The Therapy Zone

    Anyone from the outside World, who had been assigned, or came to The Village of their own free will, didn’t usually fair very well. I think Fotheringay was the luckiest one, after all his presence there was simply to help dress the scene. Had Number 6 arrived in what he thought was the Colonel’s office in Whitehall, London and Fortheirngay was not present, well Number 6 might well have smelt a rat much sooner. As for “Nadia Rakovsky,” she was a well trained agent, and would have been briefed on The Village. And afterwards when the assignment was over, she would simply move on to her next assignment. But the Colonel, he looked a very worried man as Number 6 left his office to emerge back into The Village. We don’t know what happened to the Colonel, but perhaps he paid the price for this failure instead of Number 2!
    Then came Curtis, he looked the spitting image of Number 6 once he’d undergone a makeover. And once he’d learned all about Number 6. His speech, his walk, mannerisms etcetera, he gave a very passable impersonation of Number 6. But Curtis came to a bad end, suffocated to death by Rover. At least he didn’t leave anyone behind, seeing as Susan, presumably his wife, had died a year ago. Mind you there might have been other family members.
    The Professor on the other hand left his wife, after he had been electrocuted to death by the General! No doubt his widow would live out the rest of her life in The Village giving art seminars, once she had been given time to grieve for her late husband.
    Number 34 was the man found dead on the beach by Number 6 in ‘Dance of The Dead.’ I think he had been assigned to infiltrate The Village, however he had been promised a way out for him. But that he had, for whatever reason, been left high and dry. As the appointment could not be fulfilled, other things had to be done that night. So no extraction from The Village for Number 34, or whoever he was. How did he die? Well he must have been out on the beach, just as Number 6 had been, and so had the Guardian. But unlike Number 6, Number 34’s encounter with the Guardian was a fatal one! {Well that’s my one personal interpretation}
    Then came the Colonel who had been assigned to The Village by the highest authority, and he was gratified by that. But I bet he was frightened, he certainly seemed nervous, trying to hide it behind his stiff upper lip and the desire to do his duty. The Colonel’s last words being “Tell Number One I did my duty.” A terrible thing, the mind separated from the body, if anything were to go wrong the effect would be devastating. In this case it cost the Colonel his life, although his body lived on.
   You could say I missed out Thorpe of ‘Many Happy Returns,’ that’s because there is no actual evidence he came to The Village in the capacity of Number 2. Although several times I have suggested that fictionally speaking Thorpe could be Number 2 in ‘Hammer Into Anvil, as there was his dislike of Number 6, by both Thorpe and Number 2. So even if they are supposed to be different characters they did at least have that much in common. If Thorpe had been brought to The Village in the capacity of Number 2, then Village life certainly had an ill effect on him. His paranoia leading to an eventual mental breakdown, may well have seen him removed to the psychiatric ward in the hospital. Something I have suggested on more than one occasion. But even without Thorpe’s presence in The Village, those who are assigned to the detention camp do not generally fair well from the experience.

Be seeing you