'The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy' (Fit the Fifth) by Douglas Adams

ANNOUNCER:
’The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’, by Douglas Adams. Starring Peter Jones as ‘The Book’.

[Theme Tune]

NARRATOR:
The story so far: in the beginning the universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move. Many races believe that it was created by some sort of god, though the Jatravartid people of Viltvodle Six firmly believe that the entire Universe was, in fact, sneezed out of the nose of a being called the Great Green Arkleseizure. The Jatravartids, who live in perpetual fear of the time they call ‘The Coming of the Great White Handkerchief’, are small, blue creatures with more than fifty arms each, who are therefore unique in being the only race in history to have invented the aerosol deodorant before the wheel. However, the Great Green Arkleseizure theory was not widely accepted outside Viltvodle Six. And so, one day, a race of hyper-intelligent pan-dimensional beings built themselves a gigantic supercomputer called Deep Thought, to calculate once and for all the answer to the Ultimate question of Life, the Universe, and Everything. For seven-and-a-half million years Deep Thought computed and calculated and eventually announced that the answer was in fact, “Forty-Two”. And so another, even bigger computer had to be built to find out what the actual question was. And this computer, which was called the Earth, was so large that it was frequently mistaken for a planet - particularly by the strange ape-like beings who roamed its surface, totally unaware that they were simply part of a gigantic computer program. And this is very odd, because without that fairly simple and obvious piece of knowledge, nothing that ever happened on Earth could possibly make the slightest bit of sense. However, at the critical moment of readout, the Earth was unexpectedly demolished to make way for a new hyperspace bypass, and the only hope of finding the Ultimate question now lies buried deep in the minds of Arthur Dent and Trillian, the only native Earth people to have survived the demolition. Unfortunately, they and their strange companions from Betelgeuse are at the moment being shot at, behind a computer bank on the lost planet of Magrathea. This is what the computer bank is about to do:

[Huge explosion]

NARRATOR:
And the time at which it is going to do it is twenty seconds from now.


Scene 1. Int. Computer Area. Magrathea

[Lots of Kill-O-Zap weapons fire]

FORD:
The computer bank is absorbing a hell of a lot of energy!

[As the Kill-O-Zap gunfire continues, a buzzing sound begins to build as the computer bank begins to heat up]

FORD:
I think it’s about to blow.

ARTHUR:
It’s a shame we never got the work done revising the book. I think it looked rather promising.

ZAPHOD:
Yeah… what book?

ARTHUR:
’The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’.

ZAPHOD:
Oh, that thing!

FORD:
Look I hate to say this lads, but this thing really is going to blow up!

ZAPHOD:
Ok, ookay.

[Huge explosion… silence… soft dinner music fades up into]



Scene 2. Int. Milliway's

TRILLIAN:
My head.

GARKBIT:
Good evening gentlemen. Madam.

ZAPHOD:
Er...

GARKBIT:
Have you a reservation?

FORD:
Reservation?

TRILLIAN:
So this is the afterlife.

GARKBIT:
Yes sir

FORD:
You need a reservation for the afterlife?

GARKBIT:
Afterlife, sir?

ARTHUR:
This is the afterlife?

FORD:
Well, I assume so, I mean there’s no way we could have survived that blast, is there?

ARTHUR:
No.

TRILLIAN:
None at all.

ZAPHOD:
I certainly didn’t survive, I was a total goner.

ARTHUR:
I was dead too.

ZAPHOD:
Wham, bang, and that was it.

FORD:
I mean we didn’t stand a chance, we must have been blown to bits… arms, legs everywhere. xxx

ZAPHOD:
Yeah!

ARTHUR:
Yeah!

TRILLIAN:
Yeah!

FORD:
Yeah.

GARKBIT:
If you would care to order drinks…

ZAPHOD:
Kerpow! Splat! Er…

GARKBIT:
Sir?

ZAPHOD:
And here we are…

TRILLIAN:
Yeah.

ZAPHOD:
…lying dead…

TRILLIAN:
Standing.

ZAPHOD:
Er, standing dead, in this, er, desolate…

ARTHUR:
Restaurant.

