[Outside The TARDIS]
The Cosmic Hobo :
Yes.
JAMIE:
Have you thought up
some clever plan, Doctor?
The Cosmic Hobo :
Yes, Jamie, I believe I have.
JAMIE:
What are you going to do?
The Cosmic Hobo :
Bung a rock at it.
NARRATOR :
It is now necessary to travel two-million years
backwards in time, to where
Ford Prefect and Arthur Dent
are stranded in the primeval past
of the utterly insignificant planet Earth.
They are faced with A Problem : in that a spaceship,
which has apparently travelled
back in time to rescue them,
can not materialise until
they have worked out
a way of sending a message
forward in time to summon it.
This is clearly a terribly convoluted
temporal paradox of
mind-mangling complexity.
Scene 3. Int. Prehistoric Earth
ARTHUR:
Perhaps we could wave your towel at it.
FORD:
You know what your trouble is Arthur?
You’ve got as much grasp of multi-temporal
causality as a concussed bee.
ARTHUR:
oh. You don’t think it would work?
FORD:
No. That ship hovering there is
only a potential ship,
the possibility of one.
ARTHUR:
We could still wave at it.
FORD:
Yeah, very friendly but
chronologically inept.
Listen, we have to send A Message
forward in time…
ARTHUR:
Yes….
FORD:
…to where that spaceship
is going to be.
ARTHUR:
We don’t know where.
FORD:
No.
ARTHUR:
We don’t know when.
FORD:
No.
ARTHUR:
And anyway, we haven’t got
a time machine.
FORD:
No.
ARTHUR:
So?
FORD:
You’re right.
ARTHUR:
What?
FORD:
We might just as well wave a towel at it.
ARTHUR:
Right. [Shouts] Hello!!
FORD:
[Shouts] Hello!!
ARTHUR:
[Shouts] Hel-looo!!
ARTHUR:
[Shouts] Spaceship!!
FORD:
[Shouts] Over here!!
FORD:
[Shouts] Just down here!!
ARTHUR:
[Shouts] Coo-eee!!
FORD:
[Shouts] Coo-eee!!
FORD:
[Shouts] Coo-eee!!
ARTHUR:
[Shouts] Coo-
ARTHUR:
Ford! It’s coming down!
Look it’s coming down to us!
FORD:
I don’t believe it.
It’s impossible
ARTHUR:
But it’s happening.
FORD:
Hey, I don’t like the look of that.
ARTHUR:
What?
FORD:
It’s wobbling. I think it’s gonna crash.
[Shouts] Fire your retro-rockets, you idiot!!
[The retro-rockets fire]
FORD:
[Shouts] Too hard!! Much too hard!!
Run Arthur! Run for your life!
Make for the hill!
ARTHUR:
What hill?
FORD:
Well there was a hill there a moment ago.
ARTHUR:
What that rather nice one with all the daffodils?
FORD:
Damn the daffodils, the whole hill’s gone!
ARTHUR:
The ground’s heaving beneath us!
FORD:
That ship’s causing a bloody earthquake.
ARTHUR:
Look the hill’s come back!
[Sound of volcano erupting]
ARTHUR:
It’s erupting!
It must be on a volcanic fault!
FORD:
[Shouts]
Watch outtttttt!
[Massive volcanic eruption and sounds of destruction, eventually tailing off into echoey silence…]
ARTHUR:
Well. We did it.
FORD:
Yeah.
ARTHUR:
We flagged down a logically-nonexistent
spaceship with a towel.
FORD:
Yeah, great!
ARTHUR:
Marvelous!
FORD:
Wonderful!
ARTHUR:
Terrific!
FORD:
Tell me Arthur..?
ARTHUR:
Yes?
FORD :
This boulder were stuck under…
how big would you say it was? Roughly.
ARTHUR :
Hmm. About the size of
Coventry Cathedral.
FORD :
Do you think we could move it?
… Ha. Just asking.
Can you feel my rucksack anywhere?
ARTHUR :
Ummmmm. Hmm. Here.
FORD :
Ya see, it’s in these sorts of situations that
it’s really good to have a guide to help you.
ARTHUR :
What?
FORD:
’The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’.
It tells you what to do in any eventuality.
ARTHUR:
What, even being stuck in a crack in the ground beneath a giant boulder which you can’t move
with no hope of rescue?
FORD :
Yeah. It’ll have something. Watch.
[The Guide starts up]
The BOOK :
What to do if you find yourself stuck
in a crack in the ground underneath
a giant boulder you can’t move
with no hope of rescue :
Consider how lucky you are that
Life has been good to you so far.
Alternatively, if Life hasn’t been good to you so far -
- which, given your current circumstances seems more likely -
- Consider how lucky you are that it
won’t be troubling you much longer.
FORD :
It’s time I did something
about that book.
