

POPPYCOCK PLACE SERIES

The happy ghetto of the really cool

### The IDIOTA CODE

A good old decaffeinated Murder and Violence Story.

No birds or animals were harassed in the making of this book.

Any person living, dead, or fictional who claims they resemble the characters in this book will be challenged in court before the King, to joust on horseback unless such person is under psychiatric care. The author affirms that if anything and everything inside this book resembles anything and everything outside this book it is pure co-incidence.

Dedicated to Teresa

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

Thank you for downloading this free eBook. You are welcome to share it with your friends. This book may be reproduced, copied and distributed for non-commercial purposes, provided the book remains in its complete original form. If you enjoyed this book, please link to Smashwords.com to discover other future releases by this author. Thank you for your support

Written by Tobias Dingbat

Illustrated by Tobias Dingbat

Copyright 29 January 2011 by T. Dingbat

Published by Talljohn Pty Ltd at SMASHWORDS

ISBN: 978-0-9870533-1-2

"The IDIOTA CODE"

When four Zurich Gnomes of the American Capitalist Church are kidnapped, Noodles and Botzi are summoned by Papa Speculatus III to his Basilica, the Golden Sucks Tower on Wall Street to go on a mission and save them. The missing Capitalist monsignors are the only ones who hold the codes to the multi-billion bullion stored in Swiss caves. Our boys can't unravel teaser clues which they found, and as a last resort they enlist the brains of the famous Negative Detective, Professor Matto Pipistrello to explain what is going on. Alas, some serious murders cause a change in plans, and the Bio-Teks have to return to tell the Papa he too is in great danger. The anti-clutter reactor which Noodles invented has been stolen from the CERN laboratories in Switzerland and the ancient brotherhood of the Calamari, thought extinct, has surfaced with a vengeance, not only to annihilate Papa Speculatus III but also the whole Capitalist Church....But wait! -There's more.....

REVIEWS

What others are saying about "The Idiota Code"

Rating:___Star * Star * Star * Star * Star

Taking a coffee break during the Battle of Britain Winsome Churchill said this about 'The Idiota Code' _"Never in the field of human literature was so much written for so many and read by so few."_

Abraham Lincoln put it this way, _"You can fool some people all of the time but not all the people all the time. 'The Idiota Code' therefore fills an important role - fooling all the people some of the time."_

President George Brush: "This book tells of a Mission Impossible that became a Mission Accomplished. Botzi and Noodles were CIA agents during the Iraqi war, working as court jesters for Saddam and distracting him into losing the war. Their work is still 'Top Secret' and secure from Wikileaks. After reading 2 pages all patriots should throw this book overboard from an air-craft carrier."

"Famous author Tobias Dingbat was in line to win a Pulitzer Prize last night but strayed behind a queue leading to a soup kitchen. He took home 2 pullets instead." The New Yolk Times.

* * * * * * * *

Please check more reviews at the end of this book for other great adventures now released, FREE.

Your feedback is appreciated- please email: poppycockplace@gmail.com

or visit our website at: http://www.poppycockplace.com

"The IDIOTA CODE"

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**Table of Contents  
**Chapter 1  
Chapter 2  
Chapter___3  
Chapter___4  
Chapter___5  
Chapter___6  
Chapter___7  
Chapter___8  
Chapter___9  
Chapter__10  
Chapter__11  
Chapter__12  
Chapter__13  
Chapter__14  
Chapter__15  
Chapter__16  
Chapter__17  
Chapter__18  
Chapter__19  
Chapter__20  
Chapter__21  
Chapter__22  
Chapter__23  
Chapter__24  
Chapter__25

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One (1)

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"E 'fantastico -che funziona!" (It's fantastic -it works!) Leonardo slapped his plans on the table in front of Lorenzo de Medici. The great Lorenzo screwed up his Bob Hope nose and stared at him.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Back in 1490, Leonardo da Ladro (cousin of da Vinci) made a deal with Lorenzo de Medici, great wealthy patriarch of the fabulous de Medicis, promising him he will turn lead into gold. Da Ladro really believed in the idea and employed hundreds of learned practitioners or 'scientists'.

