Literary Pastiche

Joesph Gregor K sat on the windowsill wondering what to do. Joesph wanted more than anything to jump. Incensed at the thought of having to spend another minute in the dreaded castle, any alternative seemed preferable to him. But K was not so sure. The distance from the window to the ground was thirty metres, at least. What if the jump went wrong? He didn’t dare imagine such a prospect. He would have loved to escape, but sometimes, well you just had to say no. And he didn’t want to let that bully Joseph get the better of him every time. He had no intention of ending up flattened on the courtyard below like a strawberry jam pancake, damp and sticky to the touch.

Gregor sighed. He was beginning to get tired of having taking on the role of tie-breaker. Yet, like it or not, if a decision was to be taken, then he would have to take it. Of course, for him the height was no problem, not since the days when his feats as Samson the Great were cut horribly short by waking up one day to discover nothing but a beetle in his bed. He looked out across the vast space that separated their tower from the administration block where a computer had just flickered into life. Not a mac, nor a linux but a genuine windows one… windows to a new life… windows which called out to be explored.

Gregor explained his plan as best he could. K agreed at once. He would back any plan which meant escape and which didn’t involve the risks of jumping from a height. But Joseph was adamant. No way was he going to risk further nightmarish happenings. Who knows what lay in the depths of the virtual world where, for all he knew, evil minds lurked behind every screen. If risk they had to take, then he wanted to take them in the real world.

Joseph and K clashed. Mind games turned to insults and the insults gave way to violence as fists flew between the two. Gregor was horrified. The unity he had spent so long building up, the unity which was their only chance of escape, was coming apart before his very eyes. He skidded into the fray in a bid to separate the two. But he pushed too hard. K went flying out of the window. Joseph and and Gregor looked down into the depths. All they could see was a pancake ready for consumption. And for once, they took no time in agreeing upon the inscription they would write on K’s tombstone:

Kafkaesque
in life
and
in death