Russian punks go commando to save Reagan
No Future
South African Punks (C) 2014
Dedicated to Pussy Riot
*
DATA LOG, Octobriana-768F android.
"The President must die, John. You have to kill him for me. That's how history is supposed to unfold."
Simulating voice of: Jodie Foster, actress (reference: Taxi Driver).
Processing.
Viewing: Subject: John Hinckley.
Processing.
Time: March 1, 1981.
Processing.
Subject Hinckley speaks:
"Then we can be together? A few months ago, when I tried to visit you at Yale, you stopped answering my phone calls. I thought it was hopeless and that we could never be together."
Reference: September 17, 1980: visit by Subject Hinckley to template-human's educational institution. Feign recollection.
"John, I was very busy. I had just started the school year. It was unfair of me to ignore you."
Processing.
Ensure Subject Hinckley does not deviate from familiar historical pattern. Affirm desirability of Ronald Reagan's death, as recorded on March 30, 1981.
"The only thing I need to convince me that you're serious about your love for me is the one last deed." Processing. Eye contact, firm pressure on right arm. "You are meant to shoot the President. Our future depends on it."
Accessing internal history files: March 30, 1981.
ABC News television broadcast. Glimpse of bloodied body of Target: Ronald Wilson Reagan. Two newspaper cameramen stumble backwards and Subject Hinckley is wrestled to the ground. White House Press Secretary James Brady lies nearby. A head wound, but he will recover. His role in the events of later years is not significant.
Newscaster Frank Reynolds speaking: "After some earlier confusion, we now have more details nailed down on today's incident outside the Washington Hilton Hotel. President Ronald Reagan is dead. He was shot and killed by a gunman--possibly mentally unbalanced, we do not yet know--named John Warnock Hinckley, Jr. The nation has not yet had time to mourn, and already the speculation begins about how this could affect the economy, negotiations with the Soviet Union, and countless other political factors. Once again: confirmed now, the President of the United States is dead."
Processing.
Subject Hinckley must not deviate from historical role. Approximate warm smile. Subject Hinckley appears happy. The hooligans must be prevented from interfering with him.
EXCERPT from interview with lead singer of the Russian band Divisigoths, from Spinning magazine, Oct. 2016:
*
SPINNING: Is it safe to assume your new album is called More because it will be a lot like your previous album, Timelines?
JIMMY SALVO (singer/bassist): No, album is called More because album marks 500th anniversary of Thomas More's stupid book Utopia.
SPINNING: Ah. Is it safe, then, to guess that this will be another big "political concept album," like Timelines, which described an alternate history in which Ronald Reagan died early in his presidency and the Soviet Union took over the world? Isn't doing these big art rock projects risky for a punk-influenced band? I think it was Dave Whitney from the band the Elizabeth Tailors who once warned, "Eight-minute songs about gnomes are just wrong."
JIMMY SALVO: Timelines was not "concept album"! Always we are saying this. Was truest pieces of what band was feeling back in 2012, when we go through some, hey, you know, really weird shit, man.
SPINNING: And by "really weird shit" you mean time travel? [laughs] Ah, so...Divisigoths are "real" time travelers sort of the way, shall we say, the band Gwar is a bunch of "real" monsters from outer space, is that fair to say?
JIMMY SALVO: Gwar is just joke for children! Divisigoths traveled through time!
ELECTRONIC MEMO to Vladimir Putin, Minister of Internal Affairs, Global Soviet Alliance, London Office, Dec. 22, 2012 (from Physics Institute Director Gurevich):
*
ELECTRONIC MEMO to Vladimir Putin, Minister of Internal Affairs, Global Soviet Alliance, London Office, Dec. 22, 2012 (from Physics Institute Director Gurevich):
It is with deepest regret that my office confirms the earlier report of an unforeseen complication at the Chernogolovka facility.
Despite my earlier objections, test subjects chosen for our initial time travel experiments were all young convicts, supposedly eager to redeem themselves in the eyes of the state by volunteering to participate. One of them was prone to the wearing of counter-revolutionary stilyagi and punk clothing and, prior to his time under the careful supervision of the Institute, was in a rock n' roll band known as the Divisigoths, calling himself "Jimmy Salvo" in an obvious attempt to suggest American aesthetic sympathies.
