Authors note
A story based on some nonsense, and a lot of the toys my sister and I had as children. You may re-post but not use for your own profit, or adapt or copy. 'Tis mine!
Introduction
The `Four Musketeers' of literary and cinematic fame were called Athos, Porthos, Aramis and D'Artagnan. Their adventures were told by the French authors known as Alexandre Dumas pere and Alexandre Dumas fille. These stories are connected in no substantive way with those magnificent novels of France.
Our stories are concerned with the strange adventures and incidents experienced by our four friends Dr. Pogo, Brownie, Rip van Bramble and Dai Daschund, who were known as the Musketeers at school. While there they were often entangled with the schemes of the legendary being known as the Clomp. With or without his heart of soot, he'll always pop up somewhere.
What will happen? We do not know. When you put a doctor, a teacher, a mad scientist, and a librarian in one place you never know! Especially when they're face to face with a Vortex, a rogue postman, or even the Clomp itself. And also when you work with Big Ted there are usually a few more surprises around each corner.
Read on, if you dare, about the Musketeers and what happened next...
Story
The Eddie Memorial School is a mixed facility, teaching primary and secondary pupils as well as the adult learners present in all societies. The many necessary classrooms, offices and corridors are arranged in a fairly crazy manner, apparently resembling a `Snakes and Ladders' games board. If you enter through the main entrance, turn right and head down the brown corridor, then turn left and walk past the second canteen entrance, and finally leave the main building through the double doors, you should end up fairly close to Dr Bramble's science cabin, or the ruins of such depending on said teacher's recent activities. Bramble's conscientious blowing up of science cabins with zero damage and casualties is small price to pay in exchange for his abilities as an exceptionally daft teacher of science science, excepting Biology, which latter science is best not mentioned in his presence!
As we begin, it is a Friday afternoon, and Bramble is clearing up the mess created by a small explosion, which was instigated by the mixture of two volatile chemicals in a teacup. He sweeps the edges of the floor, and moves into the middle, carefully wraps up some broken glass, and puts it in one of the recycling bins. He then examines the counter. "Huzzah!" he cries, "A sufficient covering of ash!", and runs to get his latest invention out of the back room. Mad scientists always have a latest invention; It's in the graduation charter they must sign to get the certificate.
His new gadget is green and consists of three thin tubes connected to a small shiny silver drum. After a brief moment of contemplation Bramble plugs the tubes into some matching holes in the wall and rolls the drum across the ash-covered counter. "Not much action here...", he mutters, as the ash remains unaffected.
"Gadzooks!" Bramble expostulates as the table suddenly collapses, almost falling into the confused Bramble. "This makes no sense!" The floor of the cabin begins to buckle as the drum rolls, and Bramble scrambles to unplug his new gizmo. "Fascinating." The scientist picks it up and examines the label stuck on the bottom of the drum, pulling it off in the progress. `Liable to go BOOM!' The scientist reads, before dropping the drum in shock. "Oh dear!"
Rip Van Bramble jumps through an open window, just as the little shiny drum goes...
BOOM!
The science cabin is engulfed in a sudden ball of flame and reduced to ashes in moments. The noise is heard all over the school.
Bramble gets up from the ground and checks his extravagant blue furry hat. "Huzzah... I do believe that I've run into a bit of bother. It's time to see Harold."
* * *
Bramble strolls through the school until he reaches the head teacher's office. The secretary waves him through, and Bramble waves back as he enters Harold's room. The large hippopotamus is looking through the window with his binoculars, possibly ironically watching for rare science cabins that don't explode without any warning.
"Hello Harold, I'm afraid there's been a spot of exploding going on." Bramble says, while sitting down on the most comfortable guest chair.
"I did notice that. Was this your average type of Rip Van Bramble explosion, similar to the other three we've had this year?" Harold has long since become immune to Bramble's explosive tendencies. The scientist never endangers anyone's life but his own, and always replaces everything himself.
"I am afraid, head teacher, that there is a problem." Bramble looks at Harold quite seriously. "Somebody else blew up my science cabin. This is not my fault. Someone had tampered with one of my new gadgets."
"Good grief! Then this could have been murder!"
"Huzzah! It could very well have been murder! My murder!" Bramble faints and the chair falls backwards to the ground.
* * *
Brownie Bear and Dai Daschund are both sitting by Bramble when he finally wakes up. "Old friends... where am I?" The scientist doesn't wait for an answer, as he melodramatically rambles on. "The pain and suffering! The horror of what has happened to me! What can it all mean? And what of my lovely wife Miriam?"
"Miriam's on her way, Rip. You're lying down in the Nurse's room." Dai is a type of dog known as a daschund, more commonly known as a `sausage dog'. "How do you feel now?"
