THE MISERY SEEKER

It was the happiest day of Mi Ling's life, she had just married her handsome fiancée, now husband Barry Coen, a childhood sweetheart. Mi Ling was quite gorgeous in the flowing wedding gown that her Auntie Cass had made her if she did think so herself. But so did everyone else in the reception room, she got compliments galore from the women and was swept off her feet by the men, who kept asking her to dance, being certain to kiss the bride, if only on the cheek, which was all that her new husband would allow. But that was all right, with Mi Long, since she was an old-fashioned bride who believed in 'love, honour, and obey,' your husband at all times.

As she was twirled around the room by man after man, including her husband and new father-in-law, the festive atmosphere seemed to go on forever. Then finally it was midnight and the strobe light stopped strobing, the DJ stopped DJing and packed up his gear and headed off home.

Half of the guests had already wandered off home, the other half were preparing to leave. But not before the men lined up to kiss the bride again.

"This is your second and last time," pointed out Barry Coen with a laugh.

"Spoilsport," said Donald Esk, a big burly man with dark brown hair in an old-fashioned Beatles mop top cut. Feeling uncomfortable in a tuxedo, since he usually wore his police uniform, Don walked over to kiss the bride again. Followed by Andrew Braidwood, a tall blonde man with long, for once combed blonde hair, another local cop, then Jessie Baker, a well-muscled redheaded cop. Then finally Colin Klein, a tall redheaded English reporter spending his long service leave in Australia, tracking down local legends for an intended book on the subject - and having surprisingly good luck in the Glen Hartwell to Willamby region of the Victorian countryside.

"Hey," said Terri Scott, another local cop, a tall, leggy blond of thirty-five, as Colin kissed the bride on each cheek: "You're supposed to be my date tonight."

"Sorry," said Colin going across to kiss Terri on each cheek too.

"That's better," she said, making them all laugh. "Well, we'd better be getting off too, or Mrs. Morton will be wondering what happened to us."

"No, I won't honey," said their landlady Deidre Morton, a short plumpish sixty-something brunette, for the first time since they had known her looking a little tipsy. "I'm having a wonderful time."

She took a bite from a chicken vol-au vent, grimaced then said: "Although I could have done you a nicer spread if we'd had the reception at my boarding house as I offered to do."

"I'm sure you could have Mrs. Morton," said Mi Ling laughing. "But my daddy insisted on having it here."

"I'm having a lovely time too," said Natasha Lipzing, a tall anorexically thin spinster who also boarded with them.

"Us three and four," said Freddy Kingston, a short fat balding retiree, leading over Tommy Turner, an enormously fat blonde man -- two other borders at Mrs. Morton's boarding house in Rushcutters Road Merridale.

"May kiss the...?" muttered Tommy more than a little under the weather, staggering toward a startled-looking Mi Ling Coen.

"You're not going to throw up all over me, are you?" Mi Ling asked looking worried.

"Probably," he said, collapsing to the ballroom floor instead.

"I'd advise you not to kiss him," Colin said.

"Looks like we'd better get him home," offered Donald Esk. He and Jessie Baker each grabbed Tommy by one arm to drag him to his feet again.

"Or else lock him up in the drunk tank overnight," suggested Andrew Braidwood, only half joking.

"What and have him throw up in our clean cell," said Terri Scott. "No, let Deidre clean up the mess."

As Natasha Lipzing tittered, Deidre Morton said: "Well, shame on you Terri. And just when I thought that you were a good girl."

"I am a good girl," said Terrie, making even Mrs. Morton laugh.



While people had been lining up to kiss Mi Ling, women had been lining up to kiss Barry Coen. Men to shake his hand. Including a tall thin old man, who looked a little like John Lithgow from Third Rock from the Sun and a little like Wilfred Bramble from Steptoe and Son.

Shaking Barry's hand he said: "A short life but a merry one."

"Thank you," said Barry thinking: Who the Hell is he? The man wasn't one of Barry's relatives and wasn't Asian, so he couldn't be one of Mi Ling's relatives.

Probably just a friend of her family, decided Barry. Or a gatecrasher enjoying the party. But Barry was too happy to care about that at the moment.



As they finally reached their honeymoon suite, Barry picked up a startled Mi Ling, finding that it wasn't as easy as he had expected to open the door, while carrying his bride.

Laughing, Mi Ling said: "Here, let me."

Taking the key from him, she opened the door to the second-storey apartment at the local Holiday Inn in Elroy, one of many small towns in the local area, and Barry stepped inside the lushly carpeted suite still carrying his beautiful bride.

"Here comes the bride," he sang, carrying her inside.

"If you sing, 'Big fat and wide', your wedding night won't be as much fun as you were expecting it to be, my handsome husband," teased Mi Ling.

