by Tony Lewis
“So what are you doing here, then?” asked Ethan. “And where's all your stuff?”
“We decided to use this table for now because it's made of marble and cleans easily. And besides, the floor back there isn't the strongest,” said Kilo, who was holding a blood stained scalpel. “We're actually working round the back. Once the body is reassembled we'll transfer it to a trolley and take it round.”
Ollie, Stitches and Ethan, led by Crumble, went and had a look `round the back.' To be honest it wasn't quite as impressive as the area that they'd just come from. It was like comparing Buckingham Palace to a rain soaked cardboard box that hadn't had a decent tidy up since the Victorian era. There was a single bench that had scientific odds and ends on it, a couple of chairs, and a fair smattering of discarded sweet wrappers (even with an enhanced IQ, Flug still craved confectionery every thirty seven seconds.) What did look marginally decent though was the large wooden wheel attached to the farthest wall. It was about thirty feet in diameter and roughly six feet off the floor. A wad of thick wires protruded from behind it, snaking across the floor before stopping just behind Crumble's feet.
“So, you see,” said the Professor, “once Mr. Kilo has finished with his knife and needle we can bring the body in here and get set up. We hook up the wires, ask Count Jocular to summon his bats and away we go.”
There were indeed at least three dozen leather harnesses attached to the wheel at regular intervals along its circumference.
“And then we just open up a window and hope a passing bolt of lightning pops in?” said Stitches.
“Oh no, my dear boy,” said Crumble, suppressing a smile. “I think you've been reading too much Shelley. This isn't the Dark Ages, you know. Once the bats get moving they'll provide more than enough power.”
(To be honest, Skullenia does reside in an evolutionary time frame that could quite easily be compared to life in the Dark Ages. There's pseudo barbarians wandering about killing and maiming anything that they laid their eyes on, barely functioning peasants whose brains are about as much use as a slimming club in a concentration camp, and a ruler who oversees his lands with an iron fist and who has no qualms rendering to grisly chunks anyone who gets on his nerves. Don't let that sully your image of Skullenia though. It could be worse. It could be like Glasgow).
Ollie walked over to the wheel and gave it a shake.
“Sturdy,” he said. “How did you get it built so quickly?”
“We didn't, actually,” said Crumble, tidying up the wires on the floor. “There's an old mill on the castle grounds. It's not used any more so we borrowed it. Saved a lot of time.”
“How on earth did you get it up here?” asked Ethan, who was as powerful as an Olympic weightlifter. “It must weigh a ton.”
“Flug and Egon brought it up. That little chap is a lot stronger then he looks.”
They all stared at the diminutive domestic who had a smug, self-satisfied grin on his squashy chops.
“It was nothing really,” he said, waving a dismissive hand. “I've always been blessed with a certain amount of natural strength.”
“There's nothing natural about being able to shift that,” said Stitches, suddenly remembering that he was carrying a wandering cyst. “Can you take this back by the way?”
“Would you like to help me put them down for the night?” said Egon.
Just then Flug came round the corner.
“Professor Crumble,” he said. “Mr Kilo is ready to attach the head and he requires your…um…sweets.”
“Righto,” said Crumble, as if Flug's statement were the most normal thing ever uttered.
Ollie looked at Stitches and ever so slightly shook his head.
“Not a word,” he whispered, a warning note in his voice. “We knew this would happen at some point, just not when. Let it go please.”
“Fair enough,” said the disgruntled zombie, who was fit to burst after such an extended period of not being able to chastise Flug.
Unfortunately for Stitches, Ollie had heard Egon's offer.
“Why don't you go with Egon,” he suggested, figuring Flug's transition from intellectual back to imbecile would be a damned sight easier if Stitches wasn't around.
Stitches, well aware of the sensitivity of Egon's hearing, motioned Ollie to a far corner of the room.
“You know how I feel about him,” he protested quietly. “He's weird and makes me feel uncomfortable.”
“Then a little bit of time with him will do you good,” said Ollie.
“But he's got the grooming habits of a chimpanzee,” the zombie complained bitterly.
