by Graham Johns
Once his arms were repositioned into a more useful state, he removed the tape and gag with ease, and gagged slightly when he saw that he’d been tasting a pair of what he assumed were Bob’s old Y-fronts for a good while. Man wasn’t meant to taste the gusset of man, in his opinion. He positioned the cue between his feet again and began the lengthy process of trying to get the cord off his wrists using a combination of this inadequate tool and his teeth.
***
“Then it is settled,” White Man proudly acclaimed, “we shall rid this land of anyone who goes against us and enjoy it for ourselves.”
Coward King nodded while Hippo Man and Bob smiled nervously.
“Are you able to assemble the villagers on the green?” Coward King asked. “I think we need to find out how loyal they will be.”
“With or without the mind control?” Hippo Man asked.
“Without first, then with if we need it,” White Man coolly said, “now if you will excuse me, I need to rid us of this robot.”
White Man picked up the head of The Conductor in one hand and dragged the body by an arm in the other, thrusting open the cellar door noisily and throwing them both down the stairs before closing the door once more.
Blue Boy stayed dead still as the light from the opened door brightened his task and almost leapt out of his skin when a head came barrelling down the stairs towards him. He then realised it must be The Conductor when he saw the body follow. “Easy to fix, that,” he thought, before continuing to work on his bonds.
***
Outside, the crouching figure behind the barrels had briefly been revealed to be a man. This man was hooded and seemed skilled at hugging the shadows. Incredibly, he did not have any nuts in response to Broken’s question, but had instead retrieved some chickweed from the edge of the car park to content and befriend the bird. He had seen much through the windows of the Dog & Duck.
CHAPTER 23
OH COME ALL YE VILLAGERS,
COME AND STAND IN LINE,
DO UNTO US AS WE WISH OF YOU,
OR DIE, DIE, DIE!
The Massing of the Bald, as it would henceforth come to be known in Nether-Staining by those few who would recall it later, was yet another sight to behold as the villagers came as one, dressed in white once more, onto the village green. They formed an orderly rank and file and awaited the speaking of their leader, Bob Roberts, Prime Minister and landlord extraordinaire.
The sun was beginning its descent to end the light of another day and the people shone like beacons in its lowering illumination.
The hay bales were once more in use as an impromptu dais and Bob bounded upon them and gazed briefly at the ordered masses before him, wearing a proud expression atop his purple suit. His hair fluttered above him, despite there being no breeze.
“Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, of Nether-Staining!”
Silence greeted him.
“Today, we face our first challenge as our new nation. It seems that spies would seek to infiltrate us and endeavour to usurp our aims by returning us to our former state!”
Bob paused. The crowd was quietly absorbing his words. Good, good.
“If we want to shine like the sun, first we have to burn like it! If they wish to conquer our nation, they must first disarm our citizens, they will not succeed!”
From behind the barrels, the hooded man was pretty sure he could recall that Adolf Hitler had used such words at the height of his charismatic best. This certainly didn’t bode well. Broken remained mercifully quiet from his current perch next to him.
Hippo Man, White Man and Coward King stood behind Bob, arranged as the most unlikely bodyguards ever assembled. Hippo Man groomed his beard with apparent delight, indeed the end of the beard appeared to be evading his fingers playfully.
“We face a new threat from within. Should you see anyone possessing hair or indeed anyone not assembled here on this village green right now, you should treat them as an affront to our new nation and detain them immediately!”
The villagers looked around them briefly to locate any hirsute folk, not seeming to realise that the only folk with hair were gathered in front of them. They seemed to steadily register those around them in response to the request, in a rather haunting contemplative silence.
***
Inside the Dog & Duck, hidden behind the door, Blue Boy and The Conductor, head reattached, listened with a little alarm. There was scant need to stress the importance of silence. Blue Boy retreated from the door and pointed upstairs and The Conductor followed.
“I really don’t understand why it is that everyone is so horrible to each other, either in public or private,” The Conductor said quietly, once they had arrived in the upper floor.