"Oh yes, I seem to remember that you pledged to love, honour, and obey, my beautiful piece of man's chattel," he teased, Hawaiian kissing, by rubbing noses with her.

Dropping her onto the Queen-sized bed, he said: "All right my lady, remove those voluminous garments, while I stand around ogling you."

"Da der der der da der der der," she hummed, imitating The Stripper as she slowly removed her garments, until lying naked on top of them on the bed. Then spreading her legs wide, she said, "All right, now ravish me, my handsome stallion."

"In just a moment, my beautiful swan," said Barry.

As Mi Ling watched in surprise, he walked over to the widows, threw the curtains wide, then pulled the windows wide open.

"What are you doing, honey?" asked Mi Ling a little impatiently, since she had kept herself virginal for him for this special night.

Placing a wooden coffee table under the window, Barry looked at her strangely and said: "A short life, but a merry one."

"What?" asked Mi Ling sitting up a little. As he climbed up on the table, did a perfect dive out of the window, shouting:

"Geronimoooo!" as he fell to his death.



Downstairs Terri and Colin were getting ready to go, when they suddenly heard Mi Ling screaming.

"What the," said Colin Klein, as they started to run up the two flights of steps to the wedding suite, followed by staff members at the hotel.



"Mi Ling!" cried Colin hammering on the door.

"Here, let me," said the Manageress stepping forward to unlock the suite door with her passkey.

They raced into the bedroom and saw Mi Ling, still naked, standing, staring out the open window.

As the Manageress held up the wedding dress to cover the distraught widow, Colin, and the others raced over to look out through the widow. Where they saw the shattered remains of Barry Coen lying on the road below.

"Have a short life, but a merry one!" said Mi Ling hysterically.

"What?" asked Terri Scott, puzzled.

"That's what he said before jumping," shouted Mi Ling: "Have a short life, but a merry one!"

Then Mi Ling fainted on top of the wedding gown, leaving herself naked in front of the others again.



"He jumped, wasn't pushed or fell," said Jerry "Elvis" Green the coroner dressed in a smart tux, having also attended the wedding. He had arrived home again before receiving the call about Barry Coen but had not started to change yet.

"That's what Mi Ling said," said Terri Scott watching the ambulance arrive to take Mi Ling to the Glen Hartwell and Daley Community Hospital.

"Elvis, and co.," said Cheryl. One of the paramedics, a tall muscular woman with badly dyed yellow hair.

"Cheryl," said Elvis. Nicknamed due to his love of Elvis Presley, and his long black sideburns also dyed, but not as obviously as Cheryl's self-dyed hair. Then to the black paramedic who stepped out of the ambulance: "Hello, Derek."

Since Elvis was still examining the body of Barry Coen, Cheryl and Derek took away his widow, Mi Ling, leaving the second ambulance already arriving to take away Barry's body.

Standing up again, Elvis asked: "Did Mi Ling say anything else."

"No," said Terri, "but she was naked, ready for their wedding nuptials, so whatever made him jump must have happened pretty quickly."

"So no depression at the reception?"

"Did you notice any?" Terri threw back at him.

"Well, no, but I didn't know him as well as you did."

"He seemed fine, happy, elated in fact," said Terri. "They had been childhood sweethearts who had finally tied the knot and were going to live happily ever after."

"Except that at the last moment, Barry decided to throw himself out of a second-storey window?" puzzled the coroner.

"After saying to her, 'Have a short life, but a merry one!'" said Colin Klein.

"Have a short life, but a merry one!" repeated Elvis. "That sounds like something that Hollywood might have made up in a Gene Kelly or Fred Astaire movie."

"Actually it was Bartholomew Roberts, or Black Bart the pirate who said it," explained the redheaded reporter, Colin Klein.

"So why would he quote from a Welsh Pirate before jumping from a window?" asked Elvis.

As the second ambulance crew arrived, Elvis said: "Take him to the Hospital, I'll follow you there."

"Why not your morgue?" asked Terri.

"The hospital makes better coffee than I can," said Elvis. "Plus they have pretty nurses."

"Fair enough," said Terri, laughing.

As he walked away to his car, Terrie and Colin walked across to her car, opened the door, and almost threw up.

"Yuck, what's that smell?" she asked before seeing that Tommy Turner had spewed in the back seat of her Lexus."

"How do you feel about taking a taxi?" asked Colin.

"Why did you put him into my car?" she demanded of Jessie and Don.

"I didn't want him in mine," said Donald Esk, "and since you live at the same boarding house, it seemed easier."

"Thank you; I hate you," said Terri, only half joking.



It was almost two AM by the time that Colin, Terri, Freddy, and Tommy returned to Deidre Morton's boarding house in Rochester Road.

