by Vance Huxley
“I suppose the proof will be a mystery tour, so you’ll tie the witness up and blindfold her for the trip?” Harold nodded, because he wasn’t giving the location until Doc started stitching. “In that case we’ll bring Chandra instead of Ski, because Ski is still excited about getting into the Trooper’s pants. Tying her up makes her frisky anyway so she’d be chasing your Riot Squad instead of checking out the tanker.” Christie delivered that absolutely deadpan, and even Marge had a little smile afterwards.
When the cars pulled up, only Christie came to see Harold. “We’ve been talking. Is there any way to prove some of your story before Doc comes through your gates? Some of us are still worried.” Harold looked from the Barbie cars to the gate, trying to work out how he could show Chandra the tanker before dark but without anyone seeing where he went.
“I can think of two ways, Harold. The girls from the brothel saw the tanker, and there’s the bowser?” Patty turned to Christie and explained, briefly, about ‘Marge’s girls’ as Mack had called them. She also told the Barbie the amount of fuel in the bowser.
Christie thought about it, but not for long. “The girls are refugees, so they’ll say what they’re told to. A bowser with that amount of diesel proves you’ve found something, because there’s never been a hint you’ve got anything like that. It definitely wouldn’t be full, not unless you found it very recently.” She returned to her car but came back without her weapons. “Okay, but I’ll want to check the contents.”
When Christie came back out of the gates five minutes later, beckoning with both hands, the Barbies flooded into Orchard Close. Harold and Patty brought barrows for the ‘trading goods.’ “Most of our weapons are already in the backs of the cars, so you can load up out of sight.” Ken came to help load up, then went for her search while Christie escorted the weaponry.
Once clear of eavesdroppers Christie had even better news. “Five hundred litres of diesel is enough down payment for Doc to start work. If Chandra doesn’t see the tanker tonight, Doc leaves in the morning. We’ll take your diesel with us to cover what she does overnight.”
“No problem. Lenny will have a list of the most urgent cases. I’ll send Patty to let him know, because if I run down the street with a big grin there’ll be questions.” Christie might have laughed if Harold hadn’t looked so serious. Right now Harold didn’t know if he should hope Mercedes classed as a serious case so Doc got to her sooner, or wasn’t as bad as others. If she wasn’t as bad that would be good news but then she would have to wait.
“We know Mercedes is at your house. Doc will go there first while her nurse visits to your hospital and gets the details on the rest.” Malibu smiled at the curious looks. “A genuine trainee nurse who ended up in jail after using a scalpel to settle a domestic issue. We brought portable ultrasound to look for broken bones, metal and bone fragments. She’s had a lot of practical experience in the last few years.”
Harold took Doc to his house, where she took off her wig and fighter kit to reveal an ordinary-looking, brown-haired middle-aged woman. After about ten minutes, Doc came out of Mercedes’ bedroom. She immediately directed the three Barbies carrying bags to the dining room table. Mercedes would be the first operation!
One look at the plastic sheet, all the shiny metal and the bottles of gas when Gayle arrived with her smock and mask, and Harold became even more worried. A hobbling Casper and a tired-looking Tilly took Soldier Boy off to look at sentries and do other soldier stuff, anything but get underfoot and chew his knuckles down to his elbows.
Mercedes still wasn’t in the clear when dusk fell, because Doc had used a portable ultrasound to look before she started cutting. Harold wasn’t allowed in the house during the operation, but he couldn’t concentrate on anything else.
* * *
“Time to go. It’ll be better for you than pacing up and down.” Casper nudged Harold when he stayed where he was, looking up the street towards his house. “We’re a bit early but the sooner the better. You can drive around a bit until full dark, unless you’d rather wind up that army of very nervous Barbies you’ve let inside the gates?”
Harold turned away from his house, suddenly alarmed. “What? Has something happened?”
