Doctor Who_ Ghost Ship - Keith Topping [33]
'I didn't get where I am today by backing down to lily-livered and namby-pamby concerns about consequence. My conscience is clear. Always. Where would science be if every time someone reached a point of breakthrough they stopped and spent all their effort wringing their hands in consternation and asking if they had the right to do it? It's preposterous. We'd get nothing done and all be flapping about like the dodo, waiting for our extinction to come.'
'But you must ask those questions,' I argued. 'You have that responsibility. All those of learning do. It goes with the territory. Unbridled curiosity is as dangerous a driving force as ambition or greed or lust.'
Osbourne tutted loudly, his scowling face turned away from me. Clearly, he was going to have none of it. 'Did Einstein wait to check which way the wind was blowing before he calculated the velocity of the speed of light? Did Oppenheimer's research into electron-positron pairs stop for tea and twenty questions with the local women's guild? Did Kelvin's second law of thermodynamics have to await a rubber-stamp by the procurator fiscal? And I suppose that Fracastoro's work with contagion and germ warfare was subject to approval by the Inquisition?'
Actually, I felt like observing, Fracastoro's work was subject to approval by the Inquisition. I let the matter pass. 'Have you finished?' I asked.
But he had not. 'This machine of my creation has done something that no-one else has ever achieved,' he said, proudly pointing to himself with a trembling finger. 'What do you expect? A great wailing and gnashing of teeth? No, Doctor, not from me.' He was shaking with anger now and, perhaps, a touch of excitement. 'Don't you find the achievement in the least little bit impressive, Doctor? Because, I'll tell you something for nothing, I do.'
I could not believe this man's callous conceit and disregard for the most basic human compassion. And I could not understand it either. I had tried to, but now I had given up trying. 'What's it for?' I shouted, angrily. 'Why did you invent something that causes nothing but pain and misery and suffering? What reason can you possibly have for making such an abomination?'
'Why?' asked Osbourne. 'You want to know why? Because I can!'
'That's ... ' I paused, shocked. 'A crime,' I finally added.
'Then write to your MP,' suggested Osbourne cynically. 'Have the authorities put a stop to my wicked ways ... ' He held his hands together in mock surrender. 'I'll come quietly.'
'Oh, grow up,' I told him. I stood, and the ghosts parted for me like a pair of heavy draped curtains drawing back. For a second I thought about thanking them.
Some of the shapes I could vaguely recognise from my experiences around the ship, but there were many, many others that were new to me. One, in particular, caught my attention. It was, perhaps, the most horrifying image of all: the torso and head of Simpkins, seemingly cut in half and screaming in anguish. I looked at the shimmering, barely comprehensible visitation and my anger rose to levels that, even now, frighten me. At that point, in that room, with that man sitting opposite me with a smug expression on his face, I could easily have killed.
'That hasn't happened yet,' I argued, pointing at the Simpkins 'ghost', 'This man is still alive and working on the ship at this very moment. You could have used this invention to try to save that young man's life from some future tragedy instead of damning his spirit to an eternity of imprisonment.'
'You are a weak and feeble wretch,' Osbourne said from within his shroud, his carnival tent of souls. His words echoed out to me, magnified and distorted by the curious phenomena that had engulfed him. 'I thought you were not like all the others, Doctor, but you are. Your mind is so full of concern for everyone else that you have no time to think of yourself.'
Osbourne was clearly proud of his achievements. 'The soul,' he continued. 'What is "the soul"? I should argue that it doesn't exist. I'm prepared to stake my reputation upon it.'
'Now, that