As Mrs. Moron opened the front door to welcome them, Freddy and Colin had to carry Tommy Turner into the house.

"I hope he's not going to throw up in my house?" asked Deidre Morton sternly.

"Don't worry, he's already chundered in the back seat of my Lexus," said Terri.

"Thank goodness," said Natasha Lipzing.

"The smell when we were driving home," said Freddy Kingston.

"Why didn't you open all of the windows?" asked Natasha.

"We did," said Terri, "plus the sun hatch, not that it did much good. Freddy and Colin could at least hang their heads out of the window, but I was driving."

"You poor thing," said Deidre, as the men began trying to drag Tommy Turner's limp, fat body upstairs to his room.

"I'm going to have to give him a stern talking to in the morning," said Deidre Morton.

"A stern talking to," agreed Natasha Lipzing.

"I won't have a chronic alcoholic in my house."

"A chronic alcoholic," agreed Natasha.

"Good," said Terri Scott, fuming: "The three of us can stand in line to take turns at yelling at him."

"Yelling at him," agreed Natasha Lipzing.



But the next morning, at breakfast Tommy Turner was clutching his head, moaning in agony, and swearing: "I'll never touch another drop as long as I live."

"I should hope not," said Deidre Morton.

"Hope not," agreed Natasha.

"Aaaaah!" shrieked poor Tommy as the kettle began to whistle.

"Serves you right," said Deidre.

"Serves you right," agreed Natasha.

Unlike usual Tommy was not able to eat much at breakfast, although Freddy's appetite was as ravenous as always. And Mrs. Morton did her best to feed up' Terri and Colin by piling their plates high with baked beans, sausages, bacon, fried eggs, toast, and marmalade."

"That's way too much," protested poor Terri.

"Nonsense, dear, I've got to feed you two up."

"Feed you up," agreed Natasha Lipzing.

"You're all skin and bones."

"All skin and bones."

"Er, my head," cried poor Tommy Turner.

"Here," said Deidre Morton, putting a large glass of murky-looking liquid in front of him."

"What is it?" he asked doubtfully.

"It's a well-known cure for hangovers."

"Is that the one involving milk, pepper, a raw egg, and Tabasco sauce?" asked Terri.

"That's the one."

"Er, no thanks," said Tommy.

"Either drink it, or I'll go upstairs and pack your things and get Mr. Klein and Mr. Kingston to throw you out into the street."

"Er, you blokes wouldn't do that to me would you?"

"You don't think that we have the courage to disobey an order from Mrs. M, do you?" asked Colin.

"No way," agreed Freddy.

After a second, Tommy took the glass and started to drink.

"Make sure you hold your nose as you drink it," warned Terri: "So that you can't taste it."

"Er," said Tommy staggering to his feet after finishing the drink: "I think I'm gonna spend the day in bed."

"You just do that, now," said Deidre, as Colin and Freddy had to help poor Tommy upstairs to his room.

"We'd better be going too," said Terri after they returned. She and Colin sneaked toward the front door.

"But you haven't finished your breakfasts?" protested Deidre Morton.

"Mysterious deaths wait for no man ... or woman," said Terri, as she and Colin raced outside.

"What's this?" asked Colin looking at a daggy-looking 1980s model Ford Fairlane: "Your new car?"

"No it's a loner, while I get my Lexus fumigated," said Terri. Then seeing him smirking: "And if you dare to laugh, I'll grab your happy sacks and squeeze them until they're no longer happy."

"Ooh," said Colin, "I like a strong woman, but don't overdo it, babe."



Mary and Hutch Hutchinson were walking hand in hand down Tennyson Street in Elroy when the tall, grey-haired strange approached them.

Holding out his hand to Hutch, the stranger said: "Have a short life but a merry one."

After they shook hands, the stranger walked on and Mary asked: "Who was that?"

"Damned if I know. But when a stranger wants to shake hands, it pays to do it, in case they get insulted if you don't."

They walked hand-in-hand until reaching Mortimer Road, where the traffic was much heavier. As they turned into Mortimer Road, Hutch finally released the hand of his wife of forty years, and looked strangely at her.

"What is it, Hutch?" asked Mary.

Grinning widely at her, he said: "Have a short life but a merry one."

And raced out into the speeding traffic.

The driver of the lemon-coloured Ford F-150 Raptor R truck slammed on his brakes. Too late. The Ford Raptor hit Hutch, sending the old man flying fifteen metres through the air...

Until he crashed down onto the roof of an Emerald Green Holden Commodore Ute. Killing both Hutch and the driver of the Ute.

"Hutch!" shrieked Mary, fainting on the footpath.

"Oh God!" cried the driver of the Ford Raptor. He managed to get out of his truck before throwing up.