“I think it’s simple, every living thing has to have power over something or somebody else, everything predates on something,” Blue Boy advised before changing tack, “but now, horror of horrors, I’ve got to do something that may just have a dire impact on my life, but I tell you this, mark this day because there are times when heroic deeds must be performed in honour of Yorkshire!”
“Shhhhh!” The Conductor hissed. Blue Boy heeded her request and removed his hands from his hips and lowered his head from its sideways pose. He now looked a little less mythical and headed to the bathroom to perform his heroic deed.
A little while later the toilet flushed in a treacherously loud fashion, thankfully masked as Bob was continuing to lay down plans outside, and Blue Boy emerged momentarily, shaking his hands violently, “No towel.”
The Conductor looked upon him and shook her head slowly, “It almost suits you.”
“What? I’ve not splashed myself have I?” The Conductor shook her head. “Oh, you mean the hair?”
Blue Boy had apparently located a razor and had shaved his head, and even his eyebrows just to be on the safe side. Had the women of Nether-Staining, and perhaps of wider Yorkshire, been assembled to witness the event of his emergence from the bathroom, a sharp intake of breath may have resulted.
“It certainly doesn’t fit with the image of my alter ego, I must say,” Blue Boy reflected rubbing his hand across his smooth pate, “but then grass doesn’t grow on a busy street.”
The Conductor temporarily removed her veil and simply pulled her hair from the top of her robotic head, stashing it into a sleeve before replacing the veil. Blue Boy watched this action with some degree of envy and said, “We need a plan to somehow deal with these rogue hairdos.”
After a mere moment of thought in her internal circuits, The Conductor said “I think I have it.” She headed into the bathroom herself.
Blue Boy waited and began to tap his foot as he noticed that outside the pub, quiet had begun to reign. The Conductor emerged after what felt like minutes.
“What took so long?” Blue Boy asked.
“You left it in a real mess in there, I had to clean up your hair,” she explained.
“And what of your plan?”
She tapped her other sleeve where a notable bulge presented itself and had a broad grin, “You’ll see, but we need to visit another bathroom to find more. Let’s go.”
The Conductor opened the door to the stairs and quickly closed it once more with a look of concern, “We can’t go that way, I think Hippo Man might be coming up.”
Though Blue Boy knew that Hippo Man often took a good while to ascend stairs, he realised the issue, “We need to get out of a window.”
Thinking that the back of the property represented a good bet, he rushed back into the bathroom and opened the window as wide as it would go and eyed the rather old iron soil pipe to the rear corner of the building, right next to the window, “Can you climb down a soil pipe in that dress?” he asked.
“I should think so, can you climb with a shower curtain billowing from around your neck?”
Blue Boy didn’t answer and heroically suggested, “You go first.”
***
Outside the Dog & Duck, Broken continued to amuse himself with some
weeds while the hooded man had ventured away from him to peer into windows nearby. The villagers had now dispersed back to their homes and the ringleaders had ensconced themselves within the pub once more. From the lip reading ability which the man possessed, they seemed to be debating what would happen after the interlopers were caught and dealt with. This was a concern. He was fairly certain he caught the phrases “population expansion” and “comfortable living” in there. He moved around the building, looking for a secret entrance point.
From within a nearby bush, the hooded man was being watched silently by an expert predator, though that was the least of his impending problems because he was also being watched silently from behind a nearby hedgerow by someone who had reason to wish him out of this location.
The hooded man continued to sneak around the rear of the building, alerted too late to a rush of air above him as a streak of blue descended, with gravity as its mortal enemy, and landed upon the hooded man, whose hood was knocked back by the impact. The falling object was of course the bald Blue Boy. There was a degree of groaning from Blue Boy before he managed to assess his surroundings and speak unto his landing partner.
“Robin?” he asked, remarking as much on the fact that he had forgotten about his robotic accomplice as that he had landed on someone.
“Sir Michael of Blue Boy?”