We believe that yesterday he broke into the facility and activated the time travel device without authorization, entering the past with three of his former bandmates. We also suspect we know his temporal destination. Salvo, according to former associates, had lately become fixated on the conspiracy theory hypothesis that if Ronald Reagan, the last American president, had not been assassinated on March 30, 1981, the Soviet Global Alliance might never have triumphed and forged a single world democratic republic.
I realize how speculative and abnormal all of this must sound--and I refer you to the enclosed diagrams in which I attempt a graphic explanation of how our present experiences might be only short-term, lingering residue of a version of history that has already been erased.
Though our current perceptions--my eyes on the words of this memo, my fingers on this keyboard--would seem to suggest that reality as we know it endures, I humbly suggest we discuss countermeasures immediately.
Loyally,
Dr. Aleksandr Viktorovich Gurevich
Director, Physics Institute
Chernogolovka
*
LINER NOTES: Timelines CD (2014). Track: "Arrival." Lyrics and music by Divisigoths. (Vocals/bass: Jimmy Salvo. Keyboards: Voltronaire. Guitarist: Pete Beast. Drums: Bonnie Wrong.)
...Fallin' down a time tunnel! (Heading to DC!)
Appallin' little mind funnel! (Fleeing your disease!)
Gotta save the President! (Like racing death on skis!)
Changing all our precedents! (The freedom-loving Russkies!)
[guitar solo]
CHORUS:
When did it all go astray?
Take this Red death mask away
Got an assassin in my sights
We've arrived--and now he will pay...
ELECTRONIC MEMO to the General Secretary of Earth, Dec. 22, 2012 (from Vladimir Putin, Minister of Internal Affairs, Global Soviet Alliance, London Office):
*
ELECTRONIC MEMO to the General Secretary of Earth, Dec. 22, 2012 (from Vladimir Putin, Minister of Internal Affairs, Global Soviet Alliance, London Office):
Our situation is both ridiculous and perilous. Ironically, I am reminded of one of the final films released by Hollywood before that city was liberated from the capitalists in 1984: Terminator. Except in this case, it is the heroes, we defenders of Soviet Communism, who must send a robot to target and kill humans who threaten everything.
With every agent we attempt to send to that same period, we add to the risk of fraying the entire timestream. If we are to send only one, the advantage of the robot is this: In addition to its near-perfect mimicry of a human, it is capable of storing literally all the information we possess about circumstances in Washington in March 1981--as well as absorbing and processing any data it encounters at incredibly high speed.
We do not know where the Divisigoths will be located or how exactly they plan to prevent the gunman, John Hinckley, from killing Reagan. We know Hinckley was unstable. If the robot can watch and guide him--encourage him--without significantly altering his plans, we may be able to shepherd history to its proper course even with active interference by Salvo and his compatriots.
Internal Affairs Agent Smyangulov has seen the robot--even interacted with it. Dr. Gurevich escorted him into its holding chamber at the Physics Institute. Smyangulov reports that he was prepared for the robot's ability to mimic human behavior with great accuracy--that direct mimicry was the source of the sudden leap forward in artificial intelligence. He was not, I think, quite prepared for the robot's beauty.
With hope for the future, Mother Russia, and our beloved Soviet Earth,
V.V. Putin
Minister of Internal Affairs
London
*
DATA LOG, Octobriana-768F android.
Processing. Processing.
Time: December 22, 2012. Footage review of Template: Jodie Foster complete. Simulating voice.
"Welcome, Dr. Gurevich. Welcome, Agent Smyangulov."
Tracking Subjects: Gurevich, Smyangulov.
Subject Smyangulov speaks: "It's uncanny. And I can talk to it? It will respond? She looks human, almost too perfectly human."
Subject Gurevich speaks: "It is vital that you interact with her, Agent Symangulov. Her training has been very, very quick. We overlaid the Jodie Foster template--particularly footage from the film Taxi Driver, with which the gunman was obsessed--on the already-existing basic human body and psyche-structure in place in all the androids. Mimicry and the constant practice created by input-and-response is what she craves, what she needs."
Subject Smyangulov laughs and speaks: "She is quite fetching. I think many Agents back at Internal Affairs would like to give her what she craves. How old are you, my dear?"
