Champagne & Lemonade:
A collection of Short Stories, of Mixed Genres, for Young, Middle & Old.
John AD Hickling
STORY LISTINGS
TITLE PAGE
1. A GOLDEN TAIL.
2. THE MONSTER HUNTERS.
3. BROOM’S BUBBLEBUM BOTTLES.
4. I CAN’T STAND NOSEY BUGGERS.
5. THE BEAUTIFUL SNOW.
6. CHAMPAGNE AND LEMONADE.
7. HARRY AND THE PIRATES OF ROCK BAY.
8. THE CLEANER.
9. NOTHING THAT MONEY CAN’T BUY.
10. HORSING AROUND.
11. STAND TOGETHER.
12. LOOK MUM I CAN SEE.
13. VAMPIRE OF 133A GREENSTONE STREET.
14. DEPRESSING/DEPRESSED AGAIN.
15. ROBERT HOOD.
COPYRIGHT
A Golden Tail
It was a red hot summer’s day and the lovely little fish pond in the Brannings’ back garden glistened in the morning sun. The pond was filled with Koi carp and one of them, a small orange fish with a distinctive white stripe across his back, called Nibble, was doing his daily moan routine to a big black fish named Lucky.
“Bored, bored, bored — mmm just bored.”
“I take it you are bored, Nibble?” Lucky snapped.
“There must be more to life than swimming round in circles all day with you boring old lot.”
“Why, what’s up with this place, Nibble?” Lucky questioned, swimming angrily around him.
“Well, let’s see…there’s never any action, there are no young female fish and most of you may as well be floating belly up,” Nibble replied sarcastically, ticking each point off on his fin.
“I’ve told you before, this appetite for action will get you into trouble; and a female definitely will,” Lucky replied with a smile.
Nibble was about to make a retort when a chorus of ‘Yippee’ sounded around the pond. A silence followed as the fish huddled together, remaining as still as possible; their tails swishing back and forth in the water. All eyes were firmly fixed on the human shadow that loomed over the pond. A handful of food dropped down; breakfast had arrived.
“Attack,” yelled a white fish named Bob as he shot towards the food. He opened his mouth wide to gobble some up, but another fish butted him out of the way. Another fish was also about to indulge when a multi-coloured fish pulled him back by his tail. Yes, feeding time in the Brannings’ fish pond was, as always, chaos.
“There, that’s exactly what I mean — the highlight of your day,” Nibble said, smirking.
Lucky swam back down to Nibble. “Well — chomp — you have to — chomp — eat.”
“Yeah, fair enough, but look at ’em; it’s like a pack of them humans bringing down a spit roast pig at a barbecue.”
“You had better hurry if you want some, there’s hardly anything left,” Lucky said.
Nibble shook his head. “I know; a pack of pikes would leave more than this lot.”
“You joke, but I was lucky to get away.” All down his sides Lucky was covered in scars.
“Not that story again please,” sneered Nibble.
“It’s true.”
“Yes, you were in the river when three pikes grabbed ya, but you got away and you were rescued; hence the name Lucky.”
“It was four,” Lucky snapped back.
“Four? Four what?”
“Four pikes.”
Nibble was swimming along shaking his head when a dark shadow fell across the surface of the pond. “Wow, they’re feeling generous today; two lots of food,” yelled Nibble as he shot up towards the surface.
“No, Nibble,” shouted Lucky.
There was a big splash and a dazed Nibble found himself hanging upside down. He saw Lucky with his head sticking out of the pond, but he was getting smaller and smaller. Nibble looked up to see his tail in a great bird’s mouth.
“Arrgh, oi let me go,” Nibble yelled.
The bird tossed back his head, which sent Nibble spinning in the air. “Don’t think so, mate,” he screeched.
He opened his mouth ready to catch Nibble, but at that moment another bird knocked Nibble away; also wanting to eat him for dinner.
“Here, I’m not a tennis ball!” Nibble cried as he started to fall. He was flapping his fins up and down, hoping to stop himself, but it was to no avail as he continued to plummet. He looked up to see the birds fighting high above him. Well this isn’t good, he thought.
