Legion World Forums LEGION OUTPOST Bits o' Legionnaire Business OneVision: Dragons

I'm loving this Ken... Keep it going.

P.S. I do have a message for you from SC Though. He says to tell you as much as he loves the 'Binger he just ain't that cheap...

Thanks Chuck - long time no hear.

So, what's the going price - two handfuls?

They awoke in a pile. Arrayed along the new plush sofa that Marvin had had installed in his spaceship. Arms around each other, drool dripping silently from open mouths. Various grunts, snores and other noises emanated from the throng of bodies.

There were minor scuffles as in-appropriately draped hands were slapped out of the way.

Thankfully Marvin had been listening to Sigue Sigue Sputnik on his MP5 player, and hadn’t been subjected to Captain Dallas’ lecture on tactics during the first Gulf War – The Bravery of Staying Out Of Range.
Considering the recent revelationary findings as to the reasons behind the war Harbi had found it to be a bit tasteless, as well as being so boring that everyone had nodded off.

Marvin had flown them to the village of El Asticpants and set down on the outskirts.

“Chuffin’ hell I’m hungry,” yawned Harbi as she performed her just-woken-up stretch. Sinews popped, muscles bulged and breasts thrust. Oh, and eyes bulged. Half of the squad stared in awe, whilst the other half looked away, knowing that it would just get them into trouble.

“Yeah,” said Numf, who’d seen it all before and was more interested in food, “ I hope they’ve packed rowies!”

“Gawd – it’s been positively weeks since I last had a rowie!” joined in Sonnie. “Let’s go and investigate.”

After a rummage through the galley, Sonnie came up from a cupboard clutching handfuls of clear plastic bags, through which could clearly be seen the rowies that had been craved. “Yay! Numfie – I’ve found them! Well done whoever packed these.”

“Chuck us one over min,” shouted Numf. “Nah, these are nae use – they’re Asda ones. They’re both kinds?”

“Both kinds?” asked Harbi, who was also an expert on rowies. However, she wasn’t quite fully awake.

“Yeah,” said Sonnie. “You know, cheap AND….”

“…nasty,” said Harbi and Numf in unison.

“They’ll have to do though, ‘cos there’s sod all else,” said Sonnie.

They all took up seats at the galley table and consumed rowies. Rowies with butter, rowies with jam and rowies with cheese. And some with all three. There wasn’t any peanut butter, or that would have been added to the mix as well.

Harbi turned to Mike and Captain Dallas.

“So, you two, how come we got lumbered with a couple of losers like you in charge? What happened to the big hitters like Cobalt Lad – he’d be perfect for a gig like this, head of security as he is. Or Stu, Lashy-poos, Lardy? And why don’t we have Greybirdboy here to help us track the enemy? Even bloody Invisible Boy for a bit of stealth?” she asked.

“Well, you see Harbinger,” said Mike, “since you went into your self-induced brain-dead period, a few things have happened. One of which is the disappearance of those heroes that you have just mentioned. The whole of Legionworld has been searching for them to no avail. In fact if you had mentioned Arachne in your list I would have thought the coincidence too great, and suspected you in their disappearance.
“Since their disappearance, and your hiding away inside yourself, the crime spree in Legionopolis has reached epic proportions, which has meant that the other ‘A’ list heroes – Spellbinder, Nightcrawler, Lightning Lad, Drake etc. – have had to stay and look after the city. So yes, you have been left with the dregs….no offence…” said Mike with just a smear of sarcasm, turning to look at the assembled personnel.


“Don’t worry,” growled Sonnie, glaring daggers back at him, “ PLENTY taken.”

“….but we’re all you’ve got, so get used to it,” finished Mike turning back to Harbi. There was a coldness and arrogance in his demeanour that Harbi hadn’t noticed before.

“Come on,” said Numf, in an attempt to break the tension in the room, “ show us your new knife trick Marvin! Hey everyone, Marv sez he’s got a new trick to show us.”

Marvin waddled over to the table from where he had been tinkering with the spaceship controls. On the way through the galley he detoured to pick up a perilously sharp kitchen knife. He plucked a hair and tested the sharpness by slicing it in half longways, as all cartoon characters are taught to do at cartoon acting college.
Marvin nodded at Sonnie conspiratorily as he passed, and Sonnie held Numf from behind, hand out flat on the table.
“No, you bastards! What are you doing?” screeched Numf like a big jessy.
Marvin came from the side and placed his own left hand over Numfs right, fingers spread over fingers, one thumb sticking out of either side.