He staggered across to the footpath, then fainted beside poor Mary Hutchinson.



Talking on the phone to Donald Esk for a moment, Colin said to Terri: "Looks like we've got another one. A bloke said to his wife, 'A short life but a merry one', then walked out into the traffic and got himself killed."

"Holy shit," said Terri, "where is it?"

"Near the corner of Tennyson Street and Mortimer Road in Elroy."

"All right, let's go," said Terri. Trying to shift gears, only to have the gear stick rrr-rrr-rrr for a moment, before reluctantly going up a gear. "Stupid pile of junk."

"Hey, Terri, this is a classic car," insisted Colin Klein. "You could probably get twenty bucks for it at a scrap yard."

"And then I'd feel like I was cheating them!"



As they pulled up near the accident scene, Donald Esk and Jessie Baker couldn't help smirking at the sight of Terri's new car.

"As I said to Colin," she warned: "Dare to laugh and I'll grab your happy sacks and squeeze until they're not happy anymore."

"And she'd do it too," said Colin. "If the term ball breaker hadn't already existed, they'd have made it up just for her."

"So, be warned," said Terri. She went across to where Elvis Green and Jesus Costello (pronounced Hee-Zeus), the chief administrator at the Glen Hartwell Hospital were examining the remains of Hutch Hutchinson.

To the green-faced Ford Raptor driver Terri asked: "What happened."

"He just walked out into the traffic. I tried to slam on the brakes, but didn't have a chance." He pointed back to his Raptor. "He flew all the way from there to here."

"His wife has already been taken to the hospital," said Elvis, without even looking up.

"Poor lady," said the Raptor driver. "She was hysterical. Not that I was any better at first."

"He just walked out without saying anything?" asked the redheaded reporter, Colin Klein.

"No, I heard him say to his wife: 'Have a short life but a merry one'."

"What?" asked Terri and Colin as one.

"That was my reaction," said Elvis finally getting up to walk over to them.

"Sounds like something from a movie."

"Actually Black Bart the Welsh pirate first said it in the seventeen hundreds," explained Colin.



The Glen Hartwell High School in Wentworth Street was having a swimming and diving meet that day. Hundreds of people had gathered to watch the fourth through sixth-form kids swimming or diving.

Visitors were supposed to stay well back behind a security rope, but no one paid much attention as the old man stepped over the rope and shook hands with the diving champion of the school.

"A short life but a merry one," said the old man shaking the eighteen-year-olds hand.

"Thank you, sir," said the youngster, wondering who the old man was.

"Hey you," called a security guard seeing the Misery Seeker, "back behind the rope already."

"So sorry," he said climbing back across the rope as instructed.

There were two divers before the champ. Then it was his turn to climb up the high tower. He walked slowly up to the diving board, then suddenly started to grin idiotically. Turning around he shouted: "A short life but a merry one."

Then he ran forward to leap off the wrong end of the platform, doing a perfect swan dive, headfirst into the concrete path below.

"Aaaaaaah!" shrieked a woman beside the Misery Seeker. Other people started running to try to help him. While others fainted or threw up.

"My work here is done," said the Misery Seeker. Turning he walked over to the gate and walked out of the pool area, then out of the school and headed off down Wentworth Street.

Quoting George Peppard in the A-Team, he said: "I just love it when a plan comes together!"



They had barely finished at the corner of Tennyson Street and Mortimer Road when Terri, Colin, and Elvis were racing toward the swim centre at Glen Hartwell High School.

"So what happened?" asked Terri Scott, as Elvis Green examined the remains of the teenage diver.

"He was running toward the diving board when he suddenly reversed direction," explained the swim coach: "Shouted, 'A short life but a merry one.' Then dived off the wrong end of the board headfirst into the concrete."

"A short life but a merry one," said Terri thinking aloud.

"That's right," agreed the swimming coach. "Is that all?"

"Yes," said Terri, before she and Colin went across to Elvis Green.

"What is it?" wondered Elvis aloud: "Some kind of a hypnotic command or something?"

Colin Shrugged, saying: "You got me."



Twenty minutes later they were at the G.H. Hospital where Jesus Costello was still examining Hutch Hutchinson, when Elvis and co. arrived with Cheryl and Derek wheeling in the diver's corpse.

Seeing the latest corpse, Elvis asked: "What is it a plague or something?"

"All we know is that there's a command phrase, 'A short life but a merry one'." said Terri. "Although how it works, we haven't figured out yet.

"Black Bart the pirate first said it in the seventeen hundreds," explained Colin.

"You don't think it's Black Bart's ghost coming back to possess them, do you?" asked Cheryl, a great believer in ghosts and hauntings.

"Did Black Bart commit suicide?" asked Jesus.

"No he was gunned down by the authorities," said Colin.

