Tevun-Krus #21 - Comic SF

The Universe eXperiment - a Short by @sdfrost61

"Um, so," Mr. Anderson said, collecting his thoughts. "On his project, then. Well, to put it mildly, he was quiet ambitious. I'll have to give him that. He designed his universe. All well and good there. And then he focussed on putting together a solar system. Once again, no problems at the outset."

"If I may," said Mr. Leopold, raising his hand. "On the solar system. Did he actually build his own? Or was it, you know, ready-made?"

"Yes, you're right, Leopold," said Mr. Anderson, flipping some pages on his screen. "Ah, yes. No. He bought it. Not one of the top notch models, I have to say. His father hasn't had a good year, I believe, and he couldn't afford one of the really first-rate ones. He picked it up second-hand, if I'm not mistaken. An old Thompson unit with a star that's more or less serviceable. Perfectly within the rules."

"Yes, of course," said Mr. Leopold, pushing his seat back to cross his legs. "Just making sure we're in possession of all the facts."

"No, you're quite right to ask," said Mr. Anderson, taking another sip from his glass. "So there were no problems there. And then, again, quite rightly, he focussed on one planet. The third one from the star. He called it Earth."

"Earth?" said Mrs. Carter. "What kind of name is that?"

"Yes, rather," said Mr. Anderson. "My thoughts exactly. And believe me, it was all downhill from there. Anyway, it took him nearly a week to put the whole thing together. I mean, even Allah wasn't this slow, and he is well and away the greatest foot dragger I thought I'd ever seen."

"What took him so long?" asked the headmaster. He was surprised that universe creation could be stretched out any longer than a few hours. Especially nowadays.

"To be honest, it's a mystery," said Mr. Anderson, looking at the headmaster. "One of his problem is that he writes down every single thing in a journal."

"You mean on paper?" said Mrs. Carter.

"Yes, paper," said Mr. Anderson. "His notepad is bursting with the most detailed notes you've ever seen. That alone must have added days."

"Oh, those journals," Miss Leyland said, resting her head on the back of her chair, eyes on the ornate ceiling. "You know what he calls them? The bible. As though they're the only books in existence."

"Probably full of adolescent doodles," said Mr. Leopold.

That got some quiet laughs, and even the corners of the headmaster's mouth turned up slightly.

"If only," said Mr. Anderson, contorting his face into what passed for a smile.

"But it gets worse," he said. "After he finished the planetary development stage, he took a day off to go boating. He and Rukmini spent a day on the river as though he hadn't a care in the world."

"I'll bet Krishna was none too pleased about that," said Mr. Leopold.

"You might put it that way," said Mr. Anderson. "Krishna's rather possessive."

"Who can blame him?" said Miss Leyland. "Imagine a twit like God mooning over your girlfriend."

"Please, if we could let Mr. Anderson...," said the headmaster, his words tailing off. He resisted the urge to look at the clock on the wall.

"Yes, yes," said Mr. Anderson, paying heed to the message. "So God took a day off. Yes. Remarkable at that point of the game. Everything's in ferment. The sky, the oceans, the land, all the living species. Most other students at this stage aren't even sleeping, let alone taking an unrequited love for a paddle on the water. And I think everything would have been okay at this juncture in the proceedings had he not come up with the idea of adding into his habitat a superior species after his own form."