After ten years and investing millions of gold coins, Lorenzo wanted to pull out and wanted his money back. Da Ladro said he didn't have it. Lorenzo demanded all those scientists captured and put to work for him as slaves, for the rest of their life to pay off the debt.

The scientists said nix, they had worked for the money and weren't going into slavery as well. Lorenzo got angry and had a few murdered to frighten them. The scientists murdered some of Lorenzo's bankers in revenge. Bodies floated in the Grand Canal of Venice.

Da Ladro purchased a cadaver and used it as a proxy to stage his funeral in Venice and get Lorenzo off his back. That done, he sailed to America to develop a recipe making a brown gassy drink laced with cocaine.

One night he drank half a dozen bottles, using too much seasoning. At daybreak, thinking he could outdo his famous cousin, by solving the mystery of flight singlehanded, he glued feathers all over the torso of his drunken drinking mate and pitched him out of a barrel as they rode it down over Niagra Falls.

He later claimed a series of firsts. First Italian to plunge down Niagra Falls, First Stoned Dare-Devil over the Falls, First and Last Attempt to Fly a man away from the Falls etc....

A half-feathered body was found three days later.

A hobo noticed a piece of paper in the poor dead man's wet pantaloons and quietly took it home. It was handed down through ten generations of the hobo's family until finally a smart young man decided to try the recipe. He first called it Conka Clonka (brand names were unimportant in those days), but his grandfather, tired of losing his dentures every time he said it, came up with a smoother handle and the rest is history.

The tit-for-tat murders would sometimes wane through the centuries and things would go quiet. But once in a while someone would remember the memory of a murdered ancestor and go looking for a victim. Bankers murdered Scientists (strangled by bankruptcy leading to starvation), or Scientists murdered Bankers (Merry Christmas cigars made of plastic explosives).

We take up the story to-day with two questions –Why are these serial murders happening once again? And –who is behind this outrage?

Why? The supposed reason is revenge –the Calamari symbol on each murdered victim. Another rumoured reason is a Mafia inspired plan to break the bullion vault deep inside a Swiss Mountain and blame it on the possibly extinct Calamari.

Once a year, during the "Ceremony of The Bonuses", Four Gnomes of Zurich, eminent monsignors of the Capitalist Church, are appointed to press their left ear one after the other to an image-reading device to open the massive doors of the grand bullion vault buried in the Swiss mountains.

(Eye-ball security reading was abandoned after numerous incidents of eye gouging happened, a sloppy technique suddenly made fashionable in a popular book of fiction. Eyeballs were stolen and used to gain entry to Top Secret Science Labs, DisneyLand, basketball games, Masonic Balls (aprons only), executive toilets, etc. On the positive side, these atrocities highlighted recognition of a disabled sector and opened new career opportunities for specialists -one-eyed judges, umpires, parking inspectors, pirates, etc.)

Please take a deep breath and read on......

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Two (2)

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" **You can fool** some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time." -said honest Abraham Lincoln, former president of the United States.

"- HAR!-HAR ! That motto is a salesman's delight ! By logical extension there is always somebody ready to buy something useless sometime."....argued shifty Noodles, as he thought up ways to make a quick buck........

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Poppycock Place Shopping Village

Our story begins one sunny day in the little garden backyard behind a small shop in Poppycock Place. Poppycock Place is a little shopping village in New York.

(The above snapshot shows the seven Bio-Teks at Poppycock place and their shops. Banjo (the dog) and Izaak (the green snake) run a pet shop. Next comes Noodles made of magnetic rings (the travel agent), followed by Botzi (minimart proprietor) and Aurora (the flower shop girl). Two sinister characters Alby (the loan shark) and Fungus (his dim assistant) complete the picture. For more information on the adventures of these characters download the free Ebook from details given at the end of this book, (from smashwords.com.)

Botzi was mowing the last run of his lawn in a little garden behind his shop, when his hat-phone vibrated around his ears. He killed the mower's engine, reached up to grab his cone-shaped headgear and began talking through his hat.

"Yes? -Botzi here!"