Processing.
Unit age: four months. Template response: Foster. "I'm eighteen. Just started college, Agent Smyangulov."
Subject Gurevich: "The crucial thing is not that you find her enchanting, of course, Smyangulov. The crucial thing is that Hinckley do so. If he does not and is not willing to shoot Reagan for her, she has a subroutine advising her to steal a gun and attempt to kill Reagan herself. We do not want to deviate more than necessary from the original course of events, though. Her real mission is simply to make sure that Salvo and his fellow hooligans do not get in the way of history. We should place her in the time travel chamber shortly. Reality as we may know it may start to become...indistinct soon if Salvo ultimately succeeded and we failed. I will explain in my office to you later with a few simple diagrams. I mean, if there is a later. Physics is a bit complicated."
Subject Smyangulov appears concerned.
*
PATIENT STATEMENT: self-report of John Warnock Hinckley, Jr. St. Elizabeths Hospital, Washington, DC. August 9, 1982:
I feel fine. Things are much clearer now than they were in March, at the time of the incident. There really hadn't been any trouble between me and Jodie before that. No, there had been no problems between me and the President, either. I understand now that his role in this wasn't really that important. She finally wanted to be with me. I know she did. That's the only reason I proceeded. If it hadn't been for that, I would have minded my own business, like a good citizen.
I don't fully understand what went wrong on March 30. Yes, I can tell you what happened. Jodie had ignored me back in the fall, though I wrote her letters and told her how important she is to me. That's why I began planning to do something that showed her just how important she is to me. It is very difficult to find someone who the world thinks is more important than the President. That's how the world is structured, and I understand that. It is as clear to me as it is to anyone in the hospital. I promise I know how things work. I'm not confused.
A few weeks before I--a few weeks before the Hilton Hotel incident and my arrest, Jodie began visiting me, though. She still seemed a bit...cold to me. She can seem very stiff to people who don't understand her as well as I do. But she said she was beginning to have feelings for me, that she had just been busy the previous semester. And I was right all along! She said that if I--did what I was planning to do regarding the President, she would be impressed. She would finally believe I was serious, and we could be together.
So I went to the hotel that day, and I saw the President, and all those guards. Jodie was just a few yards away. No, I know she says she wasn't there that day. I forgive her for saying that. I wouldn't want her to be caught up in all this. It wasn't really her fault. I was the one who offered her this act, this display of my love. In a sense, I'm serving time in this place for her. She doesn't have to say that to the public for me to know what's in her heart. Now she knows how serious I was. But I also understand that I can't do something like that again. When they let me leave, I won't do anything--break any laws. It was only because she wanted me to, to show that I was serious. But now she knows. She knows I'm a serious man. Life isn't all Hollywood, and she understands that.
The only thing--the only thing that makes me worry, and I--I would be very grateful to the staff, you understand how grateful, if they would allow me to communicate with Jodie, just to be sure that--I'm not sure, I mean, that I did enough. Since the President is still alive, I mean. It's good that he is. I had implied to Jodie that I would--well, that he would not be alive after he met me. He still is, but I did, well, I did use the--the weapon. I think that's enough to prove my intentions. She must understand that. But I would be grateful if you would help me find out. That would be the most settling thing for my mind. And I think we're all agreed that getting well is the important thing for me now.
I--I would have fired the weapon a moment sooner, but as I raised the pistol and saw the President and those other men, there was a commotion. It was as if there were teenagers in the crowd--bad elements--who were watching me more closely than the Secret Service was. Four of them, I think. They all slammed into me at the same time, like they had planned it. Like they knew. I had to slam them back just to get a glimpse of the President. The gun was so shaky in my hand after that. I did the best I could. I don't want to cause anyone any further bother, though.
If I could perhaps write another letter to Ms. Foster. That would help. I saw her walking away quickly as soon as the Secret Service grabbed me and the teens backed off. I'm confident she was not disappointed in me. But it would be best all around to check.
*
EXCERPT from Washington Beacon article "PRESIDENT WOUNDED BY GUNMAN," March 31, 1981:
WASHINGTON, DC - President Ronald Reagan narrowly escaped death yesterday, according to doctors who say that a bullet from a would-be assassin's gun nearly struck his heart.
