Lord Vetinari, Meet George Dubya
Chapter, The Sixth
By: Twist
A/n: Hola. I'm very, very sorry for the delay but Tony Blair had me so tied up that I dropped it and had a frustration issue. So finally, I have stopped playing Patrician 2 for more than an hour and become determined to post this. Note: If Tony Blair acts nothing like he does in real life, please don't become angry with me. I'm working with what meager information I have.
Disclaimer: I own absolutely nothing. Nada. Zip. Except what my tax dollars paid for. Wha! I own that, bweehee.
***
Lord George Dubya Bush, Patrician of Ankh-Morpork, gaped at Drumknott. "Where do I have to be again?" he asked, hardly believing what he had just heard.
"You must be in attendance in the Rats' Chamber in several minutes due to a meeting of the City Council. It's an official meeting, sir." Drumknott gave him a suspicious look, "I thought I'd remind you because you're usually down there by now, sir." Dubya nodded.
"Of course I am, I just got a little caught up in my, um, work. Thanks for reminding me." He stood up, trying and failing to conceal the fact that he was embarrassed about wearing trousers that no one could see. In fact, when he'd looked in a mirror, he appeared in all respects to be wearing a dress. As George began to walk down to the Rats' Chamber, Drumknott cleared his throat.
"Sir, you're not the actual Patrician, are you?" In the UU, Arch-Chancellor Ridcully leaned back and sucked a turkey leg. Far off in Lancre, a fox's ears pricked and it was seen tearing back to a tumbledown cottage.
George paled as he always does when faced with a difficult question. "Um, what makes you think that, Drumstring?"
"Drumknott, sir. I think that because first of all, you do not look like Lord Vetinari. And you are also more easily confused than his Lordship. And I've never known the Patrician to forget a meeting."
George sighed. "Listen, I didn't want to. There's some insane teenager somewhere and she put us into this." He watched the twisted grin form on Drumknott's face. Unlike Lord Vetinari, whose 'wife' had figured the same thing out, Drumknott was raised in Ankh-Morpork and therefore was not in the habit of keeping secrets and being nice to people who technically are not in charge of him.
"Oh, alright then," he said personably. "I'll just go and organize things, shall I?" Drumknott gave George the evilest look he the President had ever seen. Then he walked away, not the clerky sort of walk George had become accustomed to but a kind of stalk, not unlike the walk he'd seen Vetinari use. He gulped.
"Oh dear, I stepped in it now."
***
Joseph (Havelock) Vetinari, President of the Unites States of America, woke up when something buzzed. He'd been asleep, which was startling enough, but, he realized, what was even stranger was that he was not even in the Palace. And there was a woman next to him.
Of course, like the cliché calls for, it all came back to him. But, unlike the cliché, he did not groan and curse himself. Rather, he amused himself with the alarm clock for a little while. Technology and Vetinari were not two things meant for each other and the President was proving to be even more technologically challenged than the author's father, who needs help dialing the new phone they bought.
"Joe, or whatever, turn the damn alarm clock off." Laura Bush kicked the man that was supposed to be her husband. "It's annoying."
Vetinari pushed a few buttons, and turned the alarm clock over. Finding nothing to work, he threw the alarm clock against the wall. It gave one last feeble beep, and then burst. "It's off," he said, watching the steaming remains with fascination. The thought had just occurred to him that while he was no longer the Patrician of Ankh-Morpork, he didn't have to act like the Patrician. He just had to be civilized, which was easy enough.
"I didn't really mean that way."
"But it worked." There was silence. Vetinari sat up and slouched back against the headboard. "What do I do now?"
"If you're trying to be like George, you go back to sleep for another hour, wake up and panic when you remember lunch with Tony Blair. If you're going to be whoever you are, deal with it as you please."
And so Joseph (Havelock) Vetinari went to discover the wonders of the shower, and foamy soap*.
Twenty minutes later, he was back in his office, looking at a desk that was distressingly empty. So he sat and wondered what to do, while absentmindedly scratching Awesome Dude behind the ears. He didn't have that lunch thing until one, so he didn't need to eat anything, and there was no paperwork.
He started opening drawers in the desk. Most were full of things that looked like they could beep, and really the only thing he'd learned while being President so far was that beeping things were not his friend. Awesome Dude's tail started to thump against a chair leg.