Brownie sighs and mutters under his breath. "Did you have to start him off again?"
"I feel bereaved and robbed of my innocence. So many happy hours were spent in that cabin, so many happy lessons."
"It was only delivered last week!" Brownie interjects.
Bramble glares at him, before resuming his oratory. "Happy times seem longer to me. Never again shall I feel that sweet happiness of knowing I am safe in my own laboratory, never again will I be able to switch on a Bunsen burner without fearing for a moment for all of our lives. Woe is I! Woe is all of us!"
"Pogo's on his way. He's going to give you a check up before Harold sends you home for the day." Dai tries to cease Bramble's monologue.
"Brownie, get me out of here before he starts torturing me with those medical implements he has! Quickly, I said."
"Nope, we need to know if you're okay. That wasn't one of your standard explosions, you know. That was a huge bang." Brownie puts his paw on his friend's shoulder. "Besides, it's been a while since I saw a good torturer at work." The bear jokingly pulls a malevolent grin.
"I'll go and get the popcorn." Says Dai.
* * *
Sergeant Dave Dragon of the Valley Police Department circles the school twice before coming down for his landing on the main sports field. Unfortunately, this early in his time at the town, Dave still hasn't quite mastered this aspect of flight, and he ends up rolling a hundred metres into the field.
"Bother and blow!" Dave's wings shimmer and turn back into his arms and claws as he rights himself and stomps back towards the school. "I'm never going to get this right!"
Harold is waiting for him as he approaches the main entrance. "Hello, Sergeant. It looks serious this time." He solemnly informs the police dragon. "According to Bramble -- and I have no reason to doubt him on this -- this was sabotage. I don't need to explain the implications of an act of sabotage in a school, do I?"
"Sabotage?" The red dragon considers this revelation for a moment, and then strides on into the school. "Well then, I had better get started, hadn't I?"
* * *
"Could you stare into the light, please?" Pogo asks the mad scientist known as Rip van Bramble. "I need to make sure that your sense of vision hasn't been affected by the explosion."
"Certainly, Pogo, certainly." Bramble stares into the medical light, resigned to enduring the endless physical examination. He is fairly certain that Pogo only became a doctor so he could torment his old friend. He remembers the label he removed from the drum, and digs into his deep coat pockets.
"I say, Pogo, this isn't my handwriting, is it?"
"Doesn't look like it, no. I can understand it, for one thing."
"A doctor speaking from experience, I gather."
"Indeed." Pogo retrieves his stethoscope from his little black medical bag. Brownie conceals a smile. "If you would please take off the coat..."
"Never!" Bramble never removes his coat in sight of others.
"I was afraid of that. That's why I brought THIS..." Pogo reaches once again into the black bag.
"You wouldn't dare!" Gasps Bramble.
"Try me."
"Oh for goodness sake, Bramble! Would you really rather have the KAT scan instead of a simple stethoscope?"
"Yes!"
Bramble and Pogo are locked into a battle of wills. Meanwhile Dai has been studying the label dropped by Bramble in his shock. He shrugs his glasses back on his head and shows the label to Brownie. "What do you think of this mark? It looks familiar somehow."
Brownie stares at the label. "Good grief!" He looks over at Pogo. "Go sort him out, Doc. Dai and I need to go see Dave. Before you go, Rip, is this what I think it is?" Brownie shows the label to Bramble again. The colour drains from Rip's face as he stumbles to the staff room couch.
"What's going on?" Asks Pogo incredulously as Bramble actually removes his coat!
Bramble answers him faintly. "It's Bromble. He's back."
"Good grief."
* * *
Bramble is descended from a long line of pointy nosed mad scientists and was frequently referencing cousin Wilfred, his nephew Tangerine or his oft-mentioned but never seen Uncle Bart. There are, however, some relatives he only mentions once, whose infamy unnerves him even in his most bombastic moments. One such was his villainous and only ever so slightly insane cousin Victor Van Bromble, descendent of a long settled foreign branch of the family. While their name had mutated over time, their nature had remained genial, apart from the villainy of Victor.
"Do you think he's still after you, Bramble?" asks Pogo, genuinely concerned for his friend.
"Huzzah! That twisted genius will stop at nothing to get my hat!" murmurs Bramble. He suddenly rises to his feet and proclaims, "He shall not have it!", before remembering his uncoated state and blushing deeply.
"Calm down there, old pal, we know the significance of your mad gadget hat."
"No one truly knows the significance of the gadget hat... and that's how it should stay!"