He was impatient to finish his gardening and was trying to hurry the caller along. Under a shady tree, Banjo, his faithful dog was snoring fast asleep, except for an occasional scratch to his chubby rear-end, from which, on this fine day, floated a faint wisp of smoke. This smoke betrayed a family of fleas gathered around a tiny barbecue, claiming a stake on his rump, you might say.

"Botzi, is that you? It's Noodles here! A disaster Botzi, a disaster!" It was Professor Noodles, an old, dear friend of his, on the phone.

"What's a disaster?" Botzi asked slowly and calmly. He knew Noodles could get into an excited loop which often needed reassurance and the steady hand of a friend.

"They...somebody... has done something really bad...can't give details...phone link not secure!..."

Noodles was honorary scientist consultant-at-large at the LHC (the Large Hadron Collider), a huge 27 kilometer circular atom smashing tunnel buried underground and run by Dinkum Donuts laboratories in Geneva Switzerland.

"Can you come over, we need your help to solve this really dangerous problem."

"Ok, I'll be right over," Botzi said, not knowing what Noodles was talking about. Now Botzi was in New York and Noodles was in Europe so when Botzi promised to be there very soon, he took into account Noodle's invention for sub-ocean international tube travel.

A few years ago, Noodles came up with the idea of a laundry chute between Europe and China to harness the cheap Chinese Laundry industry. He originally wanted to drill straight through the earth to go from one side to the other, as his hero Jules Verne said he could. This would have been quicker, but as the earth rock got hotter, the deeper he drilled, the more and more difficult it became.

There came a point where his construction team had to wear fireproof suits and oxygen masks as they worked, but he finally reached the centre of the earth. Noodles actually thought he had discovered hell when three really ugly creatures came out of a large cave and demanded a large sum of money in U.S. dollars for customs duty, as they accused him of crossing international borders under the earth.

He thought they looked familiar and very uncomfortable, as the heat was intolerable. Two had a moustache, one kept raising his arm to the ceiling and clicking his heels, the other smoked a pipe through a cynical evil grin, throwing back an occasional gargle of vodka. The third was a short, fat Chinese wearing army pyjamas, waving a little red book, possibly a former circus performer, as he fidgeted and inserted chopsticks through one ear and out the other. Noodles was far too weary to notice he had actually stumbled into a parallel universe where these three historical heavies were doing a bit of eternity, let alone work out how far down he drilled or where he was going.

Needless to say, the drilling project was abandoned.

Noodles' next venture was more successful. Upon reading that NASA was paying $30,000 each for toilet bowls, he came up with a cheap toilet-launcher that really worked. Previously, an astronaut used to ask mission control to permit his call of nature after code verification. But it wasn't always smooth. ("Hallo? Houston calling! –please verify password code errors -the fifth, and twelfth characters plus digital suffix before we can let you evacuate!"). This often led to traumatic space-suit disasters before Houston would permit an astronaut to emit.

Noodles simply provided a tube connection between the seat of the space-suit to the toilet receptacle. Next, flushing the toilet was actually snap-freezing the dump into a bullet shape and firing it into the sun for incineration. No water wasted, no smell, unlimited capacity, works for both male and female. NASA was overjoyed and funded him $10 million to manufacture it.

Botzi's reputation soared and NASA trusted him with bigger things. Improving on the freeze-flush idea, he built a large stainless steel vacuum tube that could hold a 4 passenger capsule and suck it around the world in a couple of hours. Therefore most capital cities could be reached in less time than this. Because of the heat it generated, it was built under the seas and oceans to keep it cool. Botzi had an underground trapdoor in his shop basement which he could open up and enter into this travel contraption.

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Three (3)

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**Botzi looked around** his backyard and spied Banjo still asleep. He didn't care if Banjo didn't wake up, he'd go without him.....

....Fabio Fleabody knew he was good-looking, had known Fiona since childhood over 2 weeks ago and was proud of the ten children they had, happily skipping around them. Fiona, basking in the sun, was aware he was ogling her black, glossy body, his lecherous grin, sending a message. She lifted her sunnies and tut-tutted with a half-smile. They were squatters and they had accepted Banjo's laziness as goodwill. Today, a family picnic was in progress on the rear side of their host. Suddenly Fug, the oldest and dumbest flea leaped at his dad and knocked the miniature charcoal barbecue over, onto the hide of their host, spreading the embers. "Dammit! Fug! You funky idiot !" growled Fabio. (Fiona forbade legitimate swearing).

