Becky

“Marvin stood there.

‘Out of my way little robot,’ growled the tank.

‘I’m afraid,’ said Marvin, ‘that I’ve been left here to stop you.’

The probe extended again for a quick recheck. It withdrew again.

‘You? Stop me?’ roared the tank, ‘Go on!’

‘No, really I have,’ said Marvin simply.

‘What are you armed with?’ roared the tank in disbelief.

‘Guess,’ said Marvin.

The tank’s engines rumbled, its gears ground. Molecule-sized electronic relays deep in its micro-brain flipped backwards and forwards in consternation.

‘Guess?’ said the tank.

‘Yes, go on,’ said Marvin to the huge battle machine, ‘you’ll never guess.’

‘Errrmmm …’ said the machine, vibrating with unaccustomed thought, ‘laser beams?’

Marvin shook his head solemnly.

‘No,’ muttered the machine in its deep gutteral rumble, ‘Too obvious. Anti-matter ray?’ it hazarded.

‘Far too obvious,’ admonished Marvin.

‘Yes,’ grumbled the machine, somewhat abashed, ‘Er … how about an electron ram?’

This was new to Marvin.

‘What’s that?’ he said.

‘One of these,’ said the machine with enthusiasm.

From its turret emerged a sharp prong which spat a single lethal blaze of light. Behind Marvin a wall roared and collapsed as a heap of dust. The dust billowed briefly, then settled.

‘No,’ said Marvin, ‘not one of those.’

‘Good though, isn’t it?’

‘Very good,’ agreed Marvin.

‘I know,’ said the Frogstar battle machine, after another moment’s consideration, ‘you must have one of those new Xanthic Re-Structron Destabilized Zenon Emitters!’

'Nice, aren’t they?’ agreed Marvin.

‘That’s what you’ve got?’ said the machine in condiderable awe.

‘No,’ said Marvin.

‘Oh,’ said the machine, disappointed, ‘then it must be …’

‘You’re thinking along the wrong lines,’ said Marvin, ‘You’re failing to take into account something fairly basic in the relationship between men and robots.’

‘Er, I know,’ said the battle machine, 'is it … ’ it tailed off into thought again.

‘Just think,’ urged Marvin, ‘they left me, an ordinary, menial robot, to stop you, a gigantic heavy-duty battle machine, whilst they ran off to save themselves. What do you think they would leave me with?’

‘Oooh er,’ muttered the machine in alarm, ‘something pretty damn devastating I should expect.’

‘Expect!’ said Marvin. ‘Oh yes, expect. I’ll tell you what they gave me to protect myself with shall I?’

‘Yes, alright,’ said the battle machine, bracing itself.

‘Nothing,’ said Marvin.

There was a dangerous pause.

'Nothing?’ roared the battle machine.

‘Nothing at all,’ intoned Marvin dismally, ‘not an electronic sausage.’

The machine heaved about with fury.

‘Well doesn’t that just take the biscuit!’ it roared, ‘Nothing, eh?’ Just don’t think, do they?’

‘And me,’ said Marvin in a soft low voice, ‘with this terrible pain in all the diodes down my left side.’

‘Makes you spit, doesn’t it?’

‘Yes,’ agreed Marvin with feeling.

‘Hell that makes me angry,’ bellowed the machine, ‘think I’ll smash that wall down!’

The electron ram stabbed out another searing blaze of light and took out the wall next to the machine.

‘How do you think I feel?’ said Marvin bitterly.

‘Just ran off and left you did they?’ the Machine thundered.

‘Yes,’ said Marvin.

‘I think I’ll shoot down their bloody ceiling as well!’ raged the tank.

It took out the ceiling of the bridge.

‘That’s very impressive,’ murmured Marvin.

‘You ain’t seen nothing yet,’ promised the machine, ‘I can take out this floor too, no trouble!’

It took out the floor too.

‘Hells bells!’ the machine roared as it plummeted fifteen storeys and smashed itself to bits on the ground below.

‘What a depressingly stupid machine,’ said Marvin and trudged away.”
― Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

“I'm afraid I don't know WTF. I only discovered LOL from Joyce last week”
― Richard Osman, The Thursday Murder Club

“There was one idea that might have turned out pretty interesting. Hunter S. Thompson had written a book called Songs of the Doomed, and in the first few pages he mentions sitting around and listening to something off The Caution Horses, then he mentions the band later on in there, too. He's always been one of our favourite wackos, so we decided to call him up and see if we could maybe work on something together. It took a while to get him on the phone, because he'd wake up at midnight, stay up all night, drinking and watching sports, then sleep through the day. But we ended up having a bunch of weird phone conversations with him. His idea was we'd go to his ranch out in Colorado, get a camera crew, no script and 'just go crazy, man!' That didn't really fit what we had in mind; we wanted a little more structure than that. Going crazy isn't what we do. But he wasn't into that, at all. He didnt want to write anything, he just wanted this wacked-out thing. Eventually he got really pissed off for some reason. He sent us a fax, saying 'If you guys show up here, you're going home in body bags!' What did we do to piss him off that much?”
― Dave Bowler, Music is the Drug

“I get it. Having had Satoru take me in as his cat, I think I felt as lucky as he did. Strays, by definition, have been abandoned or left behind, but Satoru rescued me when I broke my leg. He made me the happiest cat on earth. I'll always remember those five years we had together. And I'll forever go by the name Nana, the name that - let's face it - is pretty unusual for a male cat. The town where Satoru grew up, too, I would remember that. And the green seedlings swaying in the fields. The sea, with its frighteningly loud roar. Mount Fuji, looming over us. How cosy it felt on top of that boxy TV. That wonderful lady cat, Momo. That nervy but earnest hound, Toramaru. That huge white ferry, which swallowed up cars into its stomach. The dogs in the pet holding area, wagging their tails at Satoru. That foul-mouthed chinchilla telling me Guddo rakku! The land in Hokkaido stretching out forever. Those vibrant purple and yellow flowers by the side of the road. The field of pampas grass like an ocean. The horses chomping on grass. The bright-red berries on the mountain-ash trees. The shades of red on the mountain ash that Satoru taught me. The stands of slender white birch. The graveyard, with its wide-open vista. The bouquet of flowers in rainbow colours. The white heart-shaped bottom of the deer. That huge, huge, huge double rainbow growing out of the ground. I would remember these for the rest of my life. And Kosuke, and Yoshimine, and Sugi and Chikako. And above all, the one who brought up Satoru and made it possible for us to meet - Noriko. Could anyone be happier than this?”
― Hiro Arikawa, Nana Du Ký