Marvin managed to balance the knife on the palm of his hand briefly and then snatch it out of the air with the same hand.
He turned his attention to the table.

“No Marv, buddy, don’t do it,” pleaded Numf.

“Quit whining Numf,” said Marvin, “this will need a lot of concentration.”

With that Marvin lifted the knife quickly above his head, in slow-motion.
Also in slow motion, Numfs head followed the upward sweep of the knife, eyes opening wider in alarm as he realised what Marvin intended.

When the downward stroke started, Numfs slo-mo mouth started opening – N….O…..O….OOOO…OOOOOOOOO..

Time clicked back to normal speed.

CHOP!

Digits scattered themselves across the table, blood spurted everywhere.

“Not funny Marv, not funny,” said Numf in a high panicked voice as he fainted.

“Luckily we cartoons can grow appendages at will,” said Marvin, willing another set of fingers to grow in place of his severed ones, which he picked up and put in the nearest bin.

I’ll have to remember that, thought Harbi to herself.

Numf regained consciousness screaming, only to find all of his fingers still connected, without even a scratch on them. The confusion written across his face was priceless.

Everybody apart from Numf laughed. Heartily.

Numf, I love this story! Keep it coming!

And seeing how the continuity of this story works with the continuity of my "Journies" story makes you Onevision even more fun to read. Thanks!

And I love the continued use of Marvin, one the great tag team creations that we all left a bit of an effect on. He seems like he was destined to be written by you alongside Sonnie, Harbi and Capt. Dallas.

Thanks for the kind words Cobie.

------------------------

They got booted and suited.
Suited and booted.
And loaded for bear.

Tweed three pieces, gumboots and blunderbusses. With optional deerstalker.
Twin-breasted padded shouldered pinstriped business suits, rugby boots and a man-trap on a chain.

They had the choice.

Most of them went for Option C – none of the above.
In fact, all of them went for Option C.

It appeared that whoever had been sent to pick up the uniforms etc. from the Army Surplus Store had stopped in past the pub on the way there, had a few too many beverages and then wandered into the Oxfam shop next door.

Thankfully Marvin had a few Martian Ray Guns ™ in a cupboard, which he handed out. He even gave them a free training session – “Point, close your eyes, pull the trigger. Pick yourself up, dust yourself off and start all over again.”

Michael J. Hunt baulked however when handed the bill. “£18,000 a gun!!???!!!???
You have got to be joking! And that’s before you charge them up!”

“Where else are we going to get weapons up here?” asked Harbi, looking over Hunts shoulder. “Come on you grippy bastard, just sign for it. It’s not as if it’s coming out of your pocket.”

“But, that comes to about half a million quid!”

“Yeah, and you have the authority to sign for it, haven’t you? And just think, that’s only about half of what you’ve skimmed off the top of this mission already. Isn’t it?” asked Harbi.

Hunt’s ears started to turn red. “ummmm…..” was about all he could manage as an argument.

“Hey man,” piped up Numf, “You’d better not be skimming off our wages, man, or I’ll feed you to that dragon.”

“Yeah, and I’ll help,” came Sonnies agreement.
And then the shouts and threats started from all corners, as the rest of the squad heard the conversation.

Mike had to duck a few badly thrown ashtrays, baseballs and half full cups of black coffee.

Captain Dallas made the very stupid move of getting in between Hunt and the squad. Unfortunately for him he was crap at ducking, and received one of the aforementioned cups off the forehead. Head broken open, blood everywhere, lights out.

Dallas woke confused.
He appeared to be lying in the ships sickbay, plastered from head to foot, immobile.
Apart from the pain in his head, he also had an exceedingly sore throat.
But the rest of him felt all right.

So why was he incapacitated like this?
“Wmmdn gnmok omnj?” he asked.

“Oh, hi there Cap’n. I guess you’re wondering what’s goin on, aren’t you?” asked Numf.

“Wmmdn fuunmnkm heljkhnbi gnmok omnj?” he asked, getting slightly more animated.

“Well, you see it’s like this. Marvins AutoDoctor is still hard at work trying to fix our good mate Bugs Bunny. And the last thing we want to do is to distract him. ‘Cos that rabbit saved my life, I’ll have you know.”

There were agreeable mutters from all the others jammed into the small medical centre.

“So, you’ll be glad to know that we’ve intubated you and plastered you from head to toe, just in case you’ve got injuries a lot worse than the obvious bump to the head,” continued Numf. “We decided it would be better to err on the side of safety, rather than be accused of in…..” Numf paused, having forgotten the bloody word he was looking for.