Banjo's dreaming rapidly morphed from bliss to stress as the hot stab of pain in his juicy rump swept up along his nervous system and rattled the chandeliers in his cranium.

"YEEEeeeeoooowww!!" he yelled, swinging his fat right paw to the offending spot on his backside, and hitting it with one almighty whack. Later that week AL-Jazeera Arab news reported the incident as another murderous attack by a US drone wiping out a family of asylum seekers. – so much for objective journalism.

"You coming or not, Banjo!?" Botzi was getting impatient.

Banjo now fully awake and still smarting, bounded over to his friend and together they went down the rickety stairs leading to capsule No 32. Only one had been built, but Noodles thought it would impress NASA to hint they had another 31 vehicles in storage, as back-up. He showed them many doctored photos to keep the funds flowing. "Confidence is the name of the game!" was his motto, as Botzi wondered if he were businessman, scientist, or conman or all three.

Not that Noodles was always successful. His space toilet system eventually blocked and a full holding tank exploded just as the space shuttle was on re-entry to earth, showering parts of the United States with a brown mist. Fifteen fire trucks and two hundred CIA rookies with tooth brushes took two weeks to hose and polish the Brown House back to the White House. In Vegas the stuff got into poker machines and Mafia tempers flared as "made men" were turned into maids, laundering every dollar twice, once for the IRS and once for the brown ugh. And Hollywood was abuzz as to whether some studio had produced the ultimate stinker, outdoing "Dumbo Part XVIII" by Silvestra Baloni, protégée of Federico Fellini. (The movie was made in Italy and Walt Disney sued for theft of intellectual property until the studios learnt it was about a brain-damaged gorilla not a flying elephant.)

Botzi strapped himself and Banjo into the capsule seats, and plugged in some co-ordinates into the navigation computer. (The capsule could only go where the tube took it, but NASA demanded a back-up steering command. Noodles, smart enough not to buck bureaucracy, glued a cheap calculator to the dashboard that did nothing). Botzi fired the red button and whooshed towards Geneva, passing under the Atlantic, the Mediterranean and finally part underground, bobbing up at the receiving station of the LHC laboratories in Switzerland. Noodles was there to meet him.

"Good trip?" asked Noodles being polite in the face of emergency.

"Yeah, sort of," sighed Botzi smelling of vomit courtesy of Banjo's burping up something he ate. Banjo needed no food but something in his make up made him think he had to eat left-overs that smelled bad.

"Follow me." Noodles led them through a large hall busy with white coated scientists and sinister looking magnets, lasers and lightning rods. Electrical arcs crackled everywhere from high voltage conductors, and on a large stage in the centre of it all was a huge circular yellow mass shaped like a cake, 6 metres high and 20 metres in diameter.

Powerful lasers rotated slowly as they melted weird, odd shaped holes inside this circular mountain.

"What's that?" Botzi was curious.

"Particle accelerators are down again," Noodles shrugged. "We drill Swiss cheese as a side industry to pay for the wine we drink around here and I can tell you, we need the booze with the frustrations we're getting. Large Hadron Collider my fat hat ! It's more like Large Heartburn Creator. We're trying to discover the Higgs Boson, now called 'The God Particle' because it's a pointer into the mind of God and how creation came about. We risk creating black holes which some scientists say can be catastrophic, sucking our world into annihilation. One of our theoretical physicists even calculated into the future and found God doesn't want us to succeed. The magnets are dangerously powerful and are already sucking holes in our socks. Some guys go bare feet, some do thongs or flap along with flip-flops."

"Banjo, get here!!" snarled Botzi, to save his cheese-sniffing dog from wandering into a laser and ending up with an additional rectum at the front-end, between his eyes.

They eventually came to a room and walked inside. "Oh my God!" exclaimed Botzi.