Splash. A confused Nibble landed back in the water. He was slowly swimming around, trying to regain his bearings, when out of the corner of his eye he saw something. “Lucky, i-is that you?” he nervously asked as he slowly turned around. “Arrgh,” he screamed; a lot of big teeth were heading towards him. Before Nibble could react there was a shout of ‘Chaarrggge’ and a fish as big as himself head-butted the big fish with all the teeth in the side.
“Quick, chum, follow me,” shouted the fish; he was greenish in colour and had a fin with spikes on his back. Nibble followed him as fast as he could, but the murky water made it hard for him to see where they were heading. He swam past tall reeds and lots of human rubbish; he even saw a wellington boot like the ones the Brannings left outside their back door. There were a lot of different fish swimming about; fish that Nibble had never seen before. They swam down a narrow trench and lay there. “Sssshh,” the fish said to Nibble as they lay there in silence waiting for the big fish to swim by. It felt like a lifetime waiting in that murky water but eventually the coast became clear.
“Hello, me ode pal, I’m Muncher,” said the fish with a smile as he stretched out his right fin to shake Nibble’s.
Nibble grasped the proffered fin and shook it. “Erm, hello, my name’s Nibble,” he replied looking cautiously around him.
“Ha, Nibble, ya nearly got nibbled. Mind you, I’m not surprised with you being that colour; you don’t camouflage very well, do you?” Muncher said with a smirk.
“What was that thing? And what’s it doing in a pond?” asked a puzzled Nibble.
Muncher rubbed his gills. “Pond, ha! That was Bruiser, he’s a pike, and this ain’t no pond, me ode pal, it’s a river,” he blurted cheerfully. “The coast is clear now; we should go.”
Nibble froze, “A river…b-but…”
Muncher swam up to Nibble and urged him to follow. “Anyway, where you from?” They swam off and Nibble filled him in on the day’s events.
*
A little later on and a bit farther up the river, Nibble’s rumbling stomach prompted him to say, “I’m starving; where do you eat around here, Muncher?”
“That’s a good question,” he replied, scratching his brow. Nibble was about to speak when, “Rats,” Muncher yelled.
Nibble hid behind him. “R-rats, where?”
“Don’t be daft, Nibble, what ya hiding from? What I mean is the water rats; they’ve always got food,” chirped Muncher. Nibble looked at him confused. Muncher grabbed him and said, “Oh come on, I’ll show ya.”
A couple of minutes later Muncher uttered another ‘Sssshhh’ as they swam through some weeds towards the rat nests on the bank. Their hearts sank; there was something skulking towards them through the weeds. Muncher wondered, is it Bruiser the pike or the rats? He hoped it wasn’t Nuggets; he was a large rat with one eye — a nasty piece of work.
“W-what is it?” stuttered Nibble.
“Quiet,” Muncher whispered. They huddled up as it got closer, and closer, and —
“Muncher, me old china.” A fish jumped out at them.
“My heart, are you plumbed in woman? Dear me, how’s it going, Poppet?” snapped a relieved Muncher.
“Who’s this?”
“Oh sorry, Poppet;
this is Nibble from the pond.”
“Oh, hello,” said Poppet, smiling as she looked into Nibble’s eyes.
Nibble couldn’t take his eyes off this beautiful small silver fish with red fins. “Erm, hello.”
“Shush,” interrupted Muncher, worried that the fish with the teeth were still lurking about.
“What are you both up to anyway?” asked Poppet, unable to take her eyes off Nibble.
“We’re going to borrow a bit of grub from the rats,” replied Muncher.
“Are you mad?” snapped Poppet.
“No, just hungry; well, see ya then, Poppet.” Muncher made to swim away.
Poppet looked at Nibble who still hadn’t taken his eyes off her. “Well, I’m hungry too so can I come with you?”
Muncher was just about to answer when Nibble jumped in, “Oh, yes, can she Muncher?” he begged, smiling at Poppet.
Muncher smirked, looking at the two lovebirds. “Come on then, but be quiet.”
They swam slowly towards the nests, but the first one they got to was empty. They continued and swam up to the next one along and were just about to enter when they heard something coming up behind them.