“Inebriated!”
“Inbred!”
“Incisor!”
“Incognito!”


“Thanks lads, but no – I was going to say incompetence. And of course the inability to finish a coherent, ummm…..,” said Numf, managing to confuse himself.

Captain Dallas started shaking violently, obviously very angry with the situation that he found himself in.

Numf pressed a button.

Dallas found himself being lifted off the bed, a hoist attached to points at each corner.

The incomprehensible swearing was almost comprehensible.

“Right lets leave him boys and girls. He can’t do himself any harm there,” decided Numf. They all turned around and headed towards the exit, chatting merrily amongst themselves.

“By the way, Napalm, did you remember to connect him up to the human waste disposal system?” asked Spunkeater.

“No, why? Was I supposed to?”

“I don’t suppose it’ll really matter, will it?”

DRRRRRRRRUUUMMM-DUMM-DUMM
Didddle-iddddle, diddle-iddle-iddle
DRRRRRRRRUUUMMM-DUMM-DUMM
Didddle-iddddle, diddle-iddle-iddle
DRRRRRRRRUUUMMM-DUMM-DUMM
Didddle-iddddle, diddle-iddle-iddle


Atmospheric drumming filled the air as the hatchway opened and the walkway lowered itself to the ground like something out of “The Day The Earth Stood Still”, only much, much less impressive.

“For Cripes sake will someone turn that bloody Cozy Powell tape off!!” screamed Harbinger.

Click. “Sorry Harbi! I would have used Ride Of The Valkyries, but it’s been done before.” shouted Numf.

“I love the smell of Napalm in the morning….” added Sonnie.
“Why, thank you Sonnie, that means a lot to me..” replied Napalm.
“….. reminds me of Vic fae Torry,” finished Sonnie.

Now all that could be heard was the sound of the weather. And it was not pleasant.
Gale force winds howled past. Squallid rain showers battered off the hull of the spaceship. Peals of thunder echoed, scant seconds before the lightning forks split the heavens leaving the smell of burning ozone in their wake.
The sound and smell of desolation filled the air.

“For Cripes sake, Numfy, turn that bloody Cozy Powell tape back on!” screamed Harbi.

“Theme One” filled the air, a piece of music that anyone who listened to Tommy “The” Vances Friday Night Rock Show in the early ‘80s would instantly recognise, and few others.

But, turned up loud it drowned out the sounds from the outside world, and roused the squad into a state of readiness for the task ahead.

The black cloud covering turned everything dusk-like, as per every horror movie just about ever. A single head peeked gingerly round the corner of the door, everyone else suddenly realising that they had presented a target for anyone out there, a square of light in the otherwise darkness…..

A single shot rang out.

Luckily for Numf he had realised a split second before that he was exposing himself un-necessarily, and had bent his head forward to pull his zip up.

The mercury tipped bullet, which should have taken the top of his head off , thankfully missed. It did, however, ricochet off some structural steel and smash Numfys GhettoBlaster into smithereens. The music, unsurprisingly, stopped.

They heard an exclamation which sounded remarkably like “Fu…! You lucky bassa!”, whatever that may mean.

Within half a second everyone was on the deck, head in hands, moving away from the open door as fast as they could in their prone positions. They each took shelter as they found it, behind internal structural supports, chairs, inflatable bouncy castles and whatever else they could find. They cowered expertly.

“Marvin! Shut the pigging hatch! NOW!” shouted Harbi, who, although the only civilian, appeared to have found herself in charge for the moment. In fact she was the only one who had a Scooby what was going on.

The hatchway started to shut itself and the walkway pulled itself back into the spaceship. The ping of bullets bouncing off the armoured hull of the spaceship could be heard by everyone.

A single armour-piercing bullet managed to penetrate the hull, causing the most damage possible – it burst the bouncy castle.

Grown men dropped to their knees and wept as the realisation of what had just occurred sunk in.

Not the bouncy castle!

Harbi shook her head in dismay.

“You bunch of sad bastards,” she said softly to herself.

“Marvin – get us out of here, but not very far,” she said, moving through to the spaceships bridge.

Marvin sat in his Captains chair, both feet on the floor, both hands on a single lever, which obviously piloted the ship. His tongue stuck slightly out of the side of his mouth as he concentrated hard on flying the ship in the dreadful weather conditions. The spaceship raised itself from the ground, tipped forward and then raced away from where they had been.

