by Vance Huxley
It wasn’t dusk but time dragged on soHarold told a few to doze. They’d be sharper later. Trev took another break, coming to talk to Harold but keeping his voice down. “I’m ready for the first test, but it won’t start transmitting. There might be a few lights but that’s all.”
“Okay. I’llkeep the Barbies out of sight of the kit and won’t tell them. They’ll only get wound up.” A quick word with the guards and they made sure no Barbies wandered nearer for a while.
Trev ran the first test. The speakers inside Beth’s crackled! A stampede of women came up the stairs to ask what had happened, led by Beetch. “Is it fixed?” A crowd behind her hung on every word, ignoring the weapons the startled guards were aiming.
Harold held up his hands, palms out, trying to calm them down. “Steady on. It’s just a test to see if the power is going where it should. We didn’t expect any noise because it’s not transmitting.”Harold pointed at one of the speakers that made a noise. “How come that fired up?”
“It’s our tannoy. We make announcements on there or sometimes play different music to what we transmit. Does that help?” Harold passed the message.Trev nodded, keeping clear of the door and turning back to the transmitter straight away. Down on the ground floor of the shopping centre the party picked up a bit. Beetch spoke to the succession of senior Barbies who’d come to investigate. Despite that, they looked happier because something had started working.
Harold considered prodding Trev along, but that would probably make the radio man more nervous. Lights came on inside Beth’sbefore Trev came to see him again. “This time the tannoy should work. Warn them and try to keep them clear. Please?” The stampede had wound him up all over again.
The second test produced a burst of music through the speakers, and a bloody great cheer went up. The tannoy worked at least, which livened up the dancing in the foyer.Four obviously elite Barbies, Cherry Pie, Ski, Beetch, and one wearing jodhpurs and holding a whip,stayed permanently at the top of the stairs. At least they kept the rest from trying to look in the radio room.”The decks are working now, it’s just the actual transmitting part. Whoever set that bomb knew where to put it to cause the most damage.” Harold passed the first part of Trev’s comment to Beetch. Someone down below produced a big boom box and set it up on a table.
Ru came across to Harold,speaking quietly so Trev didn’t hear. “Ski says thatthing is tuned to Barbie Radio, and the volume is on eleven.”Despite the dancing and laughter below, the revellers all kept glancing at the radio and up at the radio room. Someone even lowered the volume of the CD player. The tension began to rise again, expectation rather than aggression.
Trev kept testing, twisting and joining, and the rat’s nest turned into a thick braid of connected wiring. He tested controls again. More lights came on, but Trev confessed he didn’t actually know how to operate the kit.Harold passed that on. Within minutesSkipper turned up in her red striped top and leg warmers, a denim skirt, and carrying her old transistor radio. “Stop playing about with those controls.” She rubbed against Trev. “You can adjust anything of mine you like? Maybe stay over so you can tune it all?” Everyone but Trev laughed.
Harold rescued him. “Are you here to help him, or give him a heart attack?”
“I came to help because I usually operate Barbie Radio. I know what to press to get it to work.” Skipper started poking buttons and turning dials. “Your radio bloke can turn on anything else he likes, as long as it’s me?” She couldn’t get a reply, even his name,so Skipper settled for tellingTrev which lights should have come on and what they meant. When Trev traced wires and did some more twisting and taping inside the front panels, Skipper got on her hands and knees to see better. “Don’t look up my skirt, becauseI put these knickers on for the radio man. He can look, or put his hand up to check?”
Trev refused to check, or even answer, so she went back to playing with controls. More lights came on and dials lit up until finally Skipper put a CD in, then tapped a microphone. Nothing happened but after consulting, Trev rewired a small section. This time Skipper sent a message to turn off the CD player downstairs. Silence fell. The next tap sounded loud and clear down below, from the radio! Skipper picked up the mic and announced triumphantly that “Barbie Radio lives!” Her words boomed out at eleven and the real party started. Harold even knew where the armed to the teeth maniacs were lurking, because he could hear them cheering.
