Sir Toby Belcher
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Rudy Trudy… No puddin’… No pie… Jabbed… The plebs… And made them… Cry… When the truckers… Came to play… Rudy Trudy… Ran away!
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The now slightly portly figure of Sir Toby paced the church hall deep in thought. The inaugural meeting of the New Home Stand was not something to be taken lightly.
His preparations had been meticulous and he was sure that ‘his men’ would be both impressed and just a little cowed by the presentation that he had put together for them… That is, with the possible exception of Alderman Teigue!
Sir Toby ran his fingers through his over long shock of white hair, ‘damn that fellow,’ he thought, ‘damn, damn and blast him!’
An intelligent enough chap for sure, possibly too intelligent, but that was not his beef.
No, there was something else, something insidious and cunning, difficult to put one’s finger on – A rebellious streak!
As that thought lit up Sir Toby’s features a jaunty whistling lilt drifted into the church hall through the open window… It turned his mind to concentration camps, and motorbikes, ‘that will be him now,’ scowled Sir Toby.
Sure enough a few seconds later Teigue-the-Sage breezed into the church hall and stopped whistling, ”Tobias!” He greeted, and then a flicker of amusement shimmered across his gaze as he took in the title of Sir Toby’s presentation, already, displayed on the screen at the front of the hall, ”Zero Tolerance, eh,” smiled Teigue?
”Thought I would cut to the quick,” explained Sir Toby.
”Interesting concept, zero!”
”How so?”
”It did not always used to be around, you know, if you’ll pardon the pun?”
”I didn’t,” admitted Sir Toby.
”Some debate over who invented it first…”
”Invented it?”
”The Indians or the Arabs…”
‘Damn!’ Thought Sir Toby, ‘both the Indians and the Arabs are currently personae non grata!‘
”My money is on the Arabs,” continued Teigue, ”of course, it is possible that they both invented it first but at different times,” he laughed.
Sir Toby’s mind began to boggle, ‘of course,’ he repeated and smiled thinly.
As the last of his ‘troops’ filed into the hall and found seats, Sir Toby took to the floor, ”For our inaugural gathering, I would like to introduce Alderman Teigue who is going to talk about the concept of zero.”
The hall rippled with polite applause.
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SPENDYKE 1023 – Anarchy stalks the streets.
The Globotomists and the grandees of their Home Stand are closing in on the Rubicon – that wildly improbable haven founded thousands of years before the current madness erupted.
Our fugitive, Demos, still lurks somewhere within its crusty corridors scouring the old tomes, housed on its crumbling shelves, for an antidote to Spendyke’s most grim secret…
The Riddle of the Nine Dark Tri-Grams is key to overcoming the demon hordes that hold sway, and now run amok.
Will Demos solve his home planet’s ancient enigma, before the inevitable doom descends, or not?
Welcome, to the apocalyptic world of Cashelkeep!
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Front and Back Cover artwork by Sue Vincent
Sue Vincent's Daily Echo 