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Four (4)

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**Noodles shut the** door behind them. On the tiled laboratory floor was a naked dwarf, flat on his back and obviously deceased, his eyes glazed, still staring at the ceiling. His stomach was hideously bloated and his gaping mouth and overstretched lower jaw were fully packed with a bundle of triangular rods of a hard, brown substance.

"Toblerone," muttered Noodles, "he was stuffed with 6 kilos of Swiss chocolate."

"That's weird," said Botzi, taking a closer look. "What's this on his chest and arms? Somebody's tattooed him with the drawing of a large squid."

"Yes, it's a symbol - can you remember where you've seen squids like this, Botzi?"

"Sure, every Italian restaurant serves the stuff, but seriously, weren't they a secret society of scientists who were sponsored by the De Medicis –the big business families of Venice? These scientists called themselves the 'Calamari' because they had many contacts (tentacles) throughout 16th century renaissance society and as well, used up a lot of squid ink with their scientific writings. -I thought they were extinct."

"Not quite. They were very advanced in science and actually predicted atomic energy long before Einstein formulated E = MC Squared. Leonardo da Ladro was their director-in-chief. But a lot of their experiments were crazy and these resulted in big debts to the Medicis. When they couldn't pay back the debts with 50% interest, the Medicis sent teams of Mafiosi after them to break whatever bones they could until payment was made. The scientists didn't think this was pleasant so they went underground. They were a very closely knit brotherhood, so tightly knit and loyal to each other in fact, they saw themselves as the 'entangled ones'."

"And the code word for the 'Entangled Ones' was 'Spaghetti?" asked Botzi

"Right," replied Noodles. "Their full heraldic title, before the fall-out with the Medicis, was 'Spaghetti Calamari' –Their coat-of-arms was charged with a central squid royale rampant, relaxing on a bed of spaghetti, a coronet of mozzarella and general tincture azure – This battle shield effected a complete smokescreen, hiding the fact they were heavily involved with politics, science and religion, not to mention a little wining and wenching. Society at that time bought it and dismissed them either as a bunch of cooks or kooks. To-day, scholars call them 'The Calamari' for short."

"And their motto?" Botzi asked but he already knew the answer. It had been parodied around the world in the late 20th century.

"The advent of 'Star Wars' hi-jacked their motto and made a mockery of it by changing it to 'May the Force be with you'. The Calamari had a branch in Bologna, Italy, who went under the name of 'Spaghetti Bolognese' and of course, as a sign of unity, they greeted each other with 'May the Source be with you.' 'Source' not 'Sauce', was the authentic original but try that on Darth Vader without getting a choked windpipe."

Noodles continued his historical refresher. "The Medicis didn't die out either. They founded the Venetian Capitalist Church with Lorenzo de Medici as their first Papa. They sent out missionaries to many parts of the world including Switzerland and America and today run Swiss banks and most of Wall Street. As Venice is now merely a tourist capital and the fervour of financial faith has moved to Wall Street, New York, the Papal Seat has moved to the Golden Sucks Basilica, a multi-storey office block."

Noodles continued.

"The Capitalist Church is even stronger today whilst the Calamari have squandered most of their organisation's assets, except for a few test tubes and Bunsen burners. This presents The Calamari with a problem. There is great hatred between the two and the Capitalist Church, having Venetian roots, insists on its traditional pound of flesh, wanting all its money paid back with billions of interest accrued over the centuries. Either the Calamari pay, or the Medici's agents, the Mafia will pop off an egghead scientist whenever the opportunity presents itself. The Calamari know they're threatened and have no choice but to hit back. The war has heated up recently."

"With all the financial fire-power of the Capitalist Church, it's amazing that the Calamari actually still exist to-day." wondered Botzi.

"Oh, they sure do exist, dear boy," re-assured Noodles. "Some historians reckon the Calamari developed the art of calligraphic writing that reads the same from left to right whether reading it face up or upside down, to protect themselves. That's crap -that wouldn't dodge a musket bullet. In actual fact, they developed the art of quickly walking backwards whilst facing frontwards, making an enemy think they are coming his way. So as the enemy waited for him to come closer, the Calamari agent was actually walking further away backwards, till he could nick around the nearest corner and disappear."