Once safely out of the range of any enemy fire, and easily out of sight of anyone on the ground, Marvin straightened the ship hit the “Hoover” button on the arm of his chair….
“Oops, sorry, wrong one,” said Marvin as the ships ACME Domestic Supplies Vacuum Cleaner raced across the floor, expertly cleaning into all the nooks and crannies of the bridge. He pressed the “Hover” button instead, and the ship slowed down and hovered.

“Okay then,” said Marvin, turning to Harbi, “What’s the plan?”

Vic fae Torry? I haven't thought of him in years.....

Great stuff Ken, more and more and more please....

“Yeah Harbi, what’s your plan?” said MJ Hunt, following her into the bridge. The rest of the squad were busy disentangling themselves from the bits and pieces that they had found themselves entangled with when Marvin had run away without giving them time to strap themselves in. They slowly drifted in to the bridge, rubbing various bashed and bruised parts.

“Well, first of all we need to do a recon of the area to see if there are any villagers left around..” started Harbi.

“Agreed,” said MJH and Numf at the same time.

“And then we’ve got to cream those SGG tattooed ninja turtle bastards,” continued Harbi.

“Yippee-kiy-ai, Motherf….oh no, that’s wrong. Wrong film, sorry,” apologised Sonnie.

“And then there’s the small problem of a 90 foot long mad mental dragon to deal with,” said MJH, looking incredibly smug. He had moved away slightly, and now leant against the doorframe, arms and legs folded.

“Yeah, I hadn’t got that far – I’d kinda reckoned that these here army boys would have a plan for that, but it looks like they’re pretty much clue-less. Dragged in off the street, a bit like myself. The dregs of the universe thrown together to make it look like there’s a real army presence. What do you say…. Mike?” asked Harbi, emphasising his name.

MJH glared at Harbi for a fraction of a second before he caught himself and looked away.
“Don’t worry – I’ve got a plan for all eventualities.”

“That’s what I’m worried about,” said Sonnie.

“Right, so what we need are miniature cameras with infra red ability – one for each of you. A bank of monitors, tuned in one per person. Life-sign monitors, one per person. Motion detectors, one per group. Snack bars and water bottles. One roll of toilet paper per group. Bandy nets for catching sticklebacks and other small fish. Odour eaters, at least one pair each. Numf needs two pairs – one for his feet and one for his halitosis,” listed Harbi.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” asked Numf. “You said that you wouldn’t tell anyone about that – I told you that in confidence!” Numf turned his back on Harbi and went over to sulk in the corner.

“No, that wasn’t what I was talking about, I was …..aw forget it.” Harbi gave up, knowing from past failures the futility of trying to get Numf to understand anything without actually resorting to physical violence.

“And, pray tell,” started MJH from his place of casual smugness at the door, “looking around at the attire that this mob is wearing, do you really expect there to be infra-red miniature cameras just sitting around waiting to be used? As well as all the rest.”

“Hey Mr Soothsayer, if you’re not going to help then just shut the hell up!” said Napalm, getting all wound up and muscley about it.

“Yeah, right man!”
“Yeah, jist shut yer wheesht!”

“Okay, I’ll just stand here looking smug and I won’t say a word,” said MJH, zipping his mouth shut and swallowing the key.

“That’s better. Now, what type of remote communications do we have?” asked Harbi.

“Like what?” asked a soldier who Harbi didn’t recognise.

“Who the hell are you?” asked Harbi looking into a face that she’d never noticed before.

Sonnie helped out with this one. “This is one of our twins. Celebrity twins no less. This is Joe Blobs, and over here,” said Sonnie indicating, “is his sister Betty Swollocks.”

“Hi, pleased to meet you, Joe and Betty. And what kind of celebrities are you? You’re not some kind of brother and sister act from the Jerry Springer show, are you?” asked Harbi, very dubiously.

“Hell no, miss Harbinger, ma’am. It’s just that we can trace our ancestory back to a very famous religious man,” explained Betty.

“Oh, right…” said Harbi. “Please excuse me for not instantly recognising the family resemblance. So, ummm, which famous man of religion are we talking about? Martin Luther King? Unlikely. Torquemada? Nope? Okay, I give up.”

“The Reverend Spooner,” said Joe & Betty in unison.

“Ah, that explains a lot.”

MJH sniggered.

“So, where was I? Oh yes, communications. What have we got?” asked Harbinger.

Cicadas could be heard chirping in the silance.

“Thanks for that large round of indifference, guys,” sighed Harbi, shaking her head.

“I’ve got a mobile ‘phone,” said Sonnie. “ But I don’t know where it is. I think it’s back in the house somewhere. I haven’t seen it for months. It’s probably under my bed.”