Beetch opened her arms to include everyone. “Stay the night! Join the party!” Right now, Harold thought the invitation might be genuine. The Barbies in sight were totally relaxed and happy, only interested in dancing and celebrating.Just as well becausethey were already mixing with the Orchard Close guards, wanting them to join in. The weapons weren’t even slowing them up. Harold wondered, just for a moment, but the invasion seemed totally friendly and not the prelude to a massacre. The only assaults were lip to lip, and those victims weren’t actually fighting back.
“Sorry, I’m on a curfew.” Harold quickly organised the guards with Trev in the middle, heading downstairs while the good mood lasted.
The dancing crowd reluctantly parted, just far enough to let them through beforeclosing up behind. The Orchard Close group all had a lot of invitations on the way out, but declined. Not all of them were against the idea, Harold heard several promise “next time.” His own people were a bit too relaxed and happy if they were considering coming back!
Except Trev, who might be surrounded by guards but had a companion and wasn’t relaxed at all. Hekept cowering away as Skipper made increasing desperate pleas for him to check her knickers, tweak her nipples, anything please to remember him by. Harold received his own set of offers, a couple of them from female servants which somehow seemed more startling. He accepted one offer, a large Union Flag to drape over his shoulders, which raised a huge cheer.
Harold heaved a sigh of relief when the doors opened, and took a deep breath of fresh air. Patty, stood by Harold’s pickup in the full glare of the lightfrom the glass doors,also looked relieved and definitely ready to roll. “They kept telling me you’d stopped to party, and asking me back inside. I thought I might have to go home alone.” Several Barbies promptly offered to keep her company; the party had spilled outside to the sentries. Harold chivvied the rest of his people along, because he wanted to be over the border before the euphoria wore off. He still had the button and the muskets until the convoy reached the border, and hoped the bomb stayed enough of a deterrent. Full volume Barbie Radio, with vocal accompaniment, blasted from the transport as the escort poured out of the doors to take Harold home.
A small army of additional Barbie troops trotted alongside the vehicles, but fell behind as the vehicles accelerated. When the convoy passed theirhousing,the civvieswere actually dancing under the street lights, waving and cheering. Barbie Radio blasted out from their houses, loud and clear. “We Will Rock You” hammered out of the radiosas the convoy reached the border, loud enough for the GOFSto know that Barbie Radio lived. On this clear, still evening maybe even the General, Geeks and Hot Rods would catch it.
Harold took out the batteries and crunched the remote underfoot. “Pull out the battery and remove the bomb without pulling the string. Then pull the string and chuck it where it won’t do any damage when it goes bang. It might not anyway without the batteries.” Harold kept his voice and face dead serious despite Beetch’s huge grin. “In which case shoot it until it does, because you don’t want to take it apart.” He didn’t want the Barbies getting an example of Kharon’s clockwork fuse.
Beach Beetchcalmed down enough to send a Barbie to pass that on through the field telephone, and wait for confirmation. “What about the liquid?”
“Five gallons of oil and paraffin, harmless without the boom. If you put the mixture in a big tub the two might separate and then they’re a bonus.”
Harold and his party refused offers to join in the dancing for the few minutes until the Barbie came back. She spoke to Beetchwho gave a whoop. “All clear,
the bomb is off!”
Harold handed over the two muskets. “Careful. They’re loaded, because we weren’t sure if you’d be getting the gun or the ball.” Harold grinned as he said it because by now he knew what the result would be. Sure enough, the Barbies fell about laughing, that was their kind of joke. Beetch promptly let one musket off straight up, which knocked her onto her ass.
People on both sides put a hand on a weapon or cocked what they were carrying, then relaxed. Beetch looked round and started laughing. “Here, you try.” She threw the other musket to one of the border sentries before using the empty one to help herself up. A few seconds later, smoke and flame erupted skywards again. It looked spectacular now darkness had almost fallen, so the GOFS would know the Barbies had muskets. They were a negligible increase in firepower, but the big noisy weapons were becoming a status symbol of sorts.
Harold handed over the small bag of musket balls, half a dozen flints and a glass jar full of powder.”This is the right powder. It’s a bit rougher than the type you put in reloads, but that will work as well. The balls are just lead.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. We’ve all been looking at books and a couple of old videos to see how they work.” Beetch threw the empty musket and the ammo to another border guard. “Get those back to Beth’s. Just one of you, the rest can party when you’re relieved.”
