by Graham Johns
“Bob’s beard!” Hippo Man cried with surprise. “Where on earth is your beard, Bob?”
“What?” Bob touched his chin and then checked his cheeks to make sure. He managed to smear a few tiny spots of blood across his face and took on a rather ghastly look as a result.
“Your beard, it’s gone,” Blue Boy confirmed.
Bob seemed confused and ventured back into the pub, leaving the door ajar such that the group followed him, except for Nigel who wandered off to the duck pond. He still moved with a shimmer of purple sequins, despite the absence of his beard to complete the look. The inner sanctum was dimly lit, something only usually reserved for Valentine’s Day to facilitate a more private type of canoodling. “Any chance of some Hole, landlord?” Blue Boy enquired.
“I need to go down to the cellar and change the kegs over,” Bob said absent-mindedly, “have a seat.”
The group took one of the larger tables and waited patiently. Broken watched them from his perch at the bar with an evil glint in his eye.
“FAT BASTARD!” he shouted, on spotting who he thought was Gordon.
Hippo Man resolved to stay in character and simply chuckled and said, “That bird eh? You have to admire his speech capabilities.”
“We taught him everything he knows, mwahaha!” White Man stated, indicating the assembled group.
“MWAHAHA! BASTARD BEARD! GIVE ME SOME NUTS!”
“A peculiar turn of phrase that, when you think about it,” Coward King observed.
Bob called out from the cellar loudly, “Could I have a hand down here please?”
Blue Boy’s ingrained love of the hop caused him to arise first and make his way towards the cellar before anyone else could say that they felt it their heroic duty to assist the pub landlord in the provision of ale. As Blue Boy happened upon the cellar door to the side of the bar something entirely incredible occurred. Bob’s beard jumped from amongst the optics where it had been resting and landed upon Blue Boy’s chin.
Thinking that a large mouse had just leapt for his jugular, Blue Boy was taken aback and wrestled with his own face for a fraction of a second while he stumbled down the stairs into the darkness below.
“Blue Boy isn’t it?” Bob said, absent-mindedly caressing a rather nice hairdo of the ice cream variety. “I bid thee welcome.”
“Why thank you,” replied Blue Boy, unashamedly grooming the large ginger bush that had just taken hold of his chin.
“Shall we invite someone else to join us?” Bob asked.
“Why yes, though I fear we have no more of us to transplant,” Blue Boy replied.
“A good point, well made, here,” Bob said, gifting to Blue Boy a hefty wooden mallet used for getting bungs into kegs.
“Coward King! Could you bring your exceptionally learned skills this way please!” Blue Boy shouted up.
Coward King arose and headed down the stairs where Blue Boy accosted him with a swift hammer to the temple, knocking him out cold. Bob tied him up with some handy cord and gagged him with a dirty old rag, formerly a pair of his old undies.
“That was fun, let’s do it again,” Bob said.
“Hippo Man! Could you come and lend us your unerring strength please?” Blue Boy shouted up the cellar stairs.
Hippo Man stood from the table but The Conductor placed a steadying hand on his mighty forearm, “Something isn’t right here, how many pub landlords does it take to change a keg?”
“Is that a rhetorical question or would you like me to construct a punchline?” Hippo Man replied with a grin.
“I’m serious, don’t go down there, or if you must, you should at least take a weapon.”
“She is right, perhaps I should go with you, for there will always be victory with White Man on your side.”
Hippo Man collected his cue, also grabbing that which Blue Boy had left behind, and made his way to the cellar with one in each hand, held by the thin end, to show he meant business. White Man made his upper lip as stiff as he could and followed behind.
On the stairs, Blue Boy was fast, but Hippo Man was prepared for him. As the mallet crashed down, Hippo Man met it with one cue which deflected the blow, snapping in the process. Before the shock of seeing Blue Boy with a full beard could register, the other cue had smashed into Blue Boy’s most precious of areas in the zone of the groin and he fell like a sack of potatoes, or in his case, two potatoes and a lengthy cucumber.