“I won't be argued with,” insisted Ollie, folding his arms defiantly.
“And have you seen him eat? It's like watching a cement mixer.”
“I want you to go with Egon.”
“He'll chop me up limb from limb, you know that don't you? I'll be a headline in the paper. Handsome zombie comes apart at the seams.”
“Stitches.”
“Yes.”
“Go away.”
“Fine. But if I get dismembered I'll…”
“What?”
“£$%&*+? ‸% $£*&‸?%$£&.”
“Charming. See you later.”
* * *
Excalibur Cross and Ramekin Deadhouse sat at their respective desks in their office at the headquarters of the Skullenia Times. Actually headquarters was a bit of a grand title. It was more of an oversized shed on the outskirts of town that got so cold during the winter that it was enough to freeze the icicles off a penguin. Also, to continue with the description, their office was so small that Cross had to be careful with the arm of his typewriter, lest it break the window, and their desks were a couple of upturned crates snaffled from somewhere or another. These paltry surroundings however, did nothing to diminish their enthusiasm for reporting the news, and despite the primitive nature of their work environment they managed to put out a reasonably decent paper sometimes up to twice a fortnight (or once a week depending on how busy they were.)
Past successes had included an expose into the illegal trade in zombie worms, and a stunning piece of investigative journalism into what actually goes into a witch's apple pie. As it turned out it was nothing out of the ordinary. Spider's eggs, worm dribble, ant sweat, fractured hamster feet, tincture of bat dust, 125 grammes of flour and sugar to taste. Their findings totally negated the claim that one had been made containing Bramley apples which was, quite frankly, disgusting. As of now though, they were struggling for their latest headline.
Cross threw down his pen, closed his notebook, and leaned back in his chair (another upturned crate with a plank nailed to the back).
“Nothing,” he said exasperated. “I can't think of a single thing that's happened that's worthy of a story.”
After taking a load of snaps at the cemetery they had spoken to Constable Gullett who had informed them of the outcome of his interview with Kilo. That had killed the story stone dead, because reanimation wasn't exactly something new. It was creating something new, but that was old hat. They had reported on it only last year when Jethro Rockbuster, a visiting dimwit of some renown, had tried to breathe life into Skullenia's tourism trade. He had a small amount of success with his venture. A mob of villagers had visited from the next village and caught up with him at his room at the Bolt and Jugular. After some robust discussions involving a length of rope, a chair, and a blunt machete, they had left him in rather more pieces than usual. It was something to do with a time share scam apparently. Mind you, when they left the pub they had stolen some towels, half a dozen light bulbs, and a shower head, so it was kind of touristy.
“What-t-t-t about the Fibulan-n-n-n library scandal-l-l-l?” said Deadhouse, fiddling about with his camera. “We could do a piece on that-t-t-t.”
“Slightly out of our area, but at the moment I'm willing to go with anything. Go on then. What's the big scoop?”
“Well-l-l-l, Aubrey Tombjumper heard from Mrs. Crackpot that her friend-d-d-d Capta
in Von Schitenhausen's cousins-s-s-s housekeeper's younger brother forgot to take his book-k-k-k back and got quite a hefty-y-y-y fine.”
Cross pinched the bridge of his nose extremely tightly, not because it helped, but because it was slightly more painful than what he had just listened to, and may go some way to making hearing it slightly less arduous. Why he asked his next question was beyond him. Maybe it was a measure of how bored and fed up he actually was.
“Well, I can't deny it, Ramekin old chap, you've got me hooked. Don't leave me hanging now.”
“As it turns out-t-t-t,” continued Deadhouse, totally oblivious of Cross's sarcastic demeanour, “the book, Rowling's Guide to the Tedious-s-s-s, was three days late and he was fined-d-d-d sixpence. It was the talk-k-k-k of the town.”
“So was the Black Death but nobody bothered to write about that either. Although that's probably because they were all dead, and nobody noticed any discernible difference, but that's beside the point. There has to be something we can print.”
“We could-d-d-d do what we've done before,” suggested Deadhouse. “Make up a story-y-y-y or two.”
Cross furrowed his brow and shook his head.