In the final moment before the gunman pulled the trigger outside the Hilton Hotel, witnesses say, a small but very loud group of "punk rockers," one sporting a Mohawk and seeming to lead the group, slammed into the gunman, now identified as John Warnock Hinckley, age 25, and threw off his aim...
*
PATIENT EVALUATION: John Warnock Hinckley, Jr. St. Elizabeth's Hospital, Washington, DC. August 12, 1982:
Patient John W. Hinckley was found not guilty by reason of insanity after his March 30, 1981 non-fatal shooting of the President. Multiple hospital staff have examined Patient and concur that he is mentally unsound.
Chief amongst his delusions was the conviction that he is romantically destined to be with actress Jodie Foster, an obsession that led to him taking writing classes at Yale in 1980 in order to be near her. More troublingly, Patient seems to have entered a hallucinatory phase in early March 1981, claiming to have been visited repeatedly by Foster at his home as well as in what he perceived to be chance meetings on the street. (Foster has convincingly denied these encounters and even confirmed her location during much of that period, placing her hundreds of miles from Patient's residence.)
Patient may have projected sociopathic tendencies of his own onto the hallucinated Foster, since he claims that she spoke in an almost inhuman monotone, encouraged him to "make history" by assassinating the President--a plan of which Hinckley claims she was already aware when he first spoke to her--and that this hallucinated Foster made unusual attempts to bond with him, such as musing aloud about changes in his core temperature or the purported correlations between his mood and barely-perceptible body motions.
"I felt as if I were being studied by something not quite human," said Patient. He claims she coldly said at one point, "I can tell you're upset, John. I can tell when you're upset because your lower right eyelid twitches."
Patient says he repeatedly suggested sexual intercourse to this hallucinated Foster, but claims she rebuffed him, attributing her seeming-coldness to lesbianism. Patient has repeatedly expressed the suspicion that the hallucinated Foster was lying about her sexual orientation (staff is divided on whether this could be indicative of gender confusion on the part of Hinckley himself).
NOTE: It would likely be disorienting for Patient to hear the contents of this evaluation, and great caution should be exercised in discussing his diagnosis with him.
FILE UPDATE (7/3/85): In keeping with the Insanity Defense Reform Act of 1984, it may now be deemed to be the case that the hospital's earlier judgment of whether Patient was fit to stand trial or be subject to conventional penalties was too permissive. Under current standards, had they been applied at the time of this trial, he may in fact have been found guilty but insane. Indeed, Patient seems able to discern right from wrong, arguably making him culpable under new guidelines despite his manifestly irrational conviction that killing the President would impress actress Jodie Foster enough to secure her affections.
*
EXCERPT from The Case for U.S. Hegemony, position paper #345 from the Foundation for Security, by J.A. Hoag III, November 1996:
That Reagan was the culminating figure of the Cold War is commonly agreed. His moral and military leadership were inspirational not just to previously dispirited Americans, but also to many covert democracy activists within the Soviet Union, as attested by many after the collapse of European Communism began in 1989.
That the Soviet system would have unraveled eventually due to its economic infeasibility is certain. However, it might have lasted decades longer, conquering more territory and creating more proxy governments throughout the Third World, possibly killing thousands or even millions in the process. It was as much Reagan's moral example, and the confidence he displayed, as any concrete military expenditure that gave hope to the free world in the final years of its greatest and most protracted battle with totalitarianism.
Yet it remains unclear that America has since proven itself worthy of the legacy Reagan bequeathed. The natural tendency of a democratic society may be to lapse into mere commercial activity in the absence of an organizing principle and sense of historical mission. Commerce alone cannot fill the moral and spiritual vacuum left by the effective departure from the scene of socialism as an ideal. We must not squander this newfound opportunity by treating peace as nothing more than a chance to sell rock albums and videogames to a newly prosperous world. Rock bands, plainly, are not guarantors of freedom.
*
EXCERPT from interview with Jimmy Salvo, Spinning magazine, Oct. 2016:
JIMMY SALVO: So just moments after we stop man with gun, we bounce back to December 22, 2012, and everything is different. Everything is like this! Much happier! We notice so many funny things. In theatres is not old propaganda movie about man assassinating "evil" president--but movie about president assassinating evil man [Zero Dark Thirty]. Strange days indeed, as Lennon would say.