People all have quirks. This is true of everyone, no matter how sane they appear to be. Samuel Vimes's quirk was to settle into the Policemans' Walk and toss his sword absentmindedly into the air. Vetinari's was that when he was deep in thought and had nothing to do, he would sit in his chair cross-legged and rest his chin in his hands. Awesome Dude curled up under the desk. Just then, Laura Bush walked in, miraculously awake and well-dressed.
"I have another convention to go to, so I will be leaving now. It's in Pennsylvania, if you must know."
"Uh huh." Mr. Vetinari stared at nothing very intently.
"I'll be gone all day."
"Okay."
"Goodbye."
"Adios." Laura started to walk towards the door, and stopped. She turned and looked at him intently.
"Where did you learn to speak Spanish?"
"I have no idea."
"Oh." She seemed to think about this for a while. "Okay. Adios, I guess."
"Hasta luego." He seemed to jerk out of it. "Un momento." Laura raised her eyebrows. "Yeah, um, what do I do at these dinner things?"
"You talk about political stuff, and eat your French fries with a fork." Vetinari gave her a puzzled look. She sighed. "Just use your manners." He nodded, and Laura walked out. Several hours, one stupid bill (meaning he'd vetoed it) , and a press conference later, Vetinari found himself shaking hands with a man who had big ears and smiled all the time and agreed to everything he said. Carrot was there too, which was a great help.
"Hello, Mr. Blair, how are you?" Carrot asked, radiating politeness. "And how is the country?"
"Very well, thank you." Tony Blair replied. He was a bit uneasy for some reason around the President this time; he seemed to be studying him. "And, er, England's all right, too."
"Very good," Carrot beamed. "Please sit down."
The three men sat, in an atmosphere that was very tense. Vetinari's presence alone created tenseness, and even Carrot was having a hard time combating it. "So," Blair said, toying with his fork nervously, "this whole thing is about trade between England and America. As I'm sure you know the American economy's slow right now, so I was wonder if I could do anything to help? I feel this meeting is too important to take place between two ambassadors."
"Why is the economy down?" Vetinari seemed to ask himself. "People are buying more things than ever; it's the stock market that's the problem . . ." Blair and Carrot exchanged looks. Vetinari seemed to be in a world of his own.
"Sir?" Carrot asked nervously, clearing his throat. "Sir, perhaps you have an idea, sir?"
"No," Vetinari said slowly, looking up. From what he'd managed to gather off of CNN that morning, this problem was something he could not fix in a day but it was definitely best if it was contained nationally. "No, I don't think we need help as of now. Anything else?" He fixed Blair with a glassy smile and an icy glare.
"There is the matter of the crisis in the Middle East . . ."
"The world watches," Vetinari said softly. "And no one likes what they're seeing right now. But it's going to be worse if we, and by we I mean America and England, step in. It's all right to have two cultures fighting over s strip of land; that everyone understands, but when nations step in people get nervous. And as we are seeing after the terrible atrocities that have occurred in our nation's recent past, when people get nervous they stop consuming. They stop traveling, and, consequently, the economy falls. No, what we need right now is to stay out of it. For in the past, our interest in their war has only fueled it."
"India and Palestine?" Blair was dumbstruck. The President of the United States was using big words, made no sense but in the opposite way, like he was far above everyone intellectually. And he looked absolutely confident in what he was saying. This wasn't publicity to him. Publicity is like a big, soft blanket that wraps around what the President was presenting Blair with, which was the cold, hard steel bar of true politics.
"Get all other nationalities out of there and let them figure it out. They share a border, and therefore nuclear war would be a terribly stupid move. Someone is bound to see that eventually." Vetinari had steepled his fingers and was looking at Blair intently over them.
"What about Osama bin Laden?" Blair was not at all hungry, he realized as the food was brought out. He was terrified by the knowledge that the thin man sitting across the table from him knew exactly how man as a whole thought, and was using that as a political tool.
"If my sources are correct, he has been having kidney problems. No doubt the man is dead. As is the Taliban. And Al Qaeuda. Certainly though, we need to keep an eye on them to make sure they don't crawl back."
Blair silenced himself and began to eat. Vice-President Carrot was eating happily, as if he was not bothered at all by the cool, sharp mind that his superior possessed. The President himself ate very little, and grinned a thin, acidic smile every once and a while.
Vetinari had good reason to grin. He was only the President for three days, and this was day two. He could at least put a hold on the stupidity factor until he was forced to return to Ankh-Morpork. But right now, he almost wished he could stay for a while. A whole nation would make a new and interesting project.