She turned back to Harold with a wide smile. “I’m in charge of your escort, all the way home.You should ride with me to give directions. With a bit of luck I’ll find out if your balls are lead or brass, and you can check if I’m a genuine blond?” Harold managed to keep his smile, though he hadn’t been planning on that.Itwould be an interesting trip buthe couldn’t refuse, not without losing his fearless SAS bastard reputation.
Beetch wasn’t just being chatty, she seemed downright manic even for a Barbie. She put the inside light on, just so Harold could read the big tag now fastened to the zip down the front of her swimsuit. It read ‘Pull to Initiate Orgy’ in big letters. Then Harold had to look at her ass to see that the zip came through and nearly up to her waist, “in case I meet a beach doggie.” Harold could pull the tag if he wanted to check if she was naturally blonde, or the back zip if he didn’t care either way. The act carried on, unrelenting.
The driver and gunner joined in, with increasing precise offers of what they could do for Soldier Boy, individually or together. When Harold kept declining they switched to offering to party while he watched, then maybe he’d be tempted. He found out later that the others in the Barbie vehicles had been subjected to a similar set of probably genuine offers.
*
At least the harassmentkept the Orchard Close escort alert, which almost caused a massacre. The Barbies didn’t mess about with coming across the rubble to Orchard Close,they came up the road with their lights blazing. The road to the bypass was neutral regardless of how Caddi felt about it, and anyway they were the Barbie Girlssonoisy and blatantwere required behaviour.
The fourteen or fifteen armed men clustered around the vehicles blocking the access road to Orchard Close nearly died. Harold heard weapons being cocked all around him and yelled. “Stop, wait! Turn the bloody radios off!” The radios were turned down, not off, but relative silence fell, a silence punctuated by comments about cheeky Hot Rod bastards and dead meat.
Meanwhile, the men froze in the glare, pinned against their vehicles. “Shoot them in the legs, girls, so we can take them home to the party.” Beetch sounded totally serious.
“Don’t shoot yet, they aren’t any sort of a threat.” Harold laughed to pretend he felt relaxed, but he knew how much the Barbies disliked Hot Rods. “They’re fifty yards from Orchard Close and bright shiny targets. Crossfire.” Harold laughed again as loud as he could. “I trained the people aiming at them.”
The comments started to brighten, with the suggestions moving on to taking the Hot Rods intact and keeping them after the party. The edge came off Beetch and the gunner in with Harold, and he breathed a bit easier. One of the men stepped forward with a hand up to shade his eyes, calling out. Harold recognisedDodge and shouted again for some quiet. Eventually he could hear what the Hot Rod shouted.”Where you been, Harry? Caddi wants to know.”
“At a party with my new girlfriends.” That raised a big cheer from the Barbies, and various offers to party in different ways. Dodge realised who Harold had in all these motors.
“Barbies! You brought them back? Are you f… bloody crazy?”
“Manners, Dodge. Ladies present.” That just increased the offers. This time Harold wasn’t sure all the voices were Barbies.
“Ah, sorry Harold.” Dodgemust be sorry becausehe actually said Harold instead of Harry. The Hot Rod had finally realised he was asking Soldier Boy a possibly unwelcome question, while pinned neatly between a horde of Barbies and whatever pointed his way from Orchard Close. “It’s just that Caddi wondered, and then we saw lights coming.”
“So why does that affect me? I’m on my patch, Dodge. Cooper tried this once, but had the sense to stand the other side of your border.” Soldier Boy had to keep up hispublic image. Privately Harold would have laughed and told the man, but right now he had to be a gang boss.
“It’s just, ah shit, someone killed a couple of the lads and took their motors. Nothing special but Caddi knew you’d left with some of your lot, armed to the teeth. With you teaming up with the Barbies, you know? Ah, shit, forget it.” The last part tailed off. Dodge didn’t want to be here, or asking that question.