One of first things we do upon return to 2012 is go to see punk band called Reagan Youth. That is when we decide we stay band in new reality. It make sense to stay in America, too, since Russia and America is both very different from way we remember, which makes them confusing for us. But at least in America, as immigrants, people expect we be confused!
And our albums very popular. If we write about history or use old musical styles, that is OK, too--kids very "retro" in U.S., and Divisigoths happy to ignore past three decades, you see. We don't really know what happened in those years. Better things, though! This we know!
This world much freer, no Soviet Global Alliance. But some things not so different. When we get back, we learn punk band in prison went on hunger strike in Russia after government jail them for saying bad things about church, about government leader. So is freer there now, but not totally free.
This world too is having simpler robots but still machines are watching all the time--drones in sky, NSA computers. Is also many robots in TV shows and movies now, everywhere this idea of robots taking over, like somehow world almost remembers how things were before we change it. So many stories: Matrix "sentinels," X-Men "sentinels," replicants, HAL 9000, Terminators. Almost like some people want it to happen.
SPINNING: Speaking of robots, it seems like there's a loose end from the story of Timelines. If it all happened the way you claim [laughs], what ever became of the mechanical Jodie Foster?
JIMMY SALVO: Still you are not believing me, I think. I don't care. I have wondered myself what robot does after failed assassination. We saw it near site of assassination attempt--easy enough to tell it is not human for those of us who saw these things all the time in our version of history. But just then, with assassination prevented, we were yanked back to 2012, almost like universe know mission accomplished. But I have two theories about what might become of robot.
First, it maybe stay put in 1981 but give up trying to kill President because, hey, he already is shot--even though not dead! I have watched later Jodie Foster movies, and she seems human and she ages, but is still very stiff, I am thinking. Is she this robot? I don't know.
Other possibility, maybe robot get pulled to 2012 just like us. Have you seen this actress, calls herself Rachel Nichols? She look a lot like a young Jodie Foster and starting 2012 was in TV show about time-traveling cop. This is very suspicious, I am thinking. I don't know.
Maybe is best I stay away from both in case "Jodie Foster" or "Rachel Nichols" try to kill me. Maybe is both robot! Time travel is complicated. Could make duplicates. Some say was double of Hinckley seen in 1981, also stalking Foster and Reagan.
I watch the actress ladies on TV, though, watch for clues. Also I am seeing how everyone talk about our last album as if it is big political statement. We are not really so political! Just not free before--and now we free. So we are happy!
But still sometimes we see bits of old world...creep in, so to say. Still KGB Bar in New York City. Still Red Square Hotel with Lenin statue on top, exactly as in our world's New York City. Also these Occupy Wall Street people with the smashing the Starbucks and hating capitalism, they remind me of world I once knew. What makes me most sad, though, is we change nothing before 1981. Still 100 million people dead by Communism, most Americans don't even remember.
To change that, we might have to find way to go back to 1917. Hundredth anniversary next year! Someone in your world needs to invent time travel, but capitalist scientists too busy making shaving cream and tiny phones, I think! [laughs]
SPINNING: You say you aren't political, but this all sounds a bit political to me, even if you're hipper than the average right-winger. Come on, isn't this whole story just a thinly veiled, fictionalized version of "Conservatism for Punks," for lack of a better phrase?
JIMMY SALVO: Hey, you talking to man who changed whole space-time continuum. I'm biggest radical of all! Anarchy, man! Anarchy in USA!
*
DATA LOG, Octobriana-768F android.
Time: uncertain.
Processing. Processing. Processing. Processing.
*
Review by Bookish1
Jul 22 2014
2 of 2 liked this
Very clever
This was a fun read, a very clever time-travel tale. I had forgotten just how strange Hinckley was. I like the fact that Reagan is credited with inspiring people in communist countries to rise up. Usually Reagan is portrayed as a dotty old man. Nice story!
Review by ffleming
Mar 8 2014
2 of 2 liked this
Creative Alternate History
That was really creatively done story focusing on a potentially pivotal point in American history. I enjoyed it immensely.