And so the meal finished, with Blair and Vetinari exchanging formal goodbyes and the Prime Minister driving away safely. Vetinari gazed out the window as habit decreed.
"I think you scared him, sir," Carrot said, standing at Vetinari's shoulder. "He looked rather nervous the whole time."
"I can't say I noticed," Vetinari replied faintly. Carrot cleared his throat again.
"Last night, sir, I was in Texas and I was watching a theater production," he saw Vetinari's lip curl just the slightest bit, "like, a play sort of thing, and someone tried to assassinate me."
"Did he? And what did you so about it?"
"I, er, I talked to him, sir. He said there's a certain Act that was passed that's tyranny. Asked me to get you to look at it, sir."
"Which Act?"
"The Campaign Reformation Act of 2002, sir," Carrot said. "He wants you to throw it out of the books."
"I've already had a look at it. It'll be gone by tomorrow morning†."
"Oh, how did you manage that, sir? I thought the author said you'd only done three things this morning." Carrot watched Vetinari uneasily. He had an unpleasant gleam in his eyes.
"The author doesn't know all, Carrot."
"Sir, are you all right?" Carrot was genuinely concerned about Vetinari's sanity at this point.
"It's a mess, Carrot," Vetinari said softly, looking out of the window. "A little over two hundred years old and the most poorly run country in the world. Law enforcement is terrible and for all the technology, it's not being used for much. You don't know what everyone is doing."
"That would be invasion of privacy, sir. Sir, have you read the Constitution? It might put a stop to a few of the things I think you're planning."
"No, but I will get around to it." It was then that Carrot decided to stay at the White House all day, in case Vetinari got any ideas. After getting used to being a dictator, he seemed to be having trouble adjusting his mind to letting people do pretty much what they want and not being much more than a figurehead and a signature.
Carrot made sure that Vetinari read the Constitution as soon as they returned to the Oval Office. That seemed to diminish the insane little flame that had been lit in Vetinari's mind and he had started acting normal again. A little more relaxed than he usually was, as well. He even managed to attend a press conference and seem to be entirely confused at everything the reporters asked him.
At the end of the day, when Carrot was ready to leave, Vetinari suddenly slumped forward onto the desk and looked more depressed than Carrot had ever seen anyone look. "I'm not meant to rule a nation like this," Vetinari said. "You have to be more laid back and, well, stupid." Carrot nodded.
"It's probably made you a better person, though," he said, displaying fully his overwhelming Carrot-ness. Vetinari stared.
"I cannot believe you just said that," he said. "I really think I need to lighten up."
"That's basically what I was hinting at, sir," Carrot said. His dwarven literal-mindedness was showing through at this point.
"Goodnight, Carrot," Vetinari said. Carrot nodded, grinned cheerfully, and left. Vetinari then permitted himself to fall asleep on the desk.
Far away, in Pennsylvania, in a little county with a lot of Amish people in it, two beings were in a hotel room, getting thoroughly drunk and watching everything that was happening in the Oval Office on a television. Their names were Aziraphale and Crowley.
"I'll bet their gay," Crowley said.
"How can Vetinari be gay, he had sex with a woman last night! He broke one of the Ten Commandments!" Aziraphale cried in distress.
"Well, he's bisexual, then," Crowley conceded.
"Besides, being attracted to other men when you're a man is sinful," Aziraphale pouted.
"Well we're not technically men, are we?"
"What are you hinting at, Crowley?"
"Angel, shut up and kiss me." And so that scene will end in the author's vague attempts to keep the story at a PG-13 rating. So, out of the Motel 6 and into Ankh-Morpork. The Rats' Chamber, to be more precise.
***
George Dubya attempted to call order in the meeting, but rumors spread fast in Ankh-Morpork and the topic of the meeting had rapidly changed from 'Those Klatchian bastards again' to 'Hey, this man isn't the Patrician, so let's annoy the hells out of him.'
"George," said Lord Downey, leaning forward with a grin fixed on his face. "We've all heard this silly little rumor going around that you're not really the Patrician. And now that I'm hearing this, I'm beginning to remember things and wonder: Is that true?"
George Bush, unable to lie, was stuck. "Um, yes. Yes, it is."
"So what happened to Lord Vetinari?" Mr. Boggis asked. However, he was unable to finish because Granny Weatherwax stormed into the room and stomped her foot.
