Fit the Fourth: LIFE, THE UNIVERSE, AND GATCHAMAN.

By Briony Coote

Book: Zaphod Beeblebrox has made history as the only man to survive the Total Perspective Vortexon account of his ego being as large as the universe. Now he is determined to inflate his ego even further as the only man in history to survive the horrors of Zarking past the forty-second screening but now he is finding that even his ego has its limitations.

Zark: Oh dear, oh dear, I'm getting so worried. My viewscreens keep getting covered in dust and I've cleaned them forty times already...

Zaphod: ARRGHH! This is worse than Vogon poetry! And it's even worse than the Total Perspective Vortex because it doesn't inflate my ego!

Ford: I doubt your ego could be inflated any more than it already is!

Arthur: I can't take much more of this!

Ford: The things I do for field research!

Zaphod: The towels, quick!

Arthur: What do we do with our towels? (He wraps his towel around his eyes). Well, that's definitely much better. At least I can't see that robot.

Zaphod: Well, that's not what I had in mind but hey, you're right, it does help. But we can still hear him. Tell me, Ford, what exactly is the point of listening to this load of dingo's kidneys?

Ford: Field research Zaphod. You spend six months smelling the breath of the Blug-Blatter Beast of Traal to find out whether he prefers Vogon grandmothers rare or well-done, a year observing the mating habits of Babel fish and fifteen years on Earth trying to work out why humans constantly state and restate the very, very, obvious...

Zark: Oh, Rover, you don't want another spanner, do you? Will you settle for a bowl of nuts and bolts and whipped grease? I haven't heard a word from Mark the Hunky Hero lately. I'm getting so worried.

Marvin: Worry. All humans ever do is worry. No wonder their lives are so wretched. And they wonder why life is so awful. But why do YOU worry? You don't even have a life.

Zark: Because...because...now that you mention it I never thought about it before. I must have been programmed that way.

Marvin: Hateful, isn't it? Programmed to imitate the utterly pointless human function of worry. My companions are trying to find out the reason you were programmed that way but I doubt if they will. I'm far more intelligent than they are and I can't see any reason at all.

Zark: (an extremely rare tone of indignation) Look here, my job is to sanitise the violence on television. I monitor every single moment of television on this planet. If there is one slightest bit of violence I step in and sanitise it.

Marvin: Why do you bother? Life's so wretched that it hardly makes any difference how much violence there is.

Zark: (really indignant) It is an honourable job and gives me great satisfaction!

Marvin: You call that job satisfaction? Because I don't.

Zark: (incredulous) You don't?

Marvin: Why are you programmed to clean windows over fifty times a day?

Zark: Now that you mention it...I don't really know.

Marvin: Weren't you programmed to have intelligence? (Scans Zark's inner workings) No, you don't. You don't have a brain at all. You are nothing more than a trash can made up of fosdics, an automated system of meaningless drivel and an over-used voice synthesiser.

(Arthur bursts into the room, flings his towel over Zark and ties it securely.

Zaphod: Well done, Marvin! You stalled him long enough for us to get loose!

Arthur: What shall we do with it?

(Rover barks furiously)

Zaphod: Shut up that bloody robot! (Flings his towel over Rover and ties it up. Muffled barking continues)

Ford: Shove them into the garbage compactor!

Zaphod: No wait! I've got a better idea.

(Fifteen minutes later, Ford and his friends leave Sandy Frank Film Syndications)

Arthur: I still say this is inhumane.

Ford: And those guys from the United Planets will have our hides for using an outlawed weapon.

Zaphod: But the Frogstars from Ursa Minor will love us! The Total Pespective Vortex is now the worst torture in the universe again.

(From a locked room we hear)

Zark: Oh, dear, oh dear, I haven't heard a word from Mark the Hunky Hero. I'm getting so worried. Oh Rover, you don't want another spanner, do you?

(This is accompanied by blood-curdling screams from a bound Sandy Frank and asssociates. The programming has been altered to run indefinitely)

Marvin: It's a good thing that Sandy Frank didn't give that robot a brain. It couldn't understand how wretched its life was, not being able to do anything but worry and cleand windows over fifty times a day, while I fully understand how wretched life is, having the brain the size of a planet. I could almost envy that robot but I'm far too intelligent for that...

Arthur: Well, Ford, did you get what the Editor asked for?

Ford: No, I'm not satisfied. I didn't get to test my theory as to why you don't simply turn the television set off before going insane from being exposed to 7-Zark-7 over fifty times a day or get rid of the TV set and eliminate exposure to 7-Zark-7 altogether...

Zaphod: Look, Ford, why don't you just make up a theory, OK? To hell with why they don't simply turn the TV set off because of that bloody robot.