“Not much use to us there, is it Sonnie? What about you, Mike?” asked Harbi.

“Oh, I’ve got a mobile – but you’re not getting your grubby little paws on it,” said MJH, waving his mobile in a “nyah-nyah-nyah nyah-nyah!” way in front of their noses.

Seconds later there were half a dozen squaddies sitting /kneeling and otherwise holding him down, wathew wuffwy.

Numfy handed the mobile to Harbi, triumphantly.

“Okay, one mobile. Not much bloody use on its own. Come on, you’re all a bunch of the great unwashed – surely one of you’ve got a mobie. Or did you have to give them back when you joined up and came off the dole? J ” said Harbi, jokingly. Luckily for her, they all realised that she was joking – anyway, she was one of them, so she could get away with that. If Captain Dallas or MJH had said such a thing they would have been in serious trouble.

But not a single phone was forthcoming.

“Hey, Marvin,is there a phone line on this ship?” No luck.

“Any walkie-talkies?” Apparently, only when you took Scooby-Doo out for a Brad.

“We could always just shout very loud,” said Numf, not very helpfully. He received a skelped lug for his stupidity.

This is funny, Numf; I especially love the little touches you throw in - the MP5 player, "he slimed", Napalm, the increasingly developed Marvin, rowies, whatever they are.... I'm sure I'm missing a lot of references - (who is this Michael Hunt?) - but it's a fun romp!

It reads well on another level - the critique of National Health and Defense! If your team can take on those two monoliths - well, more power to them!

Thanks FC - and thanks for the PM on linguistics. Never having been in the forces I didn't appreciate the variety of uses that an expert can come up with.

For yourself, and anyone else that hasn't read all of the Tag Team thread with the original explanation of what a rowie is, here it is again:-

" For those not in the know, a word of explanation.

The “rowie” is an Aberdonian baked comestible, made with flour, lard (or vegetable oil for a vegetarian option) and salt. I don’t know the exact quantities, but it’s probably about equal parts of each. Roughly the size of a CD.
It is eaten in a number of ways – normally with butter. Jam (or jelly as it is known west of the big pond), cheese, peanut butter etc. can be added to your own personal taste. As with most baked goods it is at its most appetising whilst still warm.

There is absolutely no haggis in it – well, not much. About three.

The best rowies are those produced by Aitkens Bakeries and Thains Bakeries (depending on your taste).
They are also known in Aberdeen as “butteries” or occasionally just “rolls”.
Nowhere south of Stonehaven do they produce anything remotely approaching an acceptable rowie, although you may chance upon much breadier versions as far afield as Glasgow. Not to be confused with the real thing.

A native Aberdonian (or on occasion a non-native resident) can live from day to day without his/her rowies. However, take the Aberdonian away from Aberdeen and Aitkens rowies become like the Holy Grail. "

I hope that makes things slightly clearer for you.

K'Numf

Back to the story -

“Well,” said Harbi, “it looks like we’re reduced to this.”

In her hands she held two empty tin cans and a very long length of waxed string.

“What the bloody hell are we supposed to do with that?” asked Numfy.

“You stand at one end, and put the tin to your ear, and I’ll stand at the other end and talk into the other can, and you should be able to hear me.”

“But I can hear you anyway,” said Numfy, looking all confused.

“Look, take this can and go to the other side of the room, and put it to your ear and I’ll….”

She was interrupted by MJH. “Do you know what all this sounds like to me? Wasting time. If you’re not in a straight line, at a set distance from each other then it just won’t work. You’re procrastinating.”

“I sodding well am not!” said Numfy. “I’ve still got my trousers on!”

“Oh, bugger. I guess we’d just better stay together then, hadn’t we. I was hoping I could stay here and direct operations from the ship,” said Harbi. “Right, what’s the plan?”

“What?” said Sonnie. “You mean that you’re not privvy to the plan? You seem to have taken charge, so we kinda assumed that you knew what was going on. Didn’t we guys?” he said, looking around for, and getting, confirmation.

“Mike? Help us out here? What’s the plan?” begged Harbi.

“Can’t help you there, my dear sweet lady. You see, this here’s a military operation, and I’m just an insurance broker. Why the hell should I know what the plan was?” he asked, smug as all hells minions torturing helpless little kittens.

There was a sudden loud bang, and the ship lurched to one side, throwing everyone seriously off balance. There were almost as many expletives as there were bruises.

“Well,” said Marvin, “I guess we should have run further away than we did. That must have been a heat seeking missile they’ve hit us with, ‘cos we’re the only warm thing around here today.”