Blue Boy looked around furtively and whispered, “It’s just Blue Boy while I wear this mask, please Robin.”
“Noted.”
At this point the expert predator dashed from the bush and began to bark at Robin. The Conductor emerged from the hedge and said “Nigel! Stop!”
No more words were said as they all quickly moved away and back into hiding behind the hedge. It was just in time as Coward King emerged from inside the Dog & Duck in search of the racket. Barking was not a pleasing noise to dastardly deed-makers it would seem. Failing to find anything of note, he ventured back into the pub rather quickly.
“Not overly observant is he?” Blue Boy asked. “If you can’t spot these outfits behind a hedge you clearly can’t be overly bothered or skilled, bit of a man-look if you ask me. Not very heroic. He’s brought shame to the outfit. He’s not fit to wear the shirt.”
Robin, The Conductor and Nigel all looked at him as he finished, “Can we move away to somewhere else, please?” The Conductor asked.
“Indeed.”
Robin replaced his hood upon his head and led them to behind the barrels once more. Once there, Broken leapt on to his shoulder and failed to be quiet as he asked, “GOT ANY NUTS?”
There was a moment as everyone looked around just in case anyone approached.
“First things first,” Blue Boy stated, “if you’re to join us, you’re to have a super-name. Now, it may not be overly original but given you are Robin and you have a hood, I was thinking perhaps of naming you ‘The Hooded Robin’, what does everyone think?” He really did look around expectantly.
“Why not just go with ‘Robin Hood’?” Robin asked.
“I think you’ll find that’s already been done but if you insist on breach of copyright, OK,” Blue Boy replied, “but can I just call you Robin?”
“Isn’t that just the same as before?” Blue Boy raised an eyebrow impatiently and Robin Hood realised he should just let it go. “So be it.”
“We really need to press on, I need to find the required items,” The Conductor said.
“Tell me what you have in mind, I might be able to help,” Robin Hood replied.
CHAPTER 24
SHE’S REALLY RATHER FETCHING,
AND CERTAINLY NUBILE,
BUT WHEN HER LEGS ARE ROUND YOUR NECK,
SHE CAN BE RATHER VILE.
The house of Patricia Volta looked deserted. Curtains were not drawn and lights were not on. The Conductor realised that there was nothing for it but to try to enter the premises illegally. Luckily, one of her super-skills as a robotic being was an ability to pick locks using only a finger and a bit of jiggery-pokery.
“It’s a good job that Trish doesn’t have a mortise lock,” Blue Boy observed, guiltily recalling too late that he knew exactly where the key was.
The Conductor ignored him as she silently eased the door open and moved inside, with Robin Hood hot on her heels, Broken riding on his shoulder while casting Blue Boy an evil glare. Nigel was sniffing around the garden and was left to his own devices as they entered. Blue Boy decided to follow and The Conductor closed the door gently behind him before speaking in a very hushed voice.
“I need to go to the bathroom,” she said.
“Why? You’re a robot!” Blue Boy replied, which drew a hush of finger across lips from The Conductor.
“Follow me quietly, she might be here somewhere.”
The Conductor began the ascent of the stairs with Robin Hood, plus Broken, just behind her. Blue Boy followed meekly, most displeased with having been relegated to mere sidekick. As they scaled the top stair and the others entered the bathroom, he thought he noted movement from one of the bedrooms and felt a need to investigate. The room was deserted but that was not all there was to note because a very shiny pole upon which to dance and writhe around provocatively was there in the centre of the room, with a range of soft furnishings and white curtains draped around the ceiling and perimeter of the room, which had a beautiful solid wood floor. The imaginative amongst us might’ve suggested it looked like the inside of a small circus marquee. Blue Boy wandered dreamily towards the pole and rubbed his hand upon it, recalling acrobatic days of yore. As he did so, he heard a squealing noise and felt a weight upon his shoulders as Patricia Volta’s legs descended from amongst the white-clad ceiling, where she’d been concealed, and clasped firmly around his neck.