"Then I doubt that he's responsible."

"Besides, Black Bart was Welsh," said Terri. "All of the suicide-ees have said it in clear, precise English. If they'd had a Welsh accent, no one would have known what the Hell they'd said."

"Good point, well made," said Colin Klein. "If rather sarky."



At the Glen Hartwell and Daley Community Hospital Ted Munday was carefully stoking the furnace, careful to keep it hot enough, without letting it overheat. I wish they'd update to something more modern, he thought. One of those water-cooled units in every room, like they have in Melbourne hospitals.

He was carefully adjusting the controls when he heard a noise behind him. Looking around he saw the old man walk down the stairs and start across the concrete floor toward him.

"Sorry sir, but you're not allowed down here," said Ted. "It's a security regulation."

Ignoring the stoker, the Misery Seeker walked across the concrete floor, holding out his right hand toward Fred, who shook it.

"A short life but a merry one," said the seeker.

"What?" asked Ted, then repeating that the old man wasn't allowed down there.

"My apologies," said the Seeker. Turning around, he walked back across the floor then walked back up the stairs, and left the hospital as quickly as he could without attracting attention.

Ted continued to adjust the controls for a few minutes, then suddenly stopped, and said:

"A short life but a merry one." He reached for the main furnace door, which was normally never opened while the furnace was going, opened the door with his bare hands, ignoring the third- and fourth-degree burns that he got, stepped into the furnace and kept walking forward, as long as he was able to.



Upstairs in the wards, people started to complain about the unbearable heat.

"Jesus," said Annie, the Nurse-in-Charge, wiping the sweat off her brow, "it must be nearly sixty degrees in here! What is Ted doing down there."

Abandoning her patients, Annie walked across to the door to the basement, as the furnace's emergency alarm suddenly started to roar, signalling that it was overheating.

"God in Heaven," shouted Annie, racing down to the basement, followed by Jesus Costello, and three maintenance men.

"Hit the emergency shutdown button!" shouted one maintenance man.

"The what?" demanded blonde-haired Annie.

Rushing passed her, he slammed his right fist onto a large red button on the consul. For thirty seconds or so the alarms kept roaring. Then finally the furnace started to shut down, then started to cool down.

"What happened?" asked the maintenance man, then looking around he said: "The door is wide open. It's never supposed to be open when it's going."

He walked across toward the door, then stopped, gagging at the smell of cooking human flesh.

"Oh, My God!" he said, throwing up in the blast furnace.



It would be days before they knew for certain from DNA matching with his family that the human remains found in the furnace were Ted Munday's. However, the fact that he could not be located, and did not return to work, gave them the clue that it was him.



At one PM, Colin, Terri, Fred, a still woozy-looking Tommy, Natasha Lipzing, and Deidre Morton herself, were wolfing down one of Mrs. Morton's overly generous and delicious meals. When Terri's mobile phone rang.

She answered it gasping: "My God, we'll be down there ... are you sure? ... Well, okay."

Disconnecting, she said: "Whoever, or whatever it is driving people to commit suicide, just tried to blow up the Glen Hartwell Hospital by making, they think, the furnace stocker walk into the furnace while it was going."

"Oh dear, what a way to die?" said Natasha.

"More importantly," said Colin Klein, "the human body has such a high fat content, that unless it is shut down quickly, after tossing a body, including your own, into a furnace it will superheat quickly and explode."

"That's why modern furnaces have temperature gauges which set off an alarm once the temperature goes past a certain point," said Terri.

"Although it would make more sense," said Colin, "if once the temperature went past a certain point, the furnace automatically shut down." Then to Terri: So are we going?"

"Not till after lunch," said Terri. "They said Jessie Baker, Paul Bell, and Don Esk were already there, taking care of things."

"It's nice not to be needed ... for once," said Colin, getting stuck into Mrs. Morton's delicious cooking.



The Misery Seeker walked slowly through the Glen Hartwell Mall (really only a two-storey supermarket), in Boothy Street, shaking hands and saying, "A short life but a merry one," to anyone who would shake hands with him.

After ten minutes or so people started to race out of the Mall and run to their cars. "A short life but a merry one," they said as they ran, till getting to their cars.

Then they started driving around wildly colliding with other cars, backing up, racing forward to collide again, as if they thought they were in a demolition derby, not a mall car park.

Hearing the collisions outside, the mall manager, Tim Wilde walked out to see what was going on. Staring in amazement as more and more shoppers raced out of the store abandoning their purchases, or not bothering to buy anything, to jump into their cars to join the demolition derby.

"A short life but a merry one," shouted an old lady almost knocking over Tim, as she raced to her Honda Civic and started it up with a screeching of gears. Then made the mistake of driving headfirst into a yellow and black Hummer. Which was also charging at her driving straight over her Honda, crushing the Civic and the old lady inside to a pulp.