Marvin fought manfully with the controls, with only a limited success.

“Brace for impact, brace, br….”

SMACK!!!!!

Bounce.

SMACK!!
Slide………………

Shudder.

Stop.

Silence, apart from the cackle of flames.

“Quick – get the fire extinguishers!” yelled Napalm.

“Get the hell out of my cleavage!” yelled Harbi at MJH. How he had managed to land face first inside Harbis bra she would never know.

The squad battled to put out the fire as Harbi fought to get the greasy perv out of her underwear. And why did it feel like she had been licked?

I'm used to guys talking to my cleavage but it's been a while since I've had to pick one out of there Though the feeling of having been LICKED by a greasy insurance man? Well I guess it isn't as bad as inserting arodent at 172 mph so I'm not gonna complain too much And an insurance man called Mike Hunt - took me a while to catch that one, very good!

Numf your jolly romp continues to make me laugh. Love Sonnies comment about his phone being under his bed - that is SO Sonnie!! Also the mental picture of handing out tin cans on string is priceless!

Now I only hope Marvin (my new fave character) hasn't crash landed anywhere dangerous...

More, more and then some more please

Harbixx

Actually my phone's in my black bag.... I just don't know where that is

Great stuff Ken, more and more and more please....

Harbi picked herself up, dusted herself off, and resisted the temptation to start all over again.

Most of the bridge was covered in foam, to a depth of 3 or 4 feet, and black smoke floated to the ceiling where it hung like a stormcloud, blocking out most of the light. The smoke was being tackled by the Expel-air, which was slowly clearing the acrid fumes.

But where was everyone? With the exception of herself, Marvin and MJH everyone seemed to have disappeared.

Harbi couldn’t help but laugh out loud when the Useless Squad appeared on hands and knees from out of the foam.
“I knew you lot could all do with having a bath, but that’s ridiculous. Anyway – I hope that none of you lot are Muslims.”

“Hey, that’s a bit of an un-PC, post 9-11 bandwagon jumping, racist, derogatory statement straight out of left-field, Miss- bigoted- Harbinger,” said Napalm, the African American sergeant, squaring up to Harbi, covered in fire-extinguisher foam. Harbi looked so entirely un-phased. “What has our religion got to do with how well we fight?”

“I resemble that remark!” said Numfy, pushing in between Napalm and Harbi.
“Harbi’s no more racist that I am. I’m sure she had a very good reason for what she said. Didn’t you H?” said Numfy imploringly, turning his head to face her whilst still holding the much bigger Napalm off with straight arms.

“Numfy’s right. I said what I said out of respect,” agreed Harbi.

“You know # R-E-S-P-E-C-T find out what it means to me..” said Numfy, having a sad little attempt at a dance to himself.

“How the hell do you work that one out?” asked Napalm, confused as well as angry now. “You said that you hoped that none of us were Muslims – how can there be any respect in that?”

“Okay, calm down and listen. What’s all that white stuff you’re covered in?” asked H.

“You know what it is, lady. It ain’t no bubble bath - it’s fire extinguisher foam,” Napalm answered.

“Good. Now what’s it made of?” prompted H.

“I know this one!” exclaimed Numfy excitedly. “It’s made of foam!”
One skelped lug from each of Napalm and Harbi later, Numf stropped off to humf in the corner.

“No, Numfy, its made of Animal products. It says here on the label,” said Spunkeater from behind Napalm.

“And? What’s your point here H? And it better be good, ‘cos I still ain’t heard nuthin’ to convince me,” said Napalm.

“It’s simple. The animal product that Spunkeater mentioned is pigs blood, and everybody knows that Muslims hate pigs for being dirty, cloven footed and whatever else,” said Harbi. “So, being covered in pigs blood would be a very distressing, emotional religious experience for them.”

“Fair ‘nuff,” said Napalm, turning away from the confrontation. “Glad I ain’t no Muslim then.
“Yo, sorry what I said ‘bout you.”

“Apology accepted.”

“Right then – we’d better get out there and find ourselves somewhere to hole up, ‘cos those guys in black are going to be chompin’ on our asses sometime pretty darned soon,”

“Harbi - Sonnie and I’ll go first,” said Numfy. “Hey, Sonnie, remember when we were kids and we used to play cowboys? Well, lets do that again.”

“What, both guns blazin’, clearing a path to safety? Good idea!” replied Sonnie.
“Okay, everybody else ready?” The Useless Squad readied themselves in behind the two brothers, lining up in ones and twos.