"Another technique was for a Calamari to spin his body like a top, upside down on his head, to dodge grape-shot. Where do you think 'wrap-dancing' and 'moon-walking' came from? The influence of the Calamari is everywhere. Look closely at the 'American Silver Eagle' one dollar coin. That was designed by a Calamari. It shows an image of a woman, 'Walking Liberty' actually doing a moon-walk. How many friends or entertainers, not just scientists, you know that greet each other with a moon-walk? -Many of them could be secret Calamari."

Noodles turned to the stocky, short dead body lying on the floor. "And that history lesson now brings us to this chappie."

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Five (5)

**__________________________________**

" **And how's that?"** asked Botzi, watching Banjo, his dog savouring the prostrate gnome's private odours. "Banjo, don't sniff his crutch, you bionic sleaze."

"This gentleman," pointed Noodles," is a Swiss banking gnome. He was an attorney and a Red Hat, which means he had a very high level of authority in the Capitalist Church. He was obviously murdered but why and who murdered him I need your help to find out."

"Get the Police," volunteered Noodles.

"Not that simple. There's more. The killer left a note." Noodles walked over to a filing cabinet drawer and pulled out a file. He handed Botzi a note. Botzi noted its heading. "The IDIOTA CODE." He read it aloud.

" _Sweet, Bitter, Sour and Salty, The Calamari find you fawlty._

We will destroy you with the Evil Tower as we have it in our power.

When four munchkins have expired, our anger will be fired."

Botzi handed the note back. "Not much to go by, except that it was written by a scientist or engineer or even a rap artist. "

"How do you know?"

"Well, bad poetry, scrawly handwriting like a doctor's or a scientist, and spelling mistakes. Besides the squid tattoo on Choco over there, the note also mentions the Calamari so it's an open and shut case. And another thing, -don't you see? This guy's copped it sweet –he's the first of the murders in the queue of 'Sweet, Bitter, Sour and Salty'. "

"But it's hinting that more people are going to die, we have to do something," pleaded Noodles.

"It's also hinting it could be an idiotic fake. It's called 'The Idiota Code', maybe sneering at us as well as the members of the Capitalist Church, perhaps?"

Botzi continued, "If I were Sherlock Holmes, I could read the clues in the chewing gum I noticed stuck to your left shoe, but as I neither smoke a pipe nor are you as gullible as Dr Watson, I'm afraid we're rooted for now, my dear Noodles." Botzi made mocking gestures as if lighting and puffing on a meerschaum pipe.

A strident video phone on one of the desks demanded Noodles' attention. He went over and switched on the conversation to room broadcast, so Noodles could hear.

"Hello Noodles, it's Jack, we have a problem," cracked the video phone. Noodles nodded his head in greeting and Jack wasted no time in getting to the point.

"The anti-clutter stockpile reactor has been stolen along with four X-17's rocket motors." Jack was head of JPL, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena. What he was saying was that four state of the art, rocket engines each powerful enough to send a 10-man space ship to the moon and back were missing. The amazing thing about these motors was that each was small enough to be carried on a pick-up truck and they were fuelled on a hybrid principle, worked out by Noodles and the JPL engineers.

Originally they were to be powered by controlled anti-clutter emissions but this was abandoned after one canister of the stuff was hi-jacked and exploded high in the sky over the Vatican in Rome, by a disgruntled _madre superior_ (nun-in-charge). The citizens of Rome went out looking to crucify a Chinese-American called Dan Tan who they thought had dreamed up this crazy idea and influenced the nun to go on a suicide mission. However JPL admitted the nun stole one of their rockets and was heading for Las Vegas but she was too eager and over-accelerated. This caused the explosion, an accident, much to Dan Tan's relief.

How anti-clutter was created was by a chance incident. Noodles was working at JPL late one night, without much success, sitting wearily on a couch. He rummaged through the waste paper basket thinking he may have missed a promising formula or calculation. Among dozens of pizza dockets, he found nothing. In a fit of temper, he hurled the waste paper basket across the laboratory and hit the balustrade surrounding the "nuclear pit" where fissionable material was being made. The basket teetered over the railing and toppled down into the pool of heavy green water. A blinding flash almost shocked Noodles out of his shell. After he recovered, he shuffled over to see what happened. The water had disappeared. At the bottom of the tank was a glowing, fistful of material which Botzi instantly recognised as the new fuel. It came from discarded waste -this was anti-clutter.