Again, something incredible, though slightly less incredible than it was mere moments before, occurred and Bob’s former beard that had been seated upon Blue Boy’s chin leapt at Hippo Man.
Something that isn’t widely acknowledged in pool or snooker playing circles is that a cue, or pair of cues, is of limited use against an attack by an animated beard. Why this has been disregarded over the years is a mystery, snooker players being more concerned with attacks from quirky waistcoats, which may go some way to explain why ordinarily uninteresting snooker players are gifted exciting nicknames like ‘Whirlwind’ or ‘Rocket’ in homage to their waistcoat-evasion technique.
Hippo Man wasn’t known for his dexterity and despite a vain attempt to wave his cues manfully, the beard was upon him before he could say, “What the Dickens!”, “Wha…” said Hippo Man before entering quietude.
White Man watched this unfold with a degree of detached distaste at the top of the stairwell. There was a distinct opportunity here to retreat, contemplate strategy and decide on a way to usurp control of this new culture he was witnessing. “Savages,” he muttered before backing into the bar, closing the door softly behind him.
“What’s happening?” enquired The Conductor.
“BASTARD!” shouted Broken at White Man, who threw him a peanut to shut the bird up.
“It seems that we have a problem,” White Man replied, walking behind The Conductor to his seat.
“Which is?”
“That you can never trust White Man.” White Man grasped the head of The Conductor and twisted it sharply, pulling upwards to remove it from the torso below. The Conductor’s body went limp and White Man placed the head upon the table in front of her so that it could gaze artistically back upon itself, in a frozen state of mild surprise.
“Splendid, now to see what their plan is,” White Man stated confidently to himself.
CHAPTER 22
HAIR CAN BE STYLED,
HAIR CAN BE CHIC,
BUT HAIR CAN HAVE A MIND OF ITS OWN,
AND LEAVE YOU FEELING WEAK.
White Man knocked on the door to the cellar of the Dog & Duck and said, “Please do come upstairs so that we may discuss terms with some degree of civility.”
He retreated to his table calmly and waited, checking to ensure that Broken was still where he was supposed to be. He was, but he glared at White Man with a degree of devilment he reserved only for truly contemptible filth.
If White Man was surprised by the sight of Hippo Man sporting a bushy ginger beard, which clashed whole-heartedly with his mutton chops, beneath his mask, he didn’t show it, and nor did he seem moved by the sight of Bob with a Mr. Whippy hairstyle. With the beard replaced by such a peculiar haircut, he really did now look like a gameshow host. Having dealt with Blue Boy, the two of them emerged from the depths and slowly approached the table and seated themselves, showing a small degree of alarm at the dismembered head gazing back at its own body.
“Is this normal?” Hippo Man asked of White Man.
“Not especially. I thought it might be easier to discuss terms with fewer people present. She will be OK, I promise you.”
“Well, that’s good to know, we don’t want anyone to suffer unduly,” Hippo Man replied.
“Yes, we mean no harm,” concurred Bob with a nod.
Ever alert to ways of extracting an advantage, White Man made a mental note, “No harm you say? Surely you have harmed the entire village thus far?”
“Not at all, just a little control and suggestion really, things can return to normal very easily once we’re through,
” Bob replied.
“Indeed,” said White Man, “so perhaps I could enquire as to your ultimate goal here?”
“We simply desire a new place to live. Word in the intergalactic ether is that Yorkshire, and in particular Nether-Staining, is really rather desirable. Good clean air, open spaces, a healthy dislike of outsiders, that kind of thing,” Hippo Man said.
“I assume you realise that they will not take this lying down?”
“Hence our strategy of persuasion and influence, we thought we’d change things and then they’d realise that actually we were right all along,” Bob said.
“You have clearly not met the stubborn fools of Yorkshire before, have you?”
“Well, no,” Bob replied, “except for the odd traditional abduct and probe routine of someone drunken guy who said his name was Billy. You’ve got to give your audience what they expect sometimes, haven’t you?”
“You cannot persuade the ignorant of something that will benefit them. You should really take it by force, something which I assume you do not possess?”
Bob and Hippo Man exchanged a brief look which was all White Man required to know that his seat was an advantageous one.