Casper patted his back reassuringly. “Not yet, but until you take Chandra and show her the tanker the Barbies will half-expect a double-cross. They know you’d try anything to get the doctor here. Now clear off and get the deal nailed down before someone gets hurt by mistake.” Harold had to admit Casper had a point. Barbie visitors were usually fairly relaxed, strolling about chatting up the residents or having a pint. Right now, every Barbie stayed inside the visitor house, probably clutching loaded weaponry.
“Okay, I get it. Come on Mack, let’s help Casper tie up a Barbie.” At least that caused some hilarity, and again when Harold arrived at the Barbie house.
When Harold held up the ropes and blindfold, half the Barbies broke out laughing. “We warned you Ski couldn’t come because she likes being tied up.” Chandra smirked as she held out her hands. “Nobody asked me what effect being tied up has on my sex drive. I might even turn straight if there aren’t any women nearby.” She started moaning and wriggling just a bit as Harold tied her up, getting louder when Patty searched her for any tracking devices. The searching didn’t take long because Chandra only wore her usual two silk curtains, front and back, laced together down the sides.
Once she was blindfolded Mack picked Chandra up to carry her out through the gates. “I hope your missus is broad-minded Mack. Unless she wants to join in?”
“Bloody ’ell, ’Arry. Is she always like this?”
Harold remembered that the Hot Rods didn’t have anything to do with the Barbies, not socially. “You’re lucky, Mack, because Chandra prefers women. A couple of the others would definitely have meant every word.” He opened the rear door. “In here on a seat, because it would be mean to put her in the boot.”
“Ooh, you want me on something soft and bouncy? I don’t mind, as long as I’ve got company. You won’t be able to get away once the door is closed.” Harold shook his head as Mack joined him in the front of the car. When he turned the motor on and started off, Chandra lost her act for a few moments. “Shit, Christie is going to be really pissed off. She was hoping the direction you set off in would give her a hint, but this bloody thing is nearly silent.”
Casper, sitting next to her, laughed. “Hard luck, and double hard luck because I’m the only person in Orchard Close who is immune to your wiles. That means I’m safe sitting next to you.”
Christie wouldn’t hear the bodyguard’s car either, carrying the same fighters who collected the bowser. So far, they’d kept quiet about the tanker. The Hot Rods who’d seen it were still segregated, allegedly until Lenny checked them for communicable diseases. As Harold drove through the darkness, Chandra kept up a low-level barrage of threats about how wound up she’d be when they arrived. She broke off now and then to spend some time listening, trying to work out a direction.
Casper kept laughing and teasing her, especially when the car began weaving and bumping down roads covered in rubble. Since he really had set off early Harold took her on a true mystery tour, backtracking a couple of times when roads were completely blocked even for an SUV. When the cars arrived, Casper volunteered to guard them because his leg wasn’t up to running around. Mack carried Chandra through the doors, down the slope and stood her up. Harold untied her before removing the blindfold.
“You should have left me tied up. You’ve no idea…” Chandra tailed off as she saw what Mack had illuminated with the big flashlight. Her “Holy Mary, Mother of God,” in the same reverent tones Bethany used, just emphasised that all these people had only been savages for a few years. All the civilisation still remained if something got past the veneer.
A very subdued young woman, all her gangster swagger and attitude forgotten, clambered over the trailer and the unit on the front. She checked that the big tank was full, dipping Harold’s sock in it
to make sure it was diesel, before starting the engine, briefly, to check the battery had been charged up. Eventually Chandra stood, big-eyed and breathless with excitement as she was packaged up for the return. This time it definitely wasn’t the bondage. All the way back she kept quiet except for the occasional “bloody hell,” or similar quiet exclamations.
The silence only lasted a few minutes after Chandra went back into the house full of Barbies. The outbreak of cheering probably baffled most people, but ‘Born to Be Wild,’ cranked up to seventeen with a Barbie choir soon distracted everyone. Christie didn’t join in. She came outside to join Harold in the caravan in the enclosed garden. Despite several new bullet holes, it had to be the most private place in Orchard Close.