"All of this nonsense will be stopped right now! Because the wizard of yours is incompetent, I've brought Gytha Ogg instead!" Those who knew Gytha Ogg because of extensive travels cowered. Granny grinned. Lord Downey however, had not and did not see any reason to be scared of the two witches. He did not even see one of the two witches.
"And where is this Gytha, madame?" he asked.
Granny rolled her eyes. "Gytha!" she barked. "What are you doing now?"
"They've those banana things here, as well, Esme!" Gytha Ogg made her way into the room. "Are these the gentlemen I'm to lecture, then?" she asked, gulping some of the banana daiquiri.
"Yes, Gytha." Just then, Mustrum Ridcully wandered into the room.
"Hello, all," he said. "Now, what seems to be the – oh, hello Madame Weatherwax."
"Hello, Mustrum. You seemed to have shirked your duties." Granny and Arch-Chancellor Ridcully glared at each other. The others in the room felt the temperature drop several degrees.
"Right, well you all be nice to this boy," Nanny said, staying cheerful and trying to divert attention from the oncoming argument. "Havelock'll be back within a few hours, right enough. And Granny and I'll be here until then." The others in the room exchanged terrified glances and left the room, George Bush included. "Come along, Gytha. I'm sure Mustrum here has quite a lot to do." Nanny Ogg pulled at Granny's arm and eventually managed to get her out of the same room as Ridcully. Back in his office, George sagged back into his chair.
"What seems to be the trouble, George?" Dick asked, ruffling through the growing piles of paper on the Patrician's desk. He himself had had some servants set up a small card table and had been making a crack at the paperwork.
"This job is so not easy," George said, riffling half-heartedly through a document. "And I have to wear a dress."
"She said it would be three days, didn't she? Time's up tomorrow morning." Cheney was ruling the city and letting George moan, just as he had always done.
"But it's only one thirty in the afternoon and who knows what kind of wacky schedule this planet runs by. It's carried on the backs of elephants, for god's sake!"
"Try to get some work done, George," Cheney replied, ignoring Bush's outburst. As Bush tried to read a report on activities in Klatch that aroused suspicion, people outside were very suddenly ignoring the laws. This was giving Commander Vimes a lot of trouble.
"What's the trouble here?" Vimes asked, wandering into the middle of a rowdy crowd and lighting a cigar. People calmed down a little, as they always tend to do when faced with the seemingly relaxed version of Commander Vimes.
"The man in the Oblong Office isn't really our Patrician!" one man yelled.
"Really now?" Vimes asked almost lazily, blowing a smoke ring. "So why the riot?"
"Because we've been suffering under an imposter!"
"No, no," Vimes said, staring at the most outspoken man. "While I'll admit that the man in the Oblong Office right now is an imposter, I'm afraid to tell you that he isn't Vetinari, either." The faces around Vimes paled as they realized what he'd just said.
"Vetinari's going to go round the bend when he hears about this," someone said. "And we've never seen him angry. Who knows what he'll do."
"Probably be more of a bastard than he usually is," Vimes said, completely honestly. "Now listen, the man up there isn't our Patrician and we all know that. But down here I'm still the law, regardless. Who presents more of a threat?"
The crowd diffused rapidly as people compared the number of times they'd talked to the Patrician and the number of times the Watch had shouted at them. It was easy to see which the greater threat was.
"Well, glad to see that's sorted out," Vimes said more or less to himself. "I only wish Carrot were here to deal with what's going to happen after Vetinari gets back."
And so the afternoon went. The sun made its lazy arc over the Discworld, and darkness flowed over Ankh-Morpork. Or tried to, anyway. The scent of the Ankh could repulse even darkness at some times of the year. In a pub, Nanny Ogg enjoyed herself while Granny tried to look inconspicuous. In his workshop, Leonard of Quirm wondered vaguely where Vetinari had gotten to because he was running out of certain materials. However, he didn't really think that whole bit out because he was interrupted by an idea for Rotating-Device-That-Can-Peel-Potatoes (know to us Earth folk as the Rotato). And, in the wee hours of the morning, George Bush and Dick Cheney were forced to retire, both of them seriously wishing to have their own jobs back.
***
*A/n: OOC? Yes, but foamy soap is always a fixture in stories where taking a shower is included.
†And there were various cheers heard around the nation.
A/n: And so ends the hardest and longest chapter. Certainly the heaviest. I'm thinking one more chapter plus an author's note, but three more things added because one is just for fun and actually relevant.