"But we know all about your hat!" Brownie interjects in his quiet way. "It does all manner of insane things, and then there are the water hats, cyber hats and critical philosophy hats."
"Huzzah! Quiet! Bromble could have secret transmitters anywhere! We must be very cautious." Bramble rouses himself from his distracted daze, grabs for his coat and covers himself immediately. "I believe it's time I showed you all something very very secret."
Pogo looks worried, Brownie looks perplexed, Dai the eternally wise looks relieved and at the other end of a secret observation signal Bromble grins deviously.
* * *
"Miriam! Fetch the children! We have to reactivate the Lair!"
"No no, dear, the Lair is all messy, and besides the children are away with their Uncle Tinker this week. They were so happy. And your brother's children went home last week. Next week we have our own as well as Dougal's and Dr Drax's..."
"Not here? Messy? Nonsense! We must be away before my nemesis grabs them and hurts their pointy little heads. To the Lair we MUST go."
Knocks rap out on the door, and Bramble looks about worriedly. "Could it be?" Miriam heads off to answer but is stopped by the name `Bromble' and a quick inspection of the label previously discovered. Instead they check the picture from the surveilance gnome camera, whose binocular and cameras are anything but jokes. Dave is outside, so Bramble opens the door and the bulky dragon makes his way inside, eyes widening at some of the more unusual and unlikely mementoes on display. "Is that a genuine Gehrlich?" he asks, indicating an orange on a stand.
Miriam flushes proudly. "Yes! You're the first one to ever recognise it. Are you an expert in fruit sculpture?"
"In a sense. I had to sort out all the problems when Clompie was counterfeiting the Gerhlichs and Spondulis last December. Had to do a fair bit of research and rouse out my old mentor Sebastian. He's quite the expert on Gerhlich's pineapples from his middle period."
"Gosh!"
Dave looks over the umbrella with the steam rising from the tip, and the giant paperclip that stretches from floor to ceiling on its end that is being used as an impromptu coat stand. On the floor there is a large yellow exclamation mark emblazoned in the middle of an otherwise dark blue carpet, and around the hallway various photographs and paintings are to be found. Most of the photos are of Miriam and Bramble and hordes of little ones, or of Bramble looking singed and holding up something black and smoking which presumably used to be important. He always looks pleased despite soot and the inevitable dishevelled hat and coat.
"I've come to offer my assistance, Professor. I understand there's some personal danger?" Turning to Miriam, he adds, "It's a pleasure to meet you, albeit under strained circumstances. Your husband speaks highly of you and profusely even when not recovering from his inane experiments." Miriam nods in return and mumbles a pleasantry.
"Huzzah! Assistance? Danger? Inane? I was almost blown up! The horror! The megalomania! Oh, if the universe were only a washing machine and all of life only a rinse cycle! I have a theory that if we all were to determinedly block up the fluff filter..."
{This portion of the story is excised by authority of the Quergish time censors.}
"... then we would all be up to our necks in Norsemen!" Bramble finishes after quite some time, before looking rather lost. "What now? Rah!"
"As I was saying, I have come to offer my assistance, as additional security to you and your loved ones. Not much gets past me or my deputy, Frederick." Dave continued, fairly smoothly.
"Yes, yes, of course. You're most welcome and appreciated. Would you like a scone?" Miriam heads off to the kitchen for refreshments.
"What about the super secret thing you wanted to show us?" Asks Brownie, not wanting the whole endeavour to descend into scone talk after the long wait they had already suffered through.
"Huzzah, of course! One of the most important things ever devised at BrambleLabs, and something that helped us devise the original town charter. Very hush hush. Sign these papers."
"Those aren't papers, they're scones." Points out Dai, helpfully.
"I say, thank you Miriam! They look delightful! Let's have some of the Level 4 security clearances, please. I have no idea where I left them, although I wouldn't rule out the greenhouse or the top secret bureau in the Lair."
"Of course. Do you mean these?" Miriam hands him some important looking documents and then looks fondly at her daft husband. "You left them in the fridge last time."
"I say!" Bramble hands a pass each to Dai, Brownie, Pogo and Dave, the last of whom produces a Level 6 pass and waves it aside with an ironic look. Three signatures later, Bramble leads them to the living room and pauses, passing a familiar instrument quietly to Dai, who begins ambling about while quietly scanning the decor. He pauses for a moment by the phone, and then moves on, before pausing again by a painting of Lorenzo Muskoxe, inventor of the clockwork alligator, and finally one more time by Miriam herself. Waving the instrument over her left shoe he cocks an eyebrow and mouths something. Miriam nods again, while Dai points at her foot, and winks before asking, "Are we all ready?" The blank looks of incomprehension not being a definitive answer, she pulls a candleholder on the wall like a handle, and the Muskoxe painting opens from the wall, revealing a well-lit passage of steps down into a basement.