“Please do tell me how you have been controlling the population? Perhaps we can work together,” White Man allowed a small smile to assert itself before a small laugh broke free, “mwahaha!”
“It’s really very simple, we’ve been distributing leaflets imbued with a psychotropic agent and used that to influence the local populace,” Bob replied, “once they’ve been exposed to this, it has been very easy to suggest and manipulate.”
“Brilliant!” White Man wasn’t prone to a great deal of excitement but it felt warranted on this occasion. “So simple and effective. I feel I should congratulate you. Why the elaborate scheme as regards the hotel and golf course?”
“No harm in a bit of window dressing is there?” Hippo Man said.
“Yes, we thought it would deflect attention away from the fact that our goals are really somewhat smaller while giving us a nice place to relax after it’s built. We’ve been manipulating people at an international, national and local level from the word go,” Bob added. “It’s been quite easy really and hasn’t taken very long at all.”
“I tried to take over Nether-Staining once before with robots but it was sadly foiled, so I am keen to work with you to ensure you are successful, if you shall have me that is.”
White Man offered his hand and shook those of Hippo Man and Bob, neither of whom saw that the fingers of his other hand were crossed behind his back.
“DASTARDLY BASTARD!” shouted Broken, who saw the deception very clearly.
“I think perhaps I shall start with that bird,” White Man said.
If you haven’t been paying attention to Broken too much, you won’t realise that African Grey parrots are very intelligent, some may say too much so for their small size. Broken knew when the supply of goodwill towards him was about to dry up, coinciding with White Man arising from his chair while staring at him. Broken knew this game. It was much like the game of ‘Take the Bird to the Vets’ which he wasn’t keen on at all.
White Man approached without a great degree of caution, forgetting that he had no minion to rely upon. As he neared Broken’s perch and reached out his hands to grab Broken in a throttling manoeuvre, Broken surprised him by leaping onto his left shoulder. White Man flailed his arms momentarily as he tried to grab the bird, during which time Broken reared up slightly and defecated down White Man’s lapel, leaving an ugly green stain upon his white suit. Job done, Broken said “MWAHAHA!” and flew out of the pub’s door.
“I forgot he could fly,” White Man said as he attempted to wipe off the offending poo. It left a nasty smear.
“I was about to warn you about that,” Bob commented, too late, “maybe try putting a bit of vodka on that stain?”
***
The outside of the Dog & Duck can be a cold and forbidding place. This is even more so when your life thus far has largely been spent inside the warm, friendly confines of said public house.
Broken was somewhat taken aback as he entered the big, wide world. It wasn’t the first time he’d done it, but it was the first time anyone had documented it from his perspective. The village green was enormous, and what were those things on the pond making noises that sounded like “quack”, while a dog stared at them from the edge?
He didn’t know where to go first so he thought he might as well go and sit in a nearby tree, great for watching the world from on high. It was quite a pleasing tree to perch in, and Broken hadn’t perched in a tree before. He tested the quality of the tree by biting off a bit of bark before dropping it to the ground below. That done, he tore off a leaf and let it fall, enjoying the rather lazy nature of its descent. He had a preen for a few minutes to make himself look beautiful just in case there were any females in the area and noticed that this particular tree was an apple tree and saw a rather large fruit.
“Do come and eat me and assist with spreading my seeds,” the fruit said to him, theoretically speaking.
“I THINK I SURELY WILL,” Broken thought to himself, availing himself of the apple.
“Well, well, well,” said the cat that was perched upon the branch of the tree just above Broken, thus far sitting very still and fixating upon him with both eyes, “fancy seeing you here, are you a bird?”
“I AM INDEED A BIRD.”
“I like birds, I’ve not seen a bird that looks like you before,” the cat said, “what’s your name?”
“BROKEN, WHAT’S YOURS?”
“I’m called Tiger. I’ve been up this tree for a while. I can’t get down and my owner keeps hoping someone will come and help her by climbing up to fetch me down. I’m quite hungry.”
“CAN I HELP YOU GET DOWN?”