Muncher, with a lump in his throat, slowly turned around. As he did so a loud, cackling laugh surrounded him. They all turned to meet Nuggets, the one eyed rat, who was flanked by two other river rats. Nuggets put his paws on the two rats’ shoulders and with a sly grin shouted, “Lunch, boys, hehehe.”
The rats leapt for the fish; Nibble and Poppet shot off with the two rats in tow while Muncher was being chased by Nuggets. Muncher smirked to himself and swam down the dark trench.
Poppet grabbed Nibble’s fin and they exchanged a smile as they swam as fast as they could with the rats giving chase.
“Oh no,” yelled Poppet; the cackling rats had them cornered. Nibble leapt in front of Poppet, protecting her.
Elsewhere, Muncher was swimming down the trench singing, “Too many fish in the sea.”
Nuggets, however, had gained on him. “There will be one less in a moment, ha,” he yelled.
Muncher stopped dead. “Food, boys,” Bruiser the pike yelled as he lay in wait at the bottom of the trench with his mouth wide open. Muncher swam under him and headed back out of the trench again.
“Teeth,” screamed Nuggets, jumping over Bruiser. He then shot after Muncher with Bruiser and two other pikes giving chase.
Nibble gave Poppet’s fin a squeeze and couldn’t stop thinking about the pond and Lucky. The rats were about to strike.
“Swim for your lives,” screamed Nuggets.
The rats turned to see lots of teeth. “Arrrgh,” they yelled and swam as fast as they could with the pikes hot on their heels.
“Yee-ha,” yelled Muncher, bringing up the rear.
Nibble, Poppet and Muncher embraced. “That was great, Muncher,” cheered Nibble, grinning with relief.
“Yeah, not bad for a genius like me.” He smirked. Behind him Poppet and Nibble were cuddling.
Nibble thought to himself, well I wanted action and a girl. Poppet held his face and kissed him. “Yee-ha,” he shouted as he shot up to the surface. He jumped out of the water and was about to shout again when he felt a thud. He shook his head and looked down to see Muncher and Poppet getting farther and farther away. He then looked up to see wings and yelled, “You’re having a laugh!”
The Monster Hunters
The Prime Minister’s, James Barrowman’s, flustered face was the talk of the day amongst his house staff and a handful of reporters as he raced inside Number 10 for an emergency meeting. It had been arranged as a last minute thing and Barrowman had been forced to cut short his appearance at a charity function.
The red, flustered face of the PM was stared at by all in the room as he bounded in. His hair was uncombed, his right trouser leg was tucked into his sock, his tie was loosely fastened and he was still tucking his shirt into his trousers.
“Can’t even have a number two in peace,” he mumbled to himself as he sat down and threw a dossier on the table.
At this moment in time, England had eyes on her from all over the globe. There had been numerous rumours for years, of course, but these last few months had caused them to go through the roof. Various stories from conspiracy theorists were dominating the news channels and newspapers; they were all adamant that the government was hiding the truth from the nation. According to the theorists, the governments from all over the world had been working together to keep the public believing that any stories of mythical creatures were untrue. In the last couple of weeks, however, stories and sightings had quadrupled and it was becoming harder and harder to shield the truth from the public. UFO and Bigfoot sightings had come in from all over the globe, the Loch Ness monster had re-emerged and had been reported to have sunk a boat in the loch; one of the survivors had taken a photograph, but his camera had been mysteriously taken (by the government was what most of the theorists were saying). There had been stories of unicorns running around the National Park in Dartmoor, Devon; trolls were causing mayhem in the Hartsop area of the Lake District. And there was more: last week, London came to a standstill when Tower Bridge was wrecked; one half of the drawbridge had been left hanging down, bent and twisted, while the other half was at the bottom of the Thames. The reports that came in said that it was down to a large, troll-like creature which had been causing havoc. A handful of the public and a couple of reporters had borne witness to this. The government’s official explanation had been that it was an earthquake and any witnesses that said anything different were quickly silenced in one way or another. Any reporters in the area at the time had been sent on a faraway exclusive with bonus payments that amounted to enough for an early retirement.