At the bus-only parking area, the driver of a tourist coach, shouting, "A short life but a merry one," started his coach, running over fifteen of his own passengers as they ran to reboard the coach. He then powered through twenty or so other people running out of the Mall. Before joining the demolition derby, taking out six or seven cars and utes, before coming a cropper himself to an eighteen-wheeler, whose driver had been making deliveries at the mall.

The eighteen-wheeler ploughed straight through the coach, then continued toward the main entrance of the Mall, just missing the manager who, more by good luck than good timing, managed to leap aside just in time. The semi tore down the stanchions of the awnings over the front entrance, smashed through the automatic doors, which weren't fast enough to avoid being shattered, then roared down the centre aisle, sending people, cans, and parcels all flying through the air.

Until it reached the end of the shop front, smashed through into the storage area at the back, and crashed into a stack of crates of boxes of canned goods. Crates, boxes, and cans all crashed down upon the cabin of the coach. Killing the driver, and finally stopping the rampage.



Outside the demolition derby was still going on, but starting to wind down as more and more of the cars were damaged beyond driving, or crushed to a pulp by bigger cars, or utes. Which in turn were reduced to tinfoil by small trucks. Which in turn were torn apart by large trucks. Which in turn were shredded beyond recognition by three buses and one more coach.



"What the holy fuck has gone on here?" demanded Terri Scott, as the cops finally arrived at the scene.

"By the looks of things, madness," said Colin Klein. "And I don't mean the wonderful SKA band."

As Terri started to walk into the mall parking lot, Colin stopped her, saying:

"Not yet. Not until the last of the vehicles have been demolished. And even then only by car."



When it was finally safe to drive through the car park, they found the mall manager, Tim Wilde, hiding behind a Wheelie Bin.

"Don't hurt me," he said, cowering as they approached.

"Relax, Mr. Wilde," said Terri: "You know me. I'm Terri Scott, one of the local cops."

"I knew most of those people too," he said waving a hand around the car park: "Until they started running out of the mall shouting 'A short life but a merry one,' before leaping into their vehicles and engaging in a demolition derby of death in the car park

"Again 'A short life but a merry one'." said Terri. "it has to be some kind of code phrase to set them off."

"But that would mean that they've all been hypnotised in some way," pointed out Colin. "And how the Hell do you hypnotise so many people, without anyone twigging what you're up to?"

"That's a good question," said Elvis Green as he, Jesus Costello, and another dozen or more medical staff arrived in all of the Glen Hartwell Hospital's ambulances.

"But it does seem as though 'A short life but a merry one' is some kind of mechanism to send them off their rockers," agreed Jesus. "But if he, she, or it hasn't hypnotised them all, then how else can such a mechanism be implanted?"

"In nanobots, or whatever they're now called," said Colin. "Either injected into them, possibly disguised as, or added to an actual vaccine. Or else fed to them."

"But nanobots would be too tiny to make them do something like this," insisted Jesus.

"Individually yes," agreed Colin Klein. "But if you programmed them to form a matrix. They could build into a large artificial brain, taking over the real brain. Each nanobot is numbered, and the numbers are linked. If they're all rectangular, say, then bot AAA10001, would only join up with AAA10002, AAA10003, AAA10004, and AAA10005, on the correct sides. Until they have formed into a complex working machine."

"The only problem is," said Elvis Green, "we haven't found any such brain matrix during any of the autopsies performed so far."

"Maybe they dissolve when the person dies?"

"Now you're just clutching at straws," said Jesus.

"He's gotcha there," agreed Terri.



It would be days before the mayhem at the Mall was entirely straightened out. Months before the Mall could be fully repaired. All the time the Misery Seeker was drawing energy from the despair that he had wrought against the people of Glen Hartwell.

Eventually, he would have to kill again but for a month or more he was happy to bask in the misery and despair that he had caused at the mall.



Back at Mrs. Moron's boarding house, the meals were still elephantine, but the conversation less so over the next week or so. Even Natasha Lipzing and Deidre Morton's attempts at matchmaking went by the wayside for a while, to the obvious relief of Terri and Colin.

Finally, however, after a month, or so there had been no more strange suicides, and things began to get back to normal.

"Maybe whoever or whatever caused all of this has moved on or died," Natasha finally suggested.

"Fingers crossed," said Deidre piling more than generous helpings of food onto everyone's plates.

Even Tommy Turner who had been on the wagon for more than a month began secretly drinking again. But only at night after going to bed and always careful to suck a few Pascall's Curiously Strong Mints before going down to breakfast each day. In fact, he had been cunning enough to start eating the mints throughout the day, so that it wouldn't cause suspicion that his breath always smelt of mints in the morning.