“I’m staying behind to try and fix my ship, get it flying again,” said Marvin. “You never know when we’ll need to get the hell out of here. But I’ll operate the door for you.”

“Thanks Marvin, and good luck. When you’re ready….”

The hatchway opened, and the walkway once again lowered itself to the ground. Equally as unimpressive as it had been the last time.

Sonnie and Numf came bursting out of the entrance in slow-motion, Martian Rayguns in both hands. Shoulder to shoulder they moved, bursts of destructive light erupting from their pistols every two seconds, exploding in shards of sparks.

“The daft bastards are playing at Butch and Sundance!” shouted Harbi, and dived after them through the hatchway, pulling them down and rolled the remaining distance down the walkway.

Luckily for them there was no return fire, and they only ended up eating dirt instead of lead.
“We can’t have long before their troops arrive, lets head over to those buildings,” said Harbi, pointing at an array of prefabricated buildings in the middle distance. They formed up and moved out.

They ran through the rain, hunched over for protection both from the weather and the possibility of attack.

When they reached the buildings, they set about breaking down the door. Harbi turned around to survey their rear, and noticed two stragglers, labouring their way across the muddy landscape. It was Joe & Betty. Conditions underfoot were treacherous, and they were making slow headway.

She ran back to help them and noticed that they were carrying a large object between them.

“What the bloody hell is this?” Harbi found herself screaming into the wind to make herself heard.

“It’s Frosty,” said Joe, as he laboured, in a tone that indicated to Harbi that she should know exactly who and what it was.

“And just why are you carrying Frosty, a nine foot stuffed Siberian tiger through the pissing rain into battle?” asked Harbi, incredulously.

“He’s the squad lucky mascot!” shouted Betty.
“Yeah, where else should he be but with the squad in battle – he wouldn’t be very lucky for us if we left him in the ship, would he?” asked Joe loudly.

Harbi looked around, suddenly terrified for her life. She was stuck in the middle of very wet, muddy no-mans land, with two mad people and a stuffed tiger, and thoughts were starting to form in her head.

Thoughts she didn’t like.

“Whose bright idea was that?” she asked, still furtively scanning the surrounding area.

“Why, it was yours!” answered the twins together.

“It sodding was not!” exclaimed Harbi.

“Well, Mr. Hunt certainly said it was,” answered Joe.

“I’ll bet it was his idea that you put on those Manchester United tops as well, wasn’t it?” asked Harbi.

Harbi and the two Spoonerisms darted across the open ground, keeping low so as to give a smaller target. Frosty had been abandoned to the elements, to be sucked into the rain-lashed landscape. The first casualty.

Harbi crashed through the remains of the door, into near darkness, where she ran into the tail members of the squad, knocking everyone to the ground.

“Strike!” cheered Joe, following her into the building.

“Right – where’s Mike Hunt?” shouted Harbi, picking herself up off the top of the pile of bodies.

Deadly silence. Apart from the scrape of people picking themselves up.

“Aw, come on boys, I’ll ask again. I’ll give you this one for free, guys, and it’s not many of those you get. Right,” Harbi started, speaking slowly, “has anyone seen Mike Hunt.”

Still nobody muttered a word, in fact they all looked at each other, expecting someone else to say the first word.

“Oh, come on. This is ridiculous. A line like that and no-one’s gonna pick up on it? All of the readers have been waiting for this line for about 2 months – you’re not going to let them down, are you? I’ll try once more. Has anyone seen Mi…”

“Yeah, yeah, okay Harbi, I’ll take the bait,” volunteered Sonnie. “Yes, and it was VERY scary.”

“Thank you, Sonnie,” replied Harbi with a resigned sigh.

“I thought it looked lovely and cuddly and warm and inviting.”

“Thank you, Numfy”

“No ma’am, but I wish I had,” said Napalm.

“Shit,” said Sonnie.

“Yeah, I have too,” said a voice from the bottom of the pile, face squished into the lino, “when you were in hospital under the influence of anaesthetic. I hadn’t realised that you were part Brazilian.”

Mike stood up and dusted himself off. When he looked up after finishing the dusting process he immediately wished he hadn’t. In the split second he had before he landed on his ass he saw Harbi, arms folded under her breasts, head shaking with a “that’ll teach ya” look on her face. She appeared to be sandwiched between the two rapidly enlarging fists heading towards his face – one each from Sonnie and Numfy.

“I thought you said that one was for free!” squealed Mike as he jumped to his feet, much to the amusement of the onlookers. One hand flew to his arse, to rub his heavily bruised coccyx. The other hand held his ruptured nose and tried to stem the blood flow.