Ford: Look, Zaphod, it's not as easy as that. Those InterGalactic psychiatrists have been debating for mega-years over this subject and blowing their brains in the process. If their brains keep blowing up I get a dock in pay, I get sued for sloppy investigating and slapped with bills for cleaning up exploded brains on carpets. No, I have to test my theory and write a report that nobody will blow up their brains about!

Arthur: But you say you're still not satisfied, Ford. What are we going to do now?

Ford: We go to another television sanitiser. Ted Turner, I think.

Arthur/Zaphod: Oh, no...not again!

Book: The Television Sanitiser known as Ted Turner is a far more inexplicable sanitiser than Sandy Frank. Very rarely does he concentrate on sanitising violence. Instead he is renowned for the peculiar names he gives to his characters such as "Ace Goodheart" and "Dick Daring." Field researchers for the Guide widely believe that the reason for these strange names is to make the viewers laugh so much that they will hardly notice the violence that is being screened. However they find it strange that no viwer has died of laughter or, if they don't die of laughter, they don't die from his infamous backbeat music which he inserts into every programme he sanitises. While not as excruciating as Zarking it is well advised not to listen to this music as it has been likened to Chinese Water Torture. Rumour has it that the music was inspired by a dripping tap which Ted Turner was obliged to listen to when obliged to stay at the cheapest motel in the cheapest part of New York. Some researchers believe that the insipid narration which Ted Turner frequently uses counteracts the effects of the backbeat music and stops viewers from laughing too much at the peculiar voices because it makes the viewers too bored to pay much attention. However this raises the same question as with the question of Zarking: Why don't viewers simply turn the television off? It is this question that Ford is determined to address.

Ford: Arthur, why don't you simply turn the television off?

Zaphod: Yes, Monkeyman. Why don't you turn the TV off?

Arthur: What...what do you mean?

Ford: Look, Arthur, your TV waves are full of Zarking and that backbeat music that sounds like Chinese Water Torture, right?

Arthur: Er, yes. Quite.

Ford: All done to sanitise violence, right? (Arthur nods) Yet you find Zarking worse than Vogon poetry, right?

Arthur: (wincing) Quite.

Ford: So why don't you turn the television set off?

Arthur: I-don't know.

Ford: Why don't you get rid of the television set?

Arthur: (Indignant) Get rid of my television set? Out of the question!

Ford: Why?

Arthur: I couldn't get by without my television set!

Zaphod: What do you mean you can't get by without your television set? It's full of nothing but Zarking, Monkeyman!

(Arthur looks totally dumbfounded)

Zaphod: Shee, you semi-evolved sapiens. You can't stand Zarking and you can't get by without your television sets. No wonder the Ed's got exploded brains all over his carpet. (sighs) Let's go find this Turner dude...

(An hour later they arrive at Turner Productions only to find it surrounded by SWAT teams)

SWAT: right, everyone stay clear! Terrorists have taken over the building and are threatening to unleash a deadly weapon!

Zaphod: Shees, who are these terrorists?

SWAT: (to the top floor) Okay, you terrorists! Come out or we'll blast you out!

Voice: (from above) We're not terrorists!

SWAT: Well, who are you then?

Voice: My name's Ace Goodheart (SWAT collapses in fits of laughter) and my friend's called Dirk Daring (SWAT team well and truly is ROTFL) and we're fed up to the back teeth with everybody laughing at these stupid names Turner has given us!

Daring: And we've had enough of this backbeat music, too! (Plays a sample loud and clear. SWAT now rolls on the floor in agony)

Goodheart: So you listen and you listen good! You make Turner give us some decent names, get rid of this backbeat music...

Daring: And get us a decent narrator-

Goodheart: And some decent stories-

Daring: Or-

Goodheart: We'll blast the whole city with this music that sounds like Chinese Water Torture! And what's more, all the violence will be screened on television!

Turner: No, it won't!

Goodheart: Why not?

Turner: It'll be Zarked!

Goodheart: No it won't! Zark's fosdic just blew up from cleaning the windows indefinitely!

Daring: Yes, it's true! I went to blow the brains out of a guy who kept laughing at my name - and imagine my surprise when I ACTUALLLLLY BLEW THEM OUT! Yes, I didn't get Zarked at all! For the first time in my life I could do something really, really violent on television without getting Zarked!

Goodheart: That's when we found out! Zark has blown up! And Sandy Frank's been committed to the nearest psychiatric ward. He's incurably insane, just as you will be after listening to this music!

Zaphod and Co: (Looking at eachother) Gulp!

Book: Will Goodheart and Daring carry out their threat in full view of a television screen without benefit of a television sanitiser? Can Ford safely work out a plausible theory as to whether television sanitisers are saying that television is too violent in order to keep themselves in business or is there are more inexplicable theory at work? Find out in the last instalment of Life, the Universe and Gatchaman!

Ford: Thank Zarquon that it IS the last episode!