"Golly, you really love those Curiously Strong Mints, don't you?" said Natasha Lipzing. "Personally I find that they burn my mouth."

"Yes, they're an acquired taste," agreed Tommy. "But it's a taste that I have acquired."



After the mayhem at the shopping mall the Misery Seeker struggled to think of something that would top it. But finally, he did.

One morning when the Melbourne to Willamby train stopped at Glen Hartwell, he climbed aboard the engine, shaking hands and saying, "A short life but a merry one," to the stoker, then the driver. Before racing down to the Guards' van to do the same with the guard.

The train started with him on board, but he knew that he could not be hurt or killed, other than by starving to death if he ever found himself in a place where misery did not exist.



Early that morning, in Willamby at the Oxford Street railway station, perhaps forty people were waiting for the 9:15 train from Melbourne. However, it was only 8:54, and the train almost always came at least fifteen minutes late. So no one was expecting to hear the sound of the whistle yet. So everyone looked around to the right-hand side when the whistle started blowing furiously.

"My God," said an old-timer. "In my sixty-plus years in Willamby, I've never known the bloody train to arrive early."

"Not surprising that it's early," said the station master Ken, "it seems to be coming at quite a lick."

"Yes, it does," said the old-timer.

"Just so long as it remembers to slow down as it reaches the station," teased a beautiful forty-something brunette waiting to get on, to go down for the day to Sale.

"Hope so," said Ken. "This is the end of the line. Ain't no more. So God help us all, and the people aboard, if it doesn't slow down a might."

However, as the train continued to approach at a frightening pace, the whistle now blowing constantly, some of the people started to get antsy.

The brunette, Kelly, decided just in time to wait till tomorrow's train. Turning, she ran across to the car park, got into her Mitsubishi Magna, and took off as fast as the car would carry her.

After a moment others ran after her, some getting to their cars and getting away in time. Others were still in their cars, or outside in the car park, when the train roared into the station at a hundred and fifty kilometres an hour. It hit the wooden buffer stop, ploughed straight through it, then hit a train parked in the shunting area, and reared up like a bucking stallion.

The engine and front carriages soared half a kilometre into the air, before falling sideways to crash onto the station, mincing Ken the station master, then ripping through the gates, ticket office, and waiting area, scattering wood, iron, and bricks everywhere, before rolling across the people and cars still in the car park. It continued rolling sideways across the street, until smashing down a row of fences in Oxford Street. Then finally coming to a stop, upside down on people's front lawns.

"Oh, my God," cried a yellow-rinsed old lady, Suzie Holms-a-court as the train stopped metres short of her and her startled husband Rafe.

"Jesus," said Rafe, "there can't be anyone left alive in there."

Yet, even as he spoke, one of the emergency exit windows flew outwards, and a tall elderly man stepped out of the window frame, grinning idiotically.

"How the Hell?" asked Rafe.

"I've always been lucky like that," said the Misery Seeker, holding out his right hand which Rafe instinctively shook: "A short life but a merry one."

"Er, you too," said Rafe, not quite catching what the old man had said.

Leaving the misery seeker, they headed to the front door to get their mobile phone, then came back outside to ring triple-0 to ask for ambulances and the police. Hurriedly telling them both what had happened.



At Deidre Morton's boarding house, they had finished her scrumptious and monumental breakfast when Donald Esk and Jessie Baker turned up to tell them what had happened at the railway station in Willamby.

"Christ," said Terri, running outside to her restored Lexus, with Colin Klein in tow.



In Oxford Street, Willamby, Suzie Holms-a-court had just finished speaking on the phone when her husband went mad:

"A short life but a merry one!" he shouted. He raced across to climb the grey deal fence, then despite being nearly seventy walked along the top of it to the side of his house.

"Rafe, what the Hell are you doing?" demanded Suzie. As her husband climbed effortlessly up onto the first-floor roof, before running up to the top of the Mezzanine roof.

"A short life but a merry one!" he shouted again, then dived headfirst off the second (half-)storey roof.

"Rafe!" Suzie shrieked as her husband fell to his death. His head shattered on impact with the concrete footpath.

"A short life but a merry one," said the Misery Seeker, holding out his right hand, as he slowly walked toward Suzie.

"Get away from me you monster!" she cried. Dropping her mobile phone, which shattered on the concrete, as she raced across to run into the house, locking the front door behind her. Before racing down the corridor to make certain that the back door was also closed and locked.

"You can't escape me!" taunted the Seeker. He started towards her, then hearing sirens in the distance, he hesitated for a moment.

Finally saying, "Shit!" he walked down the side of the house, climbed the back fence and escaped into Denzel Street.