“Caddi sent you to ask me if I’ve raided the Hot Rods and nicked his motors? Doesn’t Caddi like you, Dodge?” Some gang bosses would have sent Dodge’s head back, or maybe the man but without his balls. Several of the Barbies had already suggested something similar, for all the Hot Rods.
“Not right now, because the blokes and the motors were mine. Look, can we have the lights off and talk please?” Harold had never heard Dodgetrying to sound reasonable before. The usually bullish Hot Rod had finally realised what a bloody dangerous placehe’d ended up in.Nobody present liked Hot Rods andhis own people were blocked in, lit up, night blind, and daren’t use rifles or shotguns or the Army would shoot them.
“Go inside the gates,Dodge. Your menleave their weapons in the motorsand are searched at the gates. These nice ladies are staying the night so their weapons get locked in theirvehiclesas well. The troops can all have a free beer in the canteen to start the party.” Harold managed to keep his voice level as a hand gave him a friendly fondle, and a low voice pointed out he wouldn’t be sorry. The Barbie convoy waited, shouting promises about the party while the Hot Rods filed through the gates and were searched. Meanwhile Beetch passed a message, warning her women to leave everything but knives in the motors.
When the Barbies moved up for searches,most of them asked if Harold,Alfie or Pattycould search them personally, please. It felt like dealing with a score of manic Mercedes wannabes, which kept Harold smiling. The offers continued as the mob spilled in through the gates, until Tessa walked through the scrum and put her arm round Harold. A momentary hush followed as the Barbies noted the short tight skirt and top, the smile, and the proprietary arm.
“Welcome home Harold. Everything’s been kept warm for you. There’s beer or stew in the canteen for the others.” Tessa gave Harold a firm kiss, what a gang boss would expect from his woman, while Harold tried to ignore the emphasis on everything. The Barbiesmade comments about what had been kept warm, until Beetch reminded them where they were. The comments moderated to slanderous innuendo.
Tessa had definitely backed the Barbies off, so Harold put an arm around his official wench and walked up the street to home. On the way he nodded thanks to Casper,Doll and Emmy,who’d lined up thirty heavily armed fighters just inside the gates. The fighters who had been to Beth’s calmed down, forming ranks again which neatly cut the Barbies and Hot Rods off from their motors and weapons. Up ahead the Hot Rod troops were heading into the canteen for their beer, watched by Matthew, Bess, and a dozen o
f their squad. Within minutes Harold reachedhis home, and as soon as the door closed Tessa and Sharyn started laughing at him.
“Emmy phoned from the gate to say someone should rescue you.” Sharyn offered a cup of coffee.
“I put these on and came to the rescue.” Tessa posed in her tight clothes. “I suppose I’d better put real clothes on nowso you don’t get ideas.” She licked her lips, then smirked. “I’d say sorry about the kiss but you wouldn’t believe me.” Harold opened his mouth to answer, then decided no comment might be safer which made them both laugh even more.
Regardless of what Tessa thought, Harold knew he couldn’t stay in here. “There’s Hot Rods and Barbies loose out there. I ought to keep an eye on the idiots.”
“Don’t worry about it. Doll has the job of chaperoning whoever’s in charge of the Barbies because they all know her. Casper is bigger than Dodge, and will threaten him with a gay search if there’s any crap. The Hot Rod and Barbie troops will end up either arguing or pairing off with each other. They’re not heavily armed so it won’t come to much.” Sharyn smiled and patted the big chair.
“We’ll need extra guards in the canteen with that lot.” Harold wanted to go and help. He definitely didn’t think he should be sat at home with his feet up.
“They won’t start a gang fight, because Emmy is keeping those guards by the gate armed and on alert tonight.Doll reckons putting the two gangs in two of the Annex houses will keep them from causing trouble in the main compound tonight, especially with the Demons next door. Someone is already moving residents out to make room, just overnight. All our fighters were ready for trouble anyway,in case Dodgefelt ambitious before you arrived back. Casper already made the Hot Rods wait out there for over an hour. We wouldn’t let them leave, in case Dodge went to ambush you coming back in just the pickup and vans.” Tessa smiled and posed. “Now do you want me to sit on the chair arm so we can play that game? The where does the hand go one? Or are you going to tell us all about the trip?”