming still considered Jordann intelligent.
     FILBERT could scheme all he wanted, but, when the final moment
came, he was paralyzed.
     Jordann stormed down the hallway, about to enter the elevator. 
Noticing a light in the teleporter room, he turned back.
     FILBERT looked on in alarm as Jordann whipped out his gun and
stunned the heck out of some poor, innocent, muscle-bound idiot who
charged at him.  A quick bio-scan revealed, however, that the idiot
would recover.
     Then Jordann pointed the gun at the small, young Chosen One called
Matt Baker, and, adjusting the gun for maximum intensity, pulled the
trigger.
     FILBERT's paralysis lifted.  This situation was covered in his
vengeance programming.  He activated the lasers.
     Jordann crashed to the floor, shaking the entire ship.
     There was a moment of silence while those in the teleport room took
in the incredible turn of events.  Donald dashed forward, hoping to
crush himself under the falling bulk.  Zordoff was the first to come to
his senses.  Waving his staff, he imprisoned Jordann behind an
indestructible magic barrier.
     FILBERT's vengeance program was relieved to discover that Jordann
was only unconscious, not dead.  Like all good would-be galactic
dictators, Jordann had been prepared.  He was wearing a laser-proof
vest.

                                 * * *

     "Oh, no," said Zot, looking down at the inert body of Matt Baker. 
He bent down and felt for a pulse.  Not finding any, he straightened and
announced solemnly, "He's dead."