Only a select handful of people had been chosen to attend this meeting. There was George Bent, Secretary of State for Defence; Neville Green, the Deputy Prime Minister; Shirley Sherburne, Mayoress of London; General Frank Peace of the army, Admiral John Lincoln of the navy and Stephanie Brown, aide to the Queen whose job it was to keep the Queen up to date on the situation.
Also in attendance at this meeting was a new member of the cabinet, a military commander, Jack Durnham. He was a strapping, six foot, muscular man who took pride in everything he did — his cuffs and collars were pressed to perfection. He had short brown hair, a thin, brown moustache, brown eyes that glinted when he smiled and on his left cheek was a two inch scar that he had obtained during one of his tour duties. He sat, looking at the various members that had gathered, wondering what the meeting was all about.
The PM was sat across from Jack and Jack found himself staring at the PM as he flicked open a page in Jack’s file and said, “I have been going through your files; you have had a remarkable career.” The PM flicked over another page and tapped his finger on it. “One tour of duty in Iraq…two tours of duty in Afghanistan.” The PM smiled then ran the fingers of his left hand through his uncombed hair; he turned to another page and said, “Plus thirty-two successful missions — without a scratch.” He snapped the file shut. “You get the job done, no matter the odds or consequences, Jack; I like that. I think you are just the man we need.” The Prime Minister suddenly turned graver. “Tell me, what do you know about the Tower Bridge incident?”
“Thank you, Sir; it’s an honour to be here. Only what I saw on TV; it was an earthquake, I believe.”
George Bent stood up, looked at Jack and said, “What have you heard about the troll story?”
“Rumours, like the rest of the stuff going round; just rubbish.” Jack started to laugh, but soon stopped when he realized he was the only one.
“They’re not rumours, Jack; read this,” said the Prime Minister as he slid the top-secret dossier across the table to Jack.
Jack flicked through the dossier, grinning at first as he thought it was all a windup because all the pictures of different creatures (trolls, dragons, werewolves and much more) couldn’t possibly be real. Then, as he was shown some video footage, his happy expre
ssion started to fade. First, there was an old black and white video of some sort of dragon creature in Mexico snatching people up from the ground, none of which were ever seen again. Some other footage showed what was known as a mountain troll being experimented on in a secret, underground facility in the USA. Jack watched the next clip open-mouthed as a man transformed into a werewolf, and his mouth opened even wider when a very fuzzy piece of film showed a goblin troll being experimented on in the Lake District. Another image flashed up on the screen and Jack piped up, “I remember that; it was the gas explosion at Chippenham Power Plant, two years back.” But after watching the clip, Jack realized it was no gas explosion as he saw a twenty foot troll smash and destroy the building. The lights came back on as the videos finished and Jack was sat as silent as night as it dawned on him that everything he had always believed to be nothing more than myths, fiction and tales, was actually real.
He gulped as he looked at the Prime Minister, who then patted Jack’s shoulder and said, “For years, we, and members of other governments, have kept these creatures contained. In the past we could just pay people off to keep quiet of any sightings, but now it’s getting worse. There are far too many to pay off as the creatures seem to be more each day and our pockets are no longer deep enough. That is why I am putting you as Head of Operations, Jack; you have forty-eight hours to come up with a plan; report to George.”
“Yes, Sir,” whispered a shocked Jack. The Prime Minister shook his hand once more and left to broadcast to the nation about ridiculous hoaxes.
*
Somewhere in London, in his mate’s Dad’s garage at 5.30 a.m., Jake Birch, a 22-year-old lifeguard, 6 foot in height, crew cut hair, stocky build, was helping his mate Greg Polanski, a polish 23-year-old who was an inventor with long, blond hair tied back in a ponytail, pack for their camping trip to Hartsop in the Lake District. Greg and Jake were putting the finishing touches to Greg’s campervan; it was chrome, could sleep six, had a brilliant GPS tracking system — all the mod cons. Jake was putting in fishing tackle and guns as they liked to go shooting. In fact, one of the reasons they were going to the Lake District was to see if they could catch the so-called beast of the Lake District; which was supposed to be some sort of a great, puma cat thing that had been spotted there.
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