ZAPHOD:
Standing dead in this…

ARTHUR:
…Five Star…

ZAPHOD:
…restaurant.

FORD:
Bit odd, isn’t it?

ZAPHOD:
Er, yeah.

TRILLIAN:
Nice chandeliers though.

ARTHUR:
It’s not so much an afterlife, more a sort of après-vie.

ZAPHOD:
Hey hang about. I think we’re missing something important here, something that somebody just said.

TRILLIAN:
About the chandeliers?

ZAPHOD:
No, something really important. Hey, hey, hey, er, you.

GARKBIT:
Sir.?

ZAPHOD:
Did you say something about… drinks?

GARKBIT:
Certainly sir. If the lady or the gentlemen would care to take drinks before dinner.

ZAPHOD:
Yeah, great!

TRILLIAN:
Yeah

FORD:
Ta-haa!

GARKBIT:
And the universe will explode later, for your pleasure.

ZAPHOD:
Hey what?

FORD:
Wow! What sort of drinks do you serve here?

GARKBIT:
I think sir has perhaps misunderstood me.

FORD:
Oh I hope not.

GARKBIT:
It is not unusual for our customers to be a little disorientated by the time journey. So if -

FORD, ZAPHOD and TRILLIAN:
Time journey?!

ARTHUR:
You mean this isn’t the afterlife?

GARKBIT:
Afterlife sir? No, sir.

ARTHUR:
And we’re not dead?

GARKBIT:
Ha. No sir. Sir is most evidently alive. Otherwise I would not attempt to serve sir.

FORD:
Then where the photon are we?

ZAPHOD:
Hey! heyy, heyyy, hey, heyyy! I’ve sussed it!

ARTHUR:
What?

FORD:
What?

TRILLIAN:
What?

ZAPHOD:
This must be Milliway's!

TRILLIAN, FORD and ARTHUR:
Milliway's?

GARKBIT:
YesMilliway's. The Restaurant at the End of the Universe.

ARTHUR:
End of what?

GARKBIT:
The universe.

ARTHUR:
When did that end?

GARKBIT:
In just a few minutes sir. Now if you would care to order drinks, I’ll show you to your table.

NARRATOR:
The Restaurant at the End of the Universe is one of the most extraordinary ventures in the entire history of catering. A vast time bubble has been projected into the future to the precise moment of the end of the universe. This is, of course, impossible. In it, guests take their places at table and eat sumptuous meals whilst watching the whole of creation explode about them. This is, of course, impossible. You can arrive for any sitting you like without prior reservation because you can book retrospectively as it were, when you return to your own time. This is, of course, impossible. At the restaurant you can meet and dine with a fascinating cross-section of the entire population of space and time. This is, of course, impossible. You can visit it as many times as you like and be sure of never meeting yourself because of the embarrassment that usually causes. This is, of course, impossible. All you have to do is deposit one penny in a savings account in your own era and when you arrive at the end of time, the operation of compound interest means that the fabulous cost of your meal has been paid for. This is, of course, impossible. Which is why the advertising executives of the star system of Bastablon came up with this slogan:

“If you’ve done six impossible things this morning, why not round it off with breakfast at Milliway's - the Restaurant at the End of the Universe!”


Scene 3. Int. Milliway's

[Applause]

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
Ladies and gentlemen… Ladies and gentlemen, friends… Welcome to the Restaurant at the End of the Universe. I am your host for tonight, Max Quordlepleen and I’ve just come straight from the very, very, very other end of time, where I’ve been hosting a show at The Big Bang Burger Chef, where we had a real wa-a-hey of an evening ladies and gentlemen, you know what I mean! And I will be with you throughout this tremendous historic occasion, the end of history itself. I just want you to think about that ladies and gentlemen, friends, thank you…

[Applause]

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
Ta-hah, well - er, nhank you, thank you. Ladies and gentlemen take your places at table, the candles are lit the band is playing and - what ma’am? Uh, yes, its, uh down the corridor, the second door on your right. And as the force shielded dome above us fades into transparency revealing a dark and sullen sky, hung heavy with the ancient light of livid swollen stars I - it’s on the right. I can see, friends, we’re in for a fabulous evening’s apocalypse! Thank you very much.

[Applause]

ARTHUR:
But look Ford, surely if the universe is about to end here and now, don’t we go with it?

FORD:
Ah, no, no, no, look, I mean, as soon as you come into this dive I think you get held in this sort of amazing force-shielded temporal warp thing.

ARTHUR:
Hmm?

FORD:
Look, look, I’ll show you…Now imagine this napkin, right? …as the temporal universe, right? And, and this spoon as a transductional mode in matter curve.

ARTHUR:
That’s the spoon I was eating with!

FORD:
Oh alright, imagine, imagine this spoon as the, as the transductional mode in the matter curve - no, no, better still, this fork -

ZAPHOD:
Hey could you let go of my fork please?

FORD:
Well, look, look, Look, why don’t we say this wine glass is the temporal universe so if I sort of…

[He demonstrates, but loses his grip and the glass smashes to the floor]

FORD:
Yeah, well, Forget that. I mean do you know how the universe began for a kick off?

ARTHUR:
Well probably not

FORD:
Alright imagine this: you get a large round bath made of ebony.

ARTHUR:
Where from? Harrod’s was destroyed by the Vogons.

FORD:
Well it doesn’t matter -

ARTHUR:
So you keep saying!

FORD:
No, No listen. Just imagine that you’ve got this ebony bath, right? And it’s conical.

ARTHUR:
Conical? What kind of bath is -

FORD:
No, no, shh, shhh, it’s, it’s, it’s conical okay? So what you do, you fill it with fine white sand right? Or sugar, or anything like that. And when it’s full, you pull the plug out and it all just twirls down out of the plug hole… but the thing is…

ARTHUR:
Why?

FORD:
No, the clever thing is that you film it happening. You get a movie camera from somewhere and actually film it. But then you thread the film in the projector backwards.

ARTHUR:
Backwards?

FORD:
Yeah, neat you see. So what happens is you sit and you watch it and then everything appears to swirl upwards, out of the plug hole and fill the bath… amazing.

ARTHUR:
And that’s how the universe began?

FORD:
No. But it’s a marvellous way to relax.

TRILLIAN:
Funny man.

FORD:
Well it broke the ice didn’t it?

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
[Blows into microphone]> And as the photon storms gather in the swirling clouds around us, preparing to tear apart the last of the red hot, hot suns, I hope you’ll all settle back and enjoy with me what I am sure we will all find an immensely exciting and terminal experience. Believe me ladies and gentleman, there’s nothing penultimate about this one you know what I mean! Ha! This ladies and gentleman is the proverbial it.

[Applause]

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
Now Thank you. And after this there is void. Absolute nothing… except, of course, for the sweet trolley and our fine selection of Aldebaran liqueurs. And now, at the risk of putting a damper on the wonderful sense of doom and futility here, well I’d like to welcome a few parties. Now, do we have a party here, do we have a party here from the Zansellquasure Flamarion Bridge Club from beyond the Vortvoid of Qvarne? Are they here?

[Cheers]

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
Yes… ah……Oh that’s wonderful, waving their qvarne streamers in the air. Good! Jolly Good! And a party of minor deities from the Halls of Asgard?

[Cheers, applause, and the sound of thunderbolts]

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
hen-heh… Ouch! That hurt. Still we’re all friends at the end of the universe. Now, do we have here a party of young conservatives from Sirius B?

[Barking, growling, and howling]

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
Hmmm… Yes, yes we do… And lastly, a party of devout believers from the Church of the Second Coming of the Great Prophet Zarquon? Well fellas, lets hope he’s hurrying because he’s only got eight minutes left! Ta-hinh-ha!

[Laughter]

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
Ha…No, seriously though, no seriously, no, please, please. I mean no offence meant because I know, we shouldn’t make fun of, deeply held beliefs. So I think, a big hand please, for the Great Prophet Zarquon…. where ever he’s got to.

[Laughter and applause]

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
Okay Thank you, thank you. I just want to say how marvellous it is to see how many of you come here time and time again…

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
As the final death-throws…

GARKBIT:
Uh, excuse me sir.

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
…of nature begin…

ZAPHOD:
Who me?

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
…their…

GARKBIT:
Mister Zaphod Beeblebrox?

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
…In just a few moments…

ZAPHOD:
Uh, yeah.

GARKBIT:
There’s a phone call for you.

ZAPHOD:
Hey what?

TRILLIAN:
Here?

ZAPHOD:
Hey-uh-heyy, but wh-who knows where I am?

TRILLIAN:
Zaphod! Perhaps it’s the police! Could they have traced us here?

ZAPHOD:
You mean they want to arrest me over the phone? Could be, I’m a pretty dangerous dude when I’m cornered.

FORD:
Oh yeah, you go to pieces so fast that people get hit by the shrapnel.

[Laugher from crowd in background]

GARKBIT:
I am not personally acquainted with the metal gentleman in question, sir -

TRILLIAN:
Metal?

GARKBIT:
…but I’m informed that he has been awaiting your return for a considerable number of millennia. It seems you left here somewhat precipitously.

ZAPHOD:
Hey, “left here”? We’ve only just arrived.

GARKBIT:
Indeed sir. But before you arrived here sir, you left here.

ZAPHOD:
You’re saying that before we arrived here, we left here?

GARKBIT:
That is what I said sir.

ZAPHOD:
Put your analyst on danger money baby, now.

FORD:
No, no, no, no, wait a minute. Where exactly is here?

GARKBIT:
The planet Magrathea sir.

FORD:
But we just left there! This is The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, I thought.

GARKBIT:
Precisely sir. The one was constructed on the ruins of the other.

ARTHUR:
Ahhh! You mean we’ve travelled in time, but not in space!

ZAPHOD:
Listen you semi-evolved simian, go climb a tree, won’t you!

ARTHUR:
Oh go and bang your heads together, four eyes!

GARKBIT:
No, no, your monkey has got it right sir.

ARTHUR:
Who are you calling a monkey?!

GARKBIT:
You jumped forward in time many millions of years, while retaining the same position in space. Your friend has been waiting for you in the mean time.

FORD:
Well what’s he been doing all the time?

GARKBIT:
Rusting a little sir.

TRILLIAN:
Marvin! It must be Marvin!

FORD:
The paranoid android!

ZAPHOD:
Space cookies! Oh, hand me the rap-rod, plate captain!

GARKBIT:
Pardon sir?

ZAPHOD:
Pass the phone, waiter. Gee you guys are so un-hip it’s a wonder your bums don’t fall off.

GARKBIT:
Our what sir?

[The telephone is set on the table]

GARKBIT:
The phone sir.

ZAPHOD:
Marvin! Hi, how you doing kid?

MARVIN:
[On telephone] I think you ought to know I’m feeling very depressed.

ZAPHOD:
Hey, yeah? We’re having a great time: food, wine, a little personal abuse, and the universe going foom. Where can we find you?

MARVIN:
[On telephone] You don’t have to pretend to be interested in me you know. I know perfectly well I’m only a menial robot -

ZAPHOD:
yeah, okay, okay, but, uh, where are you?

MARVIN:
[On telephone] “Reverse primary thrust, Marvin”, that’s all they say to me. “Open airlock number three, Marvin.” “Marvin, can you pick up that piece of paper?” Can I pick up that piece of paper! Here I am, brain the size of a planet…

ZAPHOD:
Yeah, yeah, uh

MARVIN:
[On telephone] ’m quite used to be humiliated. I can even go stick my head in a bucket of water if you’d like.

ZAPHOD:
yeah, uh Marvin?

MARVIN:
[On telephone] Would you like me to go and stick my head in a bucket of water? I’ve got one ready. Wait a minute.

FORD:
What’s he saying, Zaphod?

ZAPHOD:
Oh, nothing.

[Audible over the telephone is the sound of Marvin sticking his head in a bucket of water]

ZAPHOD:
He just phoned up to wash his head at us.

MARVIN:
[On telephone] Has that satisfied you?

ZAPHOD:
Will you please tell us where you are!

MARVIN:
[On telephone] I’m in the car park.

ZAPHOD:
In the car park!? What are you doing there?

MARVIN:
[On telephone] Parking cars what else do you do in the car park?

ZAPHOD:
well, yeah, yeah, okay. Stay there. [He hangs up the telephone] C’mon guys let’s go. Marvin’s down in the car park.

ARTHUR:
The car park? What’s he doing in the car park?

ZAPHOD:
Parking cars. What else dum-dum? Hey Ford, C’mon Trillion, let’s move.

ARTHUR:
What about my Pears Galumbit?

[They head downstairs into the car park]

TRILLIAN:
There he is! Marvin!

ZAPHOD:
Marvin! Hey kid, are we pleased to see you.

MARVIN:
No you’re not, no one ever is.

ZAPHOD:
Suit yourself.

TRILLIAN:
No really Marvin, we are

ARTHUR:
Quite.

TRILLIAN:
Hanging, around waiting for us all this time!

MARVIN:
The first ten-million years were the worst. And the second ten-million - they were the worst too… The third ten-million, I didn’t enjoy at all. After that I went into a bit of a decline.

FORD:
Hey Zaphod, come and have a look at some of these neat star trolleys! Look at this baby, Zaphod. The tangerine star buggy with black sunbusters…

ZAPHOD:
Hey get this number! Multi-cluster quark drive, perspulex running-boards. This has got to be a Lazlar LyriKon Kustom job. Look! The infra-pink lizard emblem on the neutrino cowling.

FORD:
Oh yes! And I was passed by one of these mothers once out near the Axel Nebula. I was going flat out and this thing just strolled past me, star drive hardly ticking over, just incredible!

ZAPHOD:
Too much.

FORD:
Ten seconds later it smashed straight into the third moon of Jaglan Beta.

ZAPHOD:
Hey right?

FORD:
Yeah! But a great looking ship though. Looks like a fish, moves like a fish, steers like a cow.

ZAPHOD:
No kidding!

FORD:
No. Oh, wait a minute, wait a minute! That one there.

ZAPHOD:
Hey-yeah! Now that is really bad for the eyes!

FORD:
I mean it’s so black! You can hardly even make out its shape. Light just falls into it.

ZAPHOD:
And feel this surface.

FORD:
Yeah! … Hey, hey you can’t!

ZAPHOD:
See? It’s totally frictionless. Oh this must be one mother of a mover. I bet even the cigar lighter’s on photon drive, well whadda ya reckon Ford?

FORD:
What? You mean… stroll off with it? Do you think we should?

ZAPHOD:
No. Let’s do it.

FORD:
Okay.

ZAPHOD:
We better shift soon, in a few seconds the universe will end and all the captain creeps will be pouring down here to find their bourge-mobiles

FORD:
Zaphod.

ZAPHOD:
Yeah?

FORD:
How do we get into it?

ZAPHOD:
Just don’t spoil a beautiful idea will you Ford!?

FORD:
Perhaps the robot can figure something out.

ZAPHOD:
Yeah. Hey Marvin! Come on over we’ve got a job for you!

MARVIN:
I won’t enjoy it.

ZAPHOD:
Oh yes you will, there’s a whole new life stretching out in front of you!

MARVIN:
Oh, not another one.

ZAPHOD:
Will you shut up and listen? This time there’s gonna be excitement, and adventure, and really wild things!

MARVIN:
Sounds awful.

ZAPHOD:
Marvin! All I’m trying to say is -

MARVIN:
I suppose you want me to open this spaceship for you.

ZAPHOD:
Marvin! Just listen will you! What?

MARVIN:
I suppose you want me to open this spaceship for you.

ZAPHOD:
Oh, er, yeah, yeah, yeah, that… er… that’d be… er…

MARVIN:
Well I wish you’d just tell me rather than try an’ engage my enthusiasm because I haven’t got one.

[Spaceship door opens]

FORD:
Hey, how’d ya do that, Marvin?

MARVIN:
Didn’t I tell you? I’ve got a brain the size of the planet. No one ever listens to me of course.

ZAPHOD:
Shut up Marvin.

MARVIN:
See what I mean?

FORD:
Hey, Zaphod look at this! Look at the interior of this ship!

ZAPHOD:
Hey, weird!

FORD:
I mean it’s black, everything in it is just totally black!


Scene 4. Int. Milliway's

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
And now ladies and gentleman, the moment you’ve all been waiting for.

[Soft drum roll]

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
The skies begin to boil.

[Louder drum roll]

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
Nature collapses into the screaming void.

[Louder drum roll]

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
In five seconds time, the Universe itself will be… at an end.

[Drum roll]

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
See friends, see! Where the light of infinity bursts in upon us!

CHOIR:
[Singing] Halll-e-lu-yah!

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
Hunh?

CHOIR:
[Singing] Halll-e-lu-yah!

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
What?… What’s happening here?

CHOIR:
[Singing] Halll-e-lu-yah! Halll-e-lu-yah! Halll-e-lu-yah!

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
Who’s this?

CHOIR:
[Singing] Halll-e-lu-yah!

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
I don’t believe it!

[Applause]

CHOIR:
[Singing] Halll-e-lu-yah!

MAX QUORDLEPLEEN:
A big hand please, for the Great Prophet Zarquon.

CHOIR:
[Singing] Halll-e-lu-yah! Halll-e-lu-yah!

ZARQUON:
Hello everybody.

CHOIR:
[Singing] Halll-e-lu-yah! Halll-e-lu-yah!

ZARQUON:
Sorry I’m a bit late, had a terrible time… All sort of things cropping up at the last moment. How are we for time? Umm -

[The universe explodes]

NARRATOR:
And so the universe ended. One of the major selling points of that wholly remarkable book, The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - apart from its relative cheapness and the fact that has the words “Don’t Panic” written in large, friendly letters on the cover - is its compendious and occasionally accurate, glossary. For instance, the statistics relating to the geo-social nature of the universe are all deftly set out between pages 576,324 and 576,326. The simplistic style is partly explained by the fact that its editors, having to meet a publishing deadline, copied the information off the back of a packet of breakfast cereal, hastily embroidering it with a few foot notes in order to avoid prosecution under the incomprehensibly torturous Galactic Copyright Laws. It’s interesting to note that a later and wilier editor sent the book backwards in time, through a temporal warp, and then successfully sued the breakfast cereal company for infringement of the same laws. Here is a sample in both Headings and footnotes.

The universe. Some information to help you live in it.

One: ‘Area’. Infinite. As far as anyone can make out

Two: ’Imports’. None. It’s impossible to import things into an infinite area, there being no outside to import things in from.

Three: ‘Exports’. None. See ’Imports’.

Four: ‘Rainfall’. None. Rain can not fall because in an infinite space there is no up for it to fall down from.

Five: ‘Population’. None. It is known that there are an infinite number of worlds, but that not everyone is inhabited. Therefore, there must be a finite number of inhabited worlds. Any finite number divided by infinity is as near to nothing as makes no odds. So, if every planet in the universe has a population of zero, then the entire population of the universe must also be zero, and any people you may actually meet from time to time are merely the products of a deranged imagination.

Six: ‘Monetary Units’. None. In fact, there are three freely convertible currencies in the universe, but the Altairian Dollar has recently collapsed, the Flainian Pobble Bead is only exchangeable for other Flainian Pobble Beads, and the Triganic Pu doesn’t really count as money. It’s exchange rate of six Ningis to one Pu is simple, but since a Ningi is a triangular rubber coin six-thousand, eight-hundred miles long each side, no one has ever collected enough to own one Pu. Niginis are not negotiable currency because the Galactic Banks refuse to deal in fiddling small change. From this Basic premise it’s very simple to prove that the Galactic Banks are also the products of a deranged imagination.

Seven. ‘Sex’. None. Well - actually, there is an awful lot of this. Largely because of the total lack of money, trade, banks, rainfall, or anything else that might keep all the nonexistent people in the universe occupied. However, it’s not worth embarking on a long discussion of it now, because it really is, terribly complicated. For further information See Chapters Seven, Nine, Ten, Eleven, Fourteen, Sixteen, Seventeen, Nineteen, Twenty-One to Eighty-Four inclusive, and… most of the rest of the book. It’s largely, on the account of passages like this, that the book of The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’ is being revised by Ford Prefect and Arthur Dent. Unfortunately, they are being presented with too many distractions to be able to settle down to doing any solid research. Not only does Arthur Dent still have to find the Question to the Ultimate Answer of Life, the Universe, and Everything, but the newly-stolen spaceship is currently behaving rather like this:


Scene 5. Int. Spaceship

[The sound of a spaceship in trouble. Under the noise we hear our heroes]

ARTHUR:
Basically what you’re trying to say is that you can’t control it.

FORD:
I’m not trying to say that, the whole bloody ship is!

ZAPHOD:
It’s the wild colour scheme that freaks me. I mean, when you try an’ operate one of these weird black controls which are labelled in black on a black background, a small black light lights up black to tell you you’ve done it. What is this? Some kind of intergalactic hyper-hearse?

TRILLIAN:
Well perhaps it is.

ARTHUR:
Isn’t there anyway you can control it? You’re making me feel space sick.

FORD:
Time sick. We’re plummeting backwards through time.

ARTHUR:
Oh god! Now I think I really am going to be ill.

ZAPHOD:
Go ahead, we could do with a little colour around the place.

TRILLIAN:
Oh for god’s sake Zaphod! Go easy will you? Already today we’ve had to sit through the end of the universe, and before that we were blasted five-hundred-and-seventy-six-thousand years through time by an exploding computer.

MARVIN:
It’s alright for you, I had to go the long way ‘round.

ARTHUR:
How did that happen anyway? How does an exploding computer push you through time?

MARVIN:
Very simple. It wasn’t a computer it was a hyper-spatial field generator.

ARTHUR:
Silly, I should have recognised it at once.

MARVIN:
As it overheated it blew a hole through the space-time continuum and you dropped through like a stone through a wet paper bag…. I hate wet paper bags.

TRILLIAN:
Hey, that sounds better! Have you managed to make some sense of the controls?

FORD:
No, we just stopped fiddling with them. I think this ship has a far better idea of where it’s going than we do.

ARTHUR:
Well that sounds quite sensible to me.

ZAPHOD:
What do you know about it ape-man?

ARTHUR:
Well Look! If whoever owns this ship travelled forward in time to The Restaurant at the End of the Universe then presumably he must have programmed the ship in advance to return him to the exact point he originally left. Doesn’t that make sense?

FORD:
That’s quite a good thought you know. Particularly if he was anticipating having a good time. Drunk in charge of a time ship is a pretty serious offence. They tend to lock you away in some planet’s stone age and tell you to evolve into a more responsible life-form.

TRILLIAN:
So there’s nothing to do but sit back and see where we turn up. Well what do we do in the meantime?

ARTHUR:
I’ve got a Pocket-Scrabble set.

ZAPHOD:
Go play with a nut.

ARTHUR:
Well if that’s your attitude!

ZAPHOD:
Hey look Earthman, you’ve got a job to do remember? The Question to the Ultimate Answer right? I mean there’s a lot of money tied up in that head thing of yours, I mean, just think of the merchandising: Ultimate Question T-shirts, Ultimate Question Biscuits…

ARTHUR:
Well, yes!

ARTHUR:
But where do we start?! I don’t know! The Ultimate Answer so-called is “Forty-Two”! Well what’s the question? How am I supposed to know?! Could be anything! I mean, “What’s six times seven?”

FORD, ZAPHOD and TRILLIAN:
Er… Forty-two!

ARTHUR:
Yes, I know that! I’m just saying the question could be anything! How should I know?

FORD:
Because you and Trillian are the last generation products of the Earth computer matrix, You must know!

MARVIN:
I know.

FORD:
Shut up, Marvin, this is organism talk.

MARVIN:
It’s printed in the Earthman’s brainwave patterns, but I don’t suppose you’ll be very interested in knowing that.