They descend the stairs.
* * *
"Everyone, please be very careful. Don't handle the paperclips, Pogo, they happen to be prototype fusion reactors. Now, best close the door, as we don't want a draft to activate the polarization transitioning electro-discombobulator." Bramble reached for a switch, and the secret passage closed. "Now, we can talk! This portion of the Lair is completely transmission proof, thanks to the Bramble double density shielding!"
"Which originally was supposed to be a new type of synthetic rubber to save the poor rubber trees." Miriam offered.
"Yes, yes, as long as it turned out useful it doesn't matter!"
"If this place is transmission proof then won't the person at the other end of the bugs be able to track us down?" Dave asks, looking pointedly at Miriam's left shoe, which she takes off along with the other and offers to the sergeant. "Hmmmm. I think it's hidden in the sole, like one of those old-fashioned shoe-phones. Where did you get them?"
"A shop on Tiger Tiger Lane, next to the old Fire Station."
"That's one lead. I'm still not convinced this is anything to do with anyone called Bromble at all."
"My husband Rip always jumps to the Bromble conclusion when anything bad happens, but despite all his achievements he has no other real enemies. If anyone were going to try an utterly incoherent plan it would be Cousin Bromble. He's after the secret of the techno-hat and anything else he can get his hands on. He thinks there's some kind of top secret invention hidden here in the Lair. Also, there's this label. Bromble is a compulsive labeller."
Dave examines the label, which reads: 'Property of Victor von Bromble. If found, return to...' Eyes disbelieving, he looks at Bramble's wife. She nods and sighs.
"Bramble, is there something here he would want?" Asks Brownie, "Apart from the techno-hat."
"No, nothing particularly important. Most of the -- Gadzooks!" A warning light pops out of Bramble's blue fuzzy hat, and starts blinking rapidly. "What colour is it?"
"Green."
"Everyone! Above ground please! Quickly!" Bramble practically shoves Miriam up the steps after hat-bumping the switch, as the ground begins to quiver. "He must have realised our silence meant the secret was actually in the Lair!" They scramble up and up, just in time to see the landing of a giant helicopter through the window, its blades shaking the walls with each rotation. A incredibly familiar-seeming figure jumps out and for a moment Dave is convinced it is Bramble himself.
"Good grief! You were right!" Dai exclaims! "I was thinking it might be the headmaster gone mad, or an insurance agent who cracked under the stress."
"Quick, to the spoons!" Bramble shouts, and grabs a metre long duelling wooden spoon from the wall before dashing out to the hallway.
Dave, then new to the valley, absolutely had to ask: "Did he just say 'Quick, to the spoons!'?"
"You'll get used to it." Replies Brownie, grabbing another duelling spoon and following his friend. Pogo sighs, grabs his medical bag and a spoon and follows them while Dai and Dave look on bemused.
"Why aren't you going?" Dave asks Dai, who was quite short and unsuited to duelling as a Daschund. "Sorry. Forget I asked."
The two of them rush out and behold a magnificent spoon fight between Bramble and Bromble, against the backdrop of the giant helicopter. Dave sets off for the chopper even as two spoon-wielding Bromble acolytes stumble out of it, quickly entering the fray with Brownie and Pogo, who have thoughtfully slopped their spoons full of tapioca and proceed to make the best of a sticky pudding fuelled duel. The acolytes last not even a moment before taking the pudding route to oblivion. The main duel continues, with much prancing back and forth, Bromble always trying to get close enough to take the hat, and Bramble dancing around and trying to defeat his cousin's demented plan. Finally, Bromble having been maneuvered close enough to the kitchen window, Dai throws some souvenir clogs and knocks out the cousin, even as Dave takes control of of the now-empty vehicle.
"Huzzah! What wonders will never cease! How wonderful it is that good has triumphed once again, in parts due to the valour of my old friends and the sturdiness of these grand old spoons handed down over so many generations..."
"Not now!"
Bramble looks aghast, and then recovers. "Blast! I never got to ask him what he did to my gizmo that blew up my cabin!"
"He tried to kill you with a duelling spoon!" Shouted everyone at once.
"Yes, but family is family. I'll ask him over cake and tea wherever he ends up."
Dave, by now looking thoroughly fed up with all the silliness, gathers up the unconscious Bromble and prepares to make his way back to the police station.
"Why so gloomy, Sergeant?" Miriam enquires.
"I've been doing this for three months, and still haven't managed to say 'You're nicked!'!"
"Oh dear. Would you like a cup of tea?"
The End.
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