“I had considered it believe me. But after the confrontation with Gullett the other day I'm not sure that's such a good idea. He'd probably lock me up. I know there's a certain amount of freedom to our press but I don't want to push it too far.”
Deadhouse left his chair and made them both a cup of tea which they sat drinking in silence. Ten minutes passed before Cross suddenly sat bolt upright, seized his notebook and exclaimed “Yes!” excitedly.
“What-t-t-t,” said Deadhouse, picking his camera up off the floor.
“Jocular. No one has ever done an interview with Jocular. We could go up to the castle, I could do an in depth interview with him and you can get some piccies of the place. If he agrees and we print that, we'll sell more copies than we've ever sold before.”
“Twenty six-x-x-x!” exclaimed Deadhouse.
“Maybe even more than that. I'll nip down to the village and use Mrs. Strudel's phone.”
“Just bear-r-r-r in mind that this was tried-d-d-d once before,” said Deadhouse, a warning tone to his voice.
“I know, I know,” said Cross, putting his coat on. “Whatever happened to old Humpy anyway? The last anyone saw of him he was getting into Bill's coach.”
“You know-w-w-w the larger of the two gargoyles-s-s-s above Jocular's front door?”
“I've heard about it yes.”
Deadhouse didn't need to say another word. His meaning was clear.
“Ah, but there's one thing you've got to remember, Ramekin old chap.”
“What-t-t-t?”
“It's me.”
That's exactly what I'm afraid of, Deadhouse thought to himself as Cross headed into the night.
* * *
Stitches paced up and down the corridor nervously. He'd been here for about ten minutes but it felt more like a century and a half. After leaving the lab Egon had told him to wait here because he needed to attend to something. No doubt it was something innocuous, but of course the zombie's imagination had run wild on the strength of that ambiguous open ended statement. He was thinking of everything from thumb screws and the rack to hanging, drawing, and quartering. He should have stood up to Ollie. He was definitely going to get him back for this.
“Ah, Master Stitches,” came the dulcet tones of Egon as he rejoined his guest. “I seem to have a slight problem.”
Apart from all the ones that Mother Nature had given him, Stitches couldn't immediately see what he was talking about.
Egon lifted up a wicker basket that he was holding and opened a flap in the top.
“I tried Master Splint's suggestion,” he said disconsolately, “but I still can't tell them apart.”
“Did you paint them a different colour?” asked Stitches.
“Indeed I did. See for yourself.”
Stitches gazed into the basket. Inside, the two amorphous blobs lay side by side on a bed of fresh hay. At least it looked like hay. It was probably human hair ripped from a witless victim that Egon had kidnapped in the depths of the night who was even now shackled in a subterranean pit whilst he waited for a grisly and messy death. Not that Stitches had any preconceived ideas about the creepy, serial killing dwarf though.
“Egon.”
“Yes, Master.”
“When Ollie said to paint them a different colour, I think he meant to paint one of them blue and one of them red. You've painted them both blue.”
“Oh I see,” said Egon, slapping his forehead making a sound reminiscent of a dead catfish flopping onto the surface of a stagnant pond. “That does make sense. I'll sort it out tomorrow.”
“So where do the little darlings sleep?” asked Stitches, trying to inject as much enthusiasm into the question as he was able, which was precisely none.
“In a little cubby hole in my bedroom,” said Egon, removing a large key from a trouser pocket. “I have a suite of rooms off the main dungeon.”
Stitches shuddered at the thought of what Egon's suite of rooms must look like. The set of the latest Saw movie sprang immediately to mind.
A short walk along the corridor led to a side door which Egon opened.
“This way, Master.”
Cold stone steps led down, down, down until the only light that was left was the meagre glow from a candle that Egon had produced from somewhere. Their footsteps echoed in the dark passage as their shoes clicked eerily on the cold rock.