"How the Hell are we going to shift that?" asked Terri Scott as they looked at the train lying upside down in a dozen front yards. They had already started removing the bodies in ambulances and police cars, but the train itself was another matter.

"Unhook the carriages from each other, then get in a crane to lift them out one at a time," suggested Colin Klein.

"The Department of Buildings and Works in Riordan Street, Harpertown has one," pointed out Donald Esk.

"Well let's ring 'em up," said Terri.



An hour later the crane had started moving the separate carriages out into the road for later transportation to the siding in Oxford Street.

After they moved the carriage away from Suzie Holmes-a-Court's house, they saw the body of her husband lying shattered on the concrete.

"Come on," said Terri, racing over to investigate.

Seeing the police race over, Suzie risked going out to say: "I saw him."

"Saw who?" asked Colin Klein.

"The maniac who caused this. And I know how he does it."

"What!" said Terri, Jessie, Colin, and Don Esk as one.

"He holds out his right hand to shake, then says, ' A short life but a merry one'. And if you're stupid enough to shake it, after a few minutes you go crazy and kill yourself," said Suzie, having to dab at her eyes with her pinny. "That's what happened to my poor Rafe." Finally, she broke down and started crying.



"So he does it by touch," said Terri Scott, leaving Sheila, a local policewoman to stay with Suzie.

"So if we track him down," said Colin, "as long as we're wearing some kind of full-body protection, he can't harm us."

"There are those rather daggy looking full body plastic coveralls that Elvis wears while doing autopsies," said Jessie Baker.

"Who wants to spend the summer decked out in daggy-looking blue plastic coveralls?" asked Terri.

When no hands went up, Colin added: "As opposed to being driven to madness and suicide."

Still, reluctantly, everyone put their left hand up.



As they were at Mrs. Morton's putting on the plastic coveralls, Colin said: "Hey that's a great new look for you Terri. It suits you; you should wear it all the time."

"Shut up, or I'll kill you!" said the blonde, not amused.

"Ooh, who's in a bit of a moody," said the redheaded reporter, making them all laugh.



As it turned out, it did not take them long to track down the Misery Seeker, since he had hung around the site of the train crash, basking in the misery he had caused.

Seeing Colin Klein and Terri Scott approaching him in their blue plastic coveralls, wearing hoodies and full-face masks, he asked: "What are you supposed to be? The blue avengers?"

"No we're the untouchables," said Colin Klein.

"Like Elliot Ness?" asked the Misery Seeker.

"No, untouchable by you," explained Terri.

"Oh I see," said the Seeker, no longer grinning. Stepping back a pace, he spun around. To see Sheila, Paul Bell, Andrew Braidwood, Donald Esk, and Jessie Baker had all surrounded him.

"I think the expression is, 'You're nicked'." said Terri. "Doing the worst ever British accent."

"Actually London Bobbies don't say that in real life," said Colin, "only at the movies, and on TV. And please don't ever try to do a British accent again."

"Don't spoil my big moment," teased Terri.

"Sorry," said Colin.



An hour later they had the Misery Seeker locked away in a solid steel cell at the rear of the Mitchell Street Police Station in Glen Hartwell. Unlike the other cells, this solitary confinement cell had solid steel walls instead of bars.

"What are the charges against me?" demanded the Misery Seeker.

"No charges," said Terri, "since we can't possibly take you to court. No, we're just holding you here illegally until you run out of misery energy to feed off, and eventually die."

"But that's inhuman!" he protested.

"Well, you're non-human, so who are you to complain?" she said. "Besides, after all of the innocent people that you've killed, you can hardly protest about the way that we treat you."

So saying, she slammed the small iron communication slot in the steel door and locked it.

"Let's give him a week," suggested Colin Klein. "That should be enough."



Terri and Colin were enjoying one of Deidre Morton's magnificent repasts a week later. Along with Deidre, Natasha Lipzing, Freddy Kingston, and a chagrined-looking Tommy Turner, who had been caught drinking in his bedroom. Deidre had given him a stern warning, including threats of throwing him out into the street. Then she confiscated his alcohol supply and gave all the local vendors orders not to serve him anymore.

"You can't just take my liquor," protested Tommy.

"Don't worry," teased Mrs. Morton. "I'm letting you keep your Curiously Strong Mints."

"Who needs them now,' he said sulkily.

They had barely started when Don Esk and Jessie Baker arrived to tell them that the Misery Seeker had vanished from his cell. He had been looking pale, almost translucent for the last couple of days.

"Hopefully that means he's gone for good," said Terri, as Deidre invited Jessie and Donald to join in their gargantuan feast.

"Gone for good," agreed Natasha Lipzing.

THE END
© Copyright 2023 Philip Roberts
Melbourne, Victoria, Australia