Noodles had a finger in many scientific developments and as a result, not a week went by without some organisation contacting him for advice when something went wrong.

Jack at JPL was no exception. He pleaded for help, now. "Noodles can we neutralise these motors or something to make them useless in the wrong hands?"

Noodles thought for a moment. "No, the best we can do is to trace their whereabouts and send a platoon of commandos to bring them back."

"Can you come over then and help us direct the search?" Jack sounded almost desperate.

"OK, I'll bring a dynamic colleague along to help us," Noodles looked at Botzi, "We'll be on our way."

"Not sure what I can do, but I'll tag along, beats mowing the lawn." Botzi shrugged. Banjo's ears pricked up at the possibility of adventure.

Noodles rang the caretaker and arranged for the laboratory to be cleaned up. "Chocolate", as they nicknamed the unfortunate finance guru, now dead, was to be kept in the freezer until further notice.

The video phone demanded their attention once again.

"Holy Bull Market !" uttered Noodles. Since he loved the sport of share wheeling and dealing, he knew all the world's bankster sharks, fund managers and share trading insiders. He turned to Botzi, whispering, "It's Papa Speculatus III of the United States Capitalist Church –big wheel this one. You wanna free loan? –No collateral? -Scratch his back and watch him purr!"

Like the other Papa who worked from the Vatican in Rome, this Papa Speculatus III worked from his Vatican on Wall Street New York, called the Golden Sucks Basilica, a skyscraper.

Noodles shuffled back to the monitor and bowed. "May almighty wealth keep you, Holy Financier, " Noodles' obsequious greeting tasted bad in his mouth. Well at least he wasn't on his knees planting a kiss smack on the centre of his ring.

"Bless you my son," gestured the Papa. "There is no time to lose. I'll get to the point. Four of my Zurich Gnomes have been kidnapped. They keep in their power the highly secret security codes guarding billions of bullion. They must be rescued at all cost. The security of Swiss mountain caves holding massive amounts of money, and the survival of the Capitalist Church, are at stake. I need your help immediately."

"But we are on our way to Jet Propulsion Laboratories to help with an emergency over there," explained Noodles.

"That must wait," said Papa Speculatus firmly, "All your expenses plus ten million dollars!"

"Ooooh! That WILL wait, we're on our way to you, now! -Your moneyficence!" assured Noodles. Business is business, he thought.

Before Botzi could figure what was happening, Noodles had already barked to his assistants to prepare the jet-assisted helicopter.

Botzi walked out followed by Banjo, who had by now sniffed every pot plant in the room not knowing why, as he was built without genitals, but still had some redundant "dog's life" programming code in his processor.

However, much to Banjo's great disappointment, he was left behind, in the care of an animal-loving scientist. They whiled away many a happy hour playing mah-jong and chess. Banjo cheated the scientist on a wholesale scale, out of boredom, but gave him his money back.

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Six (6)

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**Paris woke up** one foggy morning. Thousands of Parisians peered over their morning coffee through the antique dusty windows of their attic grottos. They noticed that it was particularly foggy especially in the direction of the Eiffel Tower which had yet to make an appearance through the fog. As morning moved on and sunlight dispersed the fog, Parisians began to realise that their view into the distance was today clear and unobstructed. My god! The Eiffel Tower had disappeared.....

...."Roger! This is Birdie Num-Num calling Red Herring, over." Two jet pilot Top Guns were screaming across the sky towards New York on a secret mission to investigate yet another UFO. Previously, an airline pilot had reported a strange craft that looked like a rocket but somehow had a familiar shape. He was too sensible to give more detail as he thought he might lose his flying license.

So, Bananas Air base dispatched the reconnaissance jets immediately. Within ten minutes, the jets approached the blip on their radar screens.

"UFO at 2 o'clock" cracked Red Herring to his fellow officer flