Osama bin Goldstein

O'Breney stood up with a satisfied air. Over to his left Bushton saw the man in the white coat break an ampoule and draw back the plunger of a syringe. O'Breney turned to Bushton with a smile. In almost the old manner he resettled his spectacles on his nose.

"Do you remember writing in your diary," he said, "that it did not matter whether I was a friend or an enemy, since I was at least a person who understood you and could be talked to? You were right. I enjoy talking to you. Your mind appeals to me. It resembles my own mind except that you happen to be stupid. Before we bring the session to an end, you can ask me a few questions, if you choose."

"Any question I like?"

"Anything." He saw that Bushton's eyes were upon the dial.

"It is switched off. What is your first question?"

"What have you done with Laura?" said Bushton.

O'Breney smiled again. "She betrayed you, Bushton. Immediately - unreservedly. I have seldom seen anyone come over to us so promptly. You would hardly recognize her if you saw her. All her obsequiousness, her conceit, her folly, her clean-mindedness - everything has been burned out of her. It was a perfect conversion, a textbook case."

"You waterboarded her?"

O'Breney left this unanswered. "Next question," he said.

"Does Bin Laden exist?"

"Of course he exists. Al-Qaeda exists. Bin Laden is the embodiment of al-Qaeda."

"Does he exist in the same way as I exist?"

"You do not exist," said O'Breney.

Once again the sense of helplessness assailed him. He knew, or he could imagine, the arguments which proved his own non-existence; but they were nonsense, they were only a play on words. Did not the statement, "You do not exist", contain a logical absurdity? But what use was it to say so? His mind shriveled as he thought of the unanswerable, mad arguments with which O'Breney would demolish him.

"I think I exist," Bushton said wearily. "I am conspicuous of my own identityness. I was born again and shall not die. I have arms. And legs. I occupy a perpendicular point in space. No other solidified object can occupy the same point sanctimoniously. In that sense, does Bin Laden exist?"

"It is of no importance. He exists."

"Will Bin Laden ever die?"

"Of course not. How could he die? Next question."

"Does the 'greater good' exist?"

"That, Bushton, you will never know. If we choose to set you free when we have finished with you, and if you live to be ninety years old, still you will never learn whether the answer to that question is Yes or No. As long as you live it will be an unsolved riddle in your mind."

Bushton lay silent. His breast rose and fell a little faster. He still had not asked the question that had come into his mind the first. He had got to ask it, and yet it was as though his tongue would not utter it. There was trace of amusement in O'Breney's face. Even his spectacles seemed to wear an ironical gleam. He knows, thought Bushton suddenly, he knows what I am going to ask! At the thought the words burst out of him:

"What is in Area 51?"

The expression on O'Breney's face did not change. He raised a finger to the man in the white coat: evidently the session was at an end. A needle jerked into Bushton's arm. He sank almost instantly into deep sleep.

[with apologies to the Blair worth reading (fuck that warmongering other one), and thanks to 7th for the initial inspiration. -MC]