Christie had hardly sat down before she agreed to the deal. “Done, and word has gone to Doc that she’s here until she’s seen anyone who needs her. Now how the hell do we get that home without fighting half the city? Unless we borrow your bowser, to move the contents a bit at a time?”
Harold sniggered. He couldn’t help it. “A big lorry can travel along roads that are considered impassable, as long as the Hot Rods and GOFS in particular are looking the other way. We can probably arrange that because the rumours were true. Caddi had two tankers, and I know where the other one is.” The reaction was all he’d hoped for; Christie nearly choked. After letting her take a couple of breaths, but before she could ask questions, Harold gave her the rest. “It’s way over beyond the Mansion and out of reach, but if everyone else gets to know about it at the same time?”
A blissful smile spread over Christie’s face. “If everyone arrives at once it’ll be the biggest fight in years, maybe since the big riot. The tanker will burn in the end but they’ll all try for it in case they can get it. Better yet they’ll take every spare fighter with them.”
“It will need careful timing, to make sure all the gangs arrive before one of them runs off with the tanker or the other goodies. There’s armoured vehicles there, so once they’re rolling they’d be hard to stop. I can let the Hot Rods know.” Harold smiled happily because he still owed the Hot Rods some payback. “After all, it’s still on their territory.”
“Ooh, nasty. Don’t worry about spreading the word to the rest. We, the original Barbies that is, really are all ex-guests of HM but not all for murder.” Christie sniggered this time. “Five of our girls are genuine nymphomaniacs who used to hunt as a pack. They were banged up pending treatment because, well, they get insistent if deprived, and some of their victims ended up in intensive care.”
“Will they come back?”
“Oh yes, they’re not locked up. They’ll come home because we make sure they get a regular supply of volunteer blokes without them being chained to a bed. That’s what a gang would do to them. They object to the chains, not the sex, and even go on a spree among our estates or the neighbours now and then.”
“So how does that spread the rumours?” Harold thought the gangsters would be too busy enjoying enthusiastic sex to ask questions.
“Our girls will have fun trying out some new blokes, a lot of blokes probably. They’ll get all excited when the big strong man is banging them so they’ll let secrets slip. The excitement will be real. The girls will be chatty afterwards, when the bloke’s blood supply is back in his brain. We’ve done it before, to let the Hot Rods know about Caddi dying.” The two of them were sipping a hot drink made in the caravan, another item that amused Christie.
“I’d like to keep the GOFS out of it, to save them casualties, but I don’t know how.” Harold wanted the GOFS strong, and anyway he really liked some of them. So did Patty it seemed, so he really didn’t want to get Vulcan killed.
That sobered Christie, just a little. “A good point, because a few of our lasses have made real friends among the GOFS and the bloody General is still lurking. We half expected him to try something while we were sorting out the Hot Rods.” She hesitated, thinking hard, then giggled. “We’ve worked well with the GOFS recently. As a way of getting to know them better we’ll send someone to talk to the Head Girl, an evening visit to sell her a few bits of sexy underwear. We’ll lay it on a bit, about how we heard about a diesel lorry but we aren’t stupid enough to go for it. We’ll be hanging back, allegedly, to snap up any stray vehicles or maybe a few Ferdinands or Trainspotters.” Despite the serious subject Christie still seemed to be in a very happy mood, without even a whiff of wacky baccy.
“If your eyes weren’t normal, I’d think you’d been indulging. I never realised how excited people could get over diesel.”
Christie laughed at him, which underlined Harold’s point, then sobered as she explained. “We’ve been worried, really worried. We didn’t take much territory to start with, and only had the dregs in the Mall petrol station tanks. That’s more or less gone now, along with what we found in cars or house garages. We’ve been patrolling on foot, but we can’t manage the Mart runs without diesel. Now we’ve got all that new territory which will need regular patrols for a while. There’s a petrol station included, but it’s already dry.”
“Won’t everyone wonder if you’ve suddenly got plenty of fuel?” Now Harold wondered how many others were running short, because his own dregs were about gone and he’d been really frugal.