After what seemed like the concluding portion of the half century that he had already been in Egon's company had passed, Stitches noticed something weird (our sort of weird that is, not his. A lot of people would find the cat not coming in on time, or the bins not being collected `a bit weird'. The average Skullenian residents idea of something `a bit weird' would be the postman having not as many legs as usual, which was normally about five and a half, or going out at night and not being attacked by all manner of quite frankly odd thingies that squirted ectoplasm and wanted to eat your face. The above is quite true for all normal members of polite society, unless you live in a remote village in The Outer Hebrides of course, in which case no one wants to know what you lot find weird. Chances are it's not a very long list!)
“Egon, it's getting warm.” (Told you it was weird).
“Indeed it is, Master. Just a few more steps and we'll be at my humble abode.”
Stitches had already decided that the increase in temperature was due to the fact that Egon had a rusty spit above a large fire that he would be slowly roasted over. Maybe he should just cut his losses and bolt, admit to Ollie that he was a big wuss, and emigrate somewhere safer like downtown Mali.
“Here we are, Master.”
Too late.
Egon opened the door onto…hang on…that's unexpected.
It was a sitting room he realised, noting that it was thankfully bereft of any torture chamber like fixtures and fittings. Nothing abnormal or creepy or other worldly seemed to be immediately obvious. It was just a normal room. For sitting in. A sitting room. The heat was coming from a coal fire sitting in the far wall.
“Well, this is rather pleasant,” said the zombie, taken aback. “More homey and less homeycidal than I imagined.”
“Mmm. Do sit down,” said Egon, not quite sure what Stitches was on about. “Cup of tea?”
“Just water, thanks.”
Whilst Egon was away Stitches took the opportunity to have a proper look around from the confines of his, quite frankly, extremely comfy arm chair. At least that's what his opinion of it would be until it suddenly turned into a shuddering, metal spike extruding, body slicing contraption that would give Edgar Allen Poe nightmares. Still, he wasn't judging. Much.
There were a couple of landscape paintings hanging on the wall, a charming ornament on the mantle-piece depicting an entwined couple, and an antique wooden stand on top of which was an old style gramophone. Next to the fireplace was
a bookshelf. Stitches got up to have a look. `Loves Errand' by Doris Doorknocker, `I've Had it Up To Here With Being Short' by Little John `O' Jonjon, and `Everything You Wanted To Know About Vampires But Were Afraid To Ask Because You Were Worried About Getting Your Throat Torn Out' by Bleeders Digest, were just three of the titles that he read to himself.
“I see you're admiring my collection,” said Egon upon his return. He handed Stitches a glass of water and they both sat down. “Something of a hobby of mine, old books,” he continued, after taking a sip of tea. “Some of those are very rare. My copy of Fotheringay's `Wibbles, Wobbles and Wonky Things' is one of only two in existence.”
“That's interesting,” said Stitches. “Must be worth quite a bit. Who's got the other one?”
“Me. It's in a box under my bed.”
“I see. What's that one?”
“Which one, Master?”
“The one on the table next to you. Is that what you're reading at the moment?”
“Not as such, no,” said Egon, picking up the leather bound tome and flicking through it. “These are my memoirs.”
“Really. How long have you been writing those?”
“About forty years now. You see I've been in His Lordships service since 1583, about lunchtime on January 29th to be precise, so there's quite a lot to get through. I'm up the early 1900's at present. I think I'll be done within the next five years or so.”
“What then? Get published? I reckon there could be quite a market for a book like that. You could make a fortune and get yourself out of here.”
“Oh no. I couldn't do that,” said Egon, putting the book back onto the table. “I could never leave Count Jocular's employ. If I ever come into any money I'll put it to use around the castle. Anyway, it's about time I put the boys down. Would you like to bring them through?”
Stitches, feeling a lot more relaxed and well disposed towards the tiny butler seeing as he hadn't come at him with any farming implements, grabbed the wicker basket from the floor and followed Egon into his bedroom. As the zombie passed through the doorway he nearly fell over. The last thing he ever expected to see in Egon's bedroom was a massive four poster bed the posts of which were intricately carved mahogany. The bed spread was eclectically flamboyant as well. It was a patch work quilt that, up until a few hours ago, Stitches would have assumed to be made of human skin. It seemed to comprise silk and velvet and looked so inviting that it was all that Stitches could do not to dive onto it and have a lie down.