ARTHUR:
You mean you can see into my mind?

MARVIN:
Yes.

ARTHUR:
And?

MARVIN:
It amazes me how you manage to live in anything that small.

ARTHUR:
Ah. Abuse!

MARVIN:
Yes.

ZAPHOD:
Oh, ignore him, he’s only making it up.

MARVIN:
Making it up? What should I want to make anything up? Life’s bad enough as it is without wanting to invent any more of it.

TRILLIAN:
Marvin if you knew what it was all along why didn’t you tell us?

MARVIN:
You didn’t ask.

FORD:
Well we’re asking you now, metal-man, What’s the question!?

MARVIN:
The Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything?

FORD, ARTHUR, ZAPHOD and TRILLIAN:

MARVIN:
To which the answer is forty-two?

FORD, ZAPHOD and TRILLIAN:

MARVIN:
I can tell that you’re not really interested.

FORD:
Will you just tell us you motorised maniac!?
[Electronic noise]

ARTHUR:
Oh, look the control panel’s lighting up! We must’ve arrived!

ZAPHOD:
Hey yeah, we’ve zapped back into real space.

MARVIN:
I knew you weren’t really interested.

FORD:
The controls won’t respond. It’s still going its own way. Isn’t there anyway we can introduce this ship to the concept of democracy?!

TRILLIAN:
Can we at least find out where we are?

ARTHUR:
The vision screens are all blank, can’t we turn them on?

FORD:
They are on.

ARTHUR:
Why can’t we see any stars?

ZAPHOD:
Hey, ya know, I think we must be outside the galaxy.

FORD:
We’re picking up speed! We’re heading out into intergalactic space! Arthur, check out the rear screens will you?

TRILLIAN:
I feel cold, all alone in this infinite void.

ARTHUR:
Apart from the fleet of black battle cruisers behind us.

TRILLIAN:
What?

FORD:
What fleet?

ZAPHOD:
Uhmmm, er, which, er, particular fleet of black battle cruisers is that Earthman?

ARTHUR:
Oh! The ones on the rear screens. Sorry, I though you’d noticed them. There are about a hundred-thousand. Is that wrong?

MARVIN:
No. What do you expect if you steal the flagship of an admiral of the space fleet?

ZAPHOD:
Marvin! W-what makes you think this is an admiral’s flagship?

MARVIN:
I know it is, I parked it for him.

ZAPHOD:
[Yells] Then why the planet of hell didn’t you tell us?!

MARVIN:
You didn’t ask.

FORD:
You know what we’ve done? We’ve dropped ourselves into the vanguard of a major intergalactic war.

{Dramatic cord}

NARRATOR:
Will our heroes ever have a chance to find out what the Ultimate Question is? Will they be too busy dealing with a hundred thousand horribly beweaponed battle cruisers to have a chance to have a sympathetic chat with Marvin, the paranoid android? Will they eventually have to settle down and lead normal lives as account executives or management consultants? Will life ever be the same again after next week’s last and - reasonably exciting - instalment of ’The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’?

ANNOUNCER:
In that episode of ’The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’, Peter Jones was The Book. Anthony Sharp was Garkbit the Waiter and Zarquon the Prophet; and Roy Hudd, Compeer at The Restaurant at the End of the Universe. With Simon Jones, Arthur Dent; Geoffrey McGivern, Ford Prefect; Mark Wing-Davey, Zaphod Beeblebrox; Susan Sheridan, Trillian; and Stephen Moore, Marvin. The program was written by Douglas Adams and John Lloyd, and produced by Geoffrey Perkins, with the assistance of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop. If you would like a copy of the book, ’The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’, please write to Megadodo Publications, Megadodo House, Ursa Minor. Enclosing three pounds, ninety-five for the book plus five-hundred-and-ninety-seven-million, eight-hundred-and-twelve-thousand, four-hundred-and-six pounds, seven-p, postage and packing.

TX:
BBC Radio 4:
5th April 1978

Notes:
*Featuring Arthur Dent, Ford Prefect, Zaphod Beeblebrox, Trisha 'Trillian' McMillan and Marvin