“Not really.” Christie gave a little smile. “When did you ever hear any gang admit to being short of anything? If we’ve got enough, nobody will ask how much there really is. Most of our own people won’t know.”
“What about Beetch and that lot in the house? Won’t it leak out?” Harold expected someone in Orchard Close to let something slip about the bowser, or possibly the tanker.
“Those are all original nutcases, ex-prisoner Barbies from day one, and anyone not totally committed left or died years ago. That’s the real reason Ski didn’t come; she joined up later. Even if your people let something slip, anyone not in the know will assume they saw the tanker the rest fought over, or the bowser. Those Barbies will be the only ones who know where the diesel ends up, and they won’t talk, ever.” Christie seemed very sure, good enough since the Barbies were the ones who’d be attacked. “When are you going to shift those cars? There are eight big ones in there, and they’re in the way according to Chandra.”
Harold waved a negligent hand. “Take them as a bonus if Doc saves everyone.”
Christie laughed at Harold, again; she really did seem to be on some sort of high. “I think that settles it. We’ve been wondering why nobody can be tempted away. None of your Orchard Close fighters have deserted even though the GOFS, the Geeks and our lot tried repeatedly. It bounces every time. We couldn’t understand because the offers were very good.”
“Patty told me.”
“Oh yes. She’d go straight into the top rank, that one. We might even decide that there was a Demon Barbie to keep her name, but that’s the point. She isn’t swaggering about here taking the cream, which is what she’s been offered. Instead you paid an absolute fortune in weapons to get them medical help. Not just the elite, everyone. Servant or fighter, and from what I hear none of them bought in.”
Christie leant back and swigged her tea, then waved the half-empty mug to emphasise her point. “Now you’ve turned down the biggest prize for at least four years without any sign of hesitation, just to get Doc for the rest. That and to give them all a way out if it goes to hell. Unless that Mercedes really is something bloody special in the sack?”
“Not yet, not until she’s better.” Harold smiled but then blushed. “Then I’m hoping for permanent exclusive access.”
Christie found that hilarious, but then she sobered again. “How many of those fancy electric cars are there?”
“Enough.” The Barbies would count vehicles before leaving, but some looked like petrol SUVs or saloons.
This time, Christie seemed to have her humour finally under control. “If it goes to hell in a handcart and this place is abandoned, can your people bring some of them pretty please? All of them?”
Haro
ld shrugged because in that case he’d probably be dead, or running around a field someplace. “If it really goes to hell, yes.”
“Good, because they work even if you’ve got no diesel, don’t they?”
He knew he sounded smug, but Harold thought he was justified. “Yup.”
Christie nodded. “So Orchard Close don’t even need that diesel bowser?”
“We need some diesel because a lot of them are hybrid. They’ll only do twenty or thirty miles without charging up.” Harold didn’t want the Barbies too interested in the cars.
Christie snorted in derision. “What for? Twenty miles is a lot further than the borders and back for any gang. It’s a full patrol run so they’ll never need diesel. You could do a Mart run, two runs, before you need to plug in.” The knock on the door meant the talk was over. Mercedes had regained consciousness, but Doc wanted her to sleep. Harold didn’t run, but only because Sharyn wouldn’t let him. If he ran the whole Close would go on alert, not a good idea with a house full of heavily-armed Barbies inside the walls.
* * *
The doctor met him at the bedroom door, with strict conditions. “Just a few minutes, because the patient has come round but needs proper sleep. She won’t even try until she sees ’Arold?”
Harold nodded. “That’s me.”
“Well she wants you to check something.” Doc had a little frown, but Harold started smiling.
Mercedes had been put back into her own bed, but the shoulder that showed was swathed in bandages. Harold’s worry must have shown. Mercedes put one hand out of the covers to beckon him closer. “There are a lot of bandages, so I’m not wearing your shirt.” She might still be dopey from the anaesthetic but her teasing little smile looked a lot like the old Mercedes. “Or anything.”