Ordinarily, Blue Boy would’ve enjoyed this experience whole-heartedly, but this was not an ordinary day; and he was not naked and primed for cavorting. Her legs were positioned in such a way that he could not make a noise and he grabbed her thighs and began trying to prise them apart with as much strength as he could manage, which wasn’t a whole lot as the air began to depart his lungs. Having the presence of mind to try something else, Blue Boy attempted to move away from the pole but was held firm as Patricia had her hands firmly attached to the top of the pole. Blue Boy decided on a new tactic and dropped suddenly to his knees, almost feeling like he had managed to dismember himself in the process. This succeeded in loosening the grip and he laid on his back on the floor momentarily before realising he really had to move, “Help!” he tried to gasp hoarsely.
Then Volta was upon him again, this time straddling him across his chest with her hands around his throat while Blue Boy vainly tried to punch her, despite such an action being very much of a non-heroic bent as true heroes do not advocate violence towards women. He was almost spent and didn’t know what to do next as her grip tightened.
“BASTARD!” came a cry from the doorway as Broken entered the room on Robin Hood’s shoulder.
Robin grabbed the first thing he could lay his hands on, on a chest of drawers by the door, and threw it at Patricia. It hit her square on the back of the head but bounced harmlessly on to the floor with a gentle thud, from where all nine inches of it began to vibrate and slowly move around the hardwood surface.
“MWAHAHA!” Broken screamed.
Robin grabbed something else and took aim once more, this time creating more than an amusing anecdote as the solid metal butt plug struck home. Patricia Volta sagged forwards and Blue Boy scrambled out from underneath her, switching off the vibrator as he did.
“Bad boy, Mini Mick,” he said slowly as he tried to recover himself, placing the vibrator back where it belonged, on its charging station and ready for action. He couldn’t bring himself to touch the butt plug as he wasn’t sure where it had been.
“Are you OK?” Robin Hood asked, looking critically at the red marks upon Blue Boy’s neck.
“I think so, just give me a minute, terrific aim by the way, well done, thank you,” Blue Boy replied.
The Conductor appeared in the doorway and said jovially, “Everyone ready to go?”
This drew a look from Blue Boy that could start warfare, “Where were you?”
“Just getting what I needed,” she tapped her other sleeve, “it seemed like you two had this small issue covered.”
Blue Boy checked on Patricia carefully and reported that she was out cold. With Robin’s assistance he carefully took her to her bed and laid her there to rest. “Hopefully she won’t have any memory of this or one of my favourite places will become inaccessible.”
The band of heroes descended the stairs and opened the front door.
“Stop right there, scum,” Smutty Mathew said, blocking the exit. He was clad entirely in tight white Lycra and looked a lot like a superhero himself, but clearly possessed villainous intentions towards our party. “I have you now,” he smiled and pouted.
“What’s wrong with everyone in this village? It used to be a peaceful place to be, now it’s fifty shades of weird!” Blue Boy muttered as he approached the virginal Smutty Mathew slowly.
“There’s nothing wrong, except for you, you’re coming with me, STS.”
Blue Boy launched a ferocious kick that hit home right where the Lycra revealed his target area to be. Smutty Mathew crumpled to the ground in pain with a falsetto squeak.
“What just happened?” Smutty Mathew asked from his prostrate position, an octave higher than normal. “I feel like I’ve been kicked in the love spuds.”
“Sorry about that, needs must I’m afraid,” Blue Boy said, offering a hand to pull Mathew back to his feet.
“What am I wearing?” Mathew asked as he grew more self-aware. “I rather like it.”
“Well, you almost look like a hero already, albeit bar the cape and mask, so perhaps you’d best join us, Smutterance!”
Blue Boy disappeared to a kitchen draw and returned with a black marker pen and scrawled a majestic cock and balls upon Smutterance’s chest, which was duly flexed by movement of the pectorals to make it look alive. He also found some of Trish’s nylons and pulled one over Smutterance’s head.