“No, I said that I would give you it for free – I didn’t say how anyone else would take it,” explained Harbi.

“Ah, semantics,” said Mike, distastefully, shaking his head.

“Wait a minute,” said Numfy, getting all aggressive and having to be held back. “She’s no’ a Jew. Tell him Harbi, you’re Church o’ Scotland, aren’t you!”

“We’ve lost our first member of the squad, I’m afraid,” said Harbi once the hilarity had died down.

Following the two second stunned silence everybody tried to speak at once.

“Oh no…” “ What happened…” “ Who….”

“Wait a minute, we’re all here!” said Sonnie who had done a quick head count.

“I’m afraid to tell you that we’ve had to leave Frosty behind to face the music,” said Harbi.

Once again everbody tried to talk at once.

“Oh no!” “What on earth was….” “What music? I don’t hear any….”

“Because somebody,” and here Harbi turned to face Mike, “told Joe and Betty that I had said it was a good idea to carry a nine foot stuffed tiger into a battlezone. Didn’t you Mike?”

Mike at least had the good grace to look sheepish about being foound out. Either that or he was trying to work his boyish charm on Harbi, and failing abysmally.

“Hey, has anyone seen my patented Wanker Detector?” asked Numfy.
So saying he put his left hand flat out palm upwards. Then he pointed his right index finger out and balled the rest of his right hand into a fist, which he then sat on his left palm.

“Deet…….Deet……..Deet…….” came the sound effects as Numfy turned slowly around his colleagues and friends. His hands were steady.

The interval between deets became less, until, of course, he reached Mike.

“Deetdeetdeetdeetdeetdeetdeetdeet,” went the detector, as Numfys right hand bounced up and down on his left, pointing at Mike. Everybody fell about laughing, with the exception of Mike, who just stood there and looked daggers at Numf.

“I suppose this means that we have to give him back the dry clothing he gave us,” said Spunkeater from the back of the group.

“What dry clothing is this, then?” asked Harbi.

“Well, he had a whole pile of dry football tops in a cardboard box that he took with him. I got an England 1966 World Cup winners top – you know, the red one,” said Spunkeater.

“Yeah, he gave me an Thailand top,” said Sonnie. “Cool, I was in Thailand last year you know!”

“And I got a Liverpool top,” said Numfy, chuffed to bits.

“I got a Washington Redskins top,” said Napalm.

“And the two Spoonerisms got Man Utd tops. Anybody else?” asked Harbi.

Drock had been given an Arsenal top.
Ahole had been given a Spain top.
Vaseline had been given a Portugal top.

“Hows about one for me, Mikey boy?” said Harbi. “Oh, look, an Aberdeen top. And yourself? Oh, right, a green-and-white-hooped Glasgow Celtic top. Well, that’s a surprise. You don’t sound Glaswegian, nor Irish, to me. And I haven’t seen you genuflecting either, so I’m guessing you ain’t no Catholic.
“So, you’ve got one of the most instantly recognisable tops anywhere, and everybody else is wearing red, or thereabouts. Coincidence?”

“I don’t know what you’re suggesting, Harbinger. Hey, come on guys, stop crowding me!”

“I’ll tell you what,” said Harbi, “ most of these guys here are Trekkies, so they know the significance. So, we’ll all take off our new tops, and let you wear one of the red ones. How’d you like them bananas?”

“No, I couldn’t possibly do that. I’m allergic to man-made fabrics, I come out in a rash,” weasled Hunt.

“Well, the England ’66 top’s made of cotton, so you’ve got no excuses there,” said Spunkeater, taking off his recently aquired top and handing it across. Mike looked at
Spunky like he was envisaging him drowning in slowly solidifying strawberry jelly. (Of the ice cream and jelly variety, not the peanut butter and jelly.)

“I’ll tell you what, Mike, put on your Celtic top and we’ll try an experiment,” said Sonnie.

“No, bugger off – you’re setting me up here,” protested Mike.

Sonnie reached out and stuck two fingers up Mikes already bloodied nose, lifting him up so that he was standing on his tiptoes. Mike held on to Sonnies arm, screaming for him to let go.
Sonnie unceremoniously dumped him on his bruised coccyx.

Michael J Hunt squealed like a stuck pig.

“So. We don’t have to get nasty here do we Mikey-boy?” asked Sonnie, wiping his fingers on the back of his combat trousers.

Go Keefee!

more more more please Numf, thanks

Bxx