“I don’t think so. I suspect you’re too small to help really. But come closer as I’m sure we can at least be best friends.”
“WOULD YOU LIKE SOME OF THIS APPLE? IT’S REALLY SWEET AND JUICY.”
“No thank you. I don’t eat fruit.”
Broken thought anyone who didn’t eat fruit was a bit silly, “WHAT DO YOU EAT? MAYBE I CAN GET SOME FOR YOU?”
“Oh, fish, some meat, that kind of thing,” Tiger said absent-mindedly.
“I SEE,” Broken said, he’d seen fish, chicken, beef and lamb dishes often enough on plates in the pub. He looked at Tiger suspiciously and decided to climb up to the branch above.
Tiger gave a yawn and stretched out his front limbs as Broken looked on. Broken could see his sharp teeth and his sharp claws as they gripped the branch.
“Come closer, friend,” Tiger said, licking his lips.
“I’VE JUST SEEN YOUR TEETH, THEY’RE VERY SHARP,” Broken replied, staying put.
“I use them to catch mice and rats hereabouts,” Tiger replied, “but there aren’t many of them up this tree.”
Broken edged closer to Tiger. When he was within a body length, Tiger’s true colours unveiled themselves as he hissed and lashed out with a front paw in a swiping motion. Broken darted backwards equally fast which led to Tiger over-balancing and toppling sideways from the branch and falling to the ground below, striking multiple branches on the way, yet still landing firmly on all fours.
“BASTARD!” shouted Broken.
“You’re lucky this time,” meowed Tiger, licking his paw and trying his best to saunter nonchalantly away.
“I KNEW I’D HELP!”
With this, Broken took to the air, spotting someone crouching behind some old barrels outside the pub. He descended down and landed upon said barrels and said, “HELLO, GOT ANY NUTS?”
***
Back inside the pub, the bearded incarnation of Hippo Man was currently plaiting his beard into a nice point and felt immensely pleased, bar the incessant appetite of his oversized gut. “I feel an overwhelming urge to eat at present, do we have any food to keep powering this large body?”
“There’re some of Beryl’s
Baps left over from yesterday on the bar if it pleases you?” Bob offered, retrieving said articles from the bar. Despite being wrapped in cling film, they were just a touch stale.
“Please, I’d best have them all, and throw in a pork pie or some pork scratchings if you’ve got any. I have a feeling that will satiate this beastly form.”
White Man had descended into the basement to rouse Coward King after Broken had departed and left the two hairpieces alone.
“Can we trust him?” Hippo Man asked quietly, between bites, chews and swallows.
“I don’t see why not, he seems to have a shared interest doesn’t he? Don’t the earthlings value white as a colour of purity?” Bob replied, tweaking his ice cream quiff playfully.
“Hmmm, yes. But my body is telling me that this man cannot be trusted.”
“Best give him a trial then eh? We can always change our minds. We have a secret weapon after all.”
Hippo Man laughed at that one. Very heartily.
White Man and Coward King re-emerged from the depths with a rather serious air and returned to the table, closing the cellar door behind them.
***
In the cellar, Blue Boy was slowly coming around and had seen White Man and Coward King depart, unable to utter anything profound in their wake as he found three issues with his current state, namely that his mouth was full and taped shut, his arms were tied behind his back and he had an almighty throbbing pain in his testicles.
“I hope it doesn’t swell up too much down there, it might render me impotent,” thought Blue Boy, before grimacing some more as his tongue acquired a taste that felt a bit like saliva mixed with underpants.
Blue Boy looked about him for inspiration in the gloom and noticed a broken cue nearby. He managed to move using just his legs and grip the cue between his feet such that the pointed jagged end was facing upwards. He plunged his mouth carefully at it and pierced the tape, allowing a little more air in. He tried to spit out the gag but couldn’t do so.
He lay still for a moment, not wishing to draw attention to himself and entered a deeper state of thought. Drawing on his alter-ego’s mastery of the yogic bedroom arts, he instinctively brought his knees up to his chest and began the slightly arduous process of pulling his arms around beneath his feet. Not easy for an older male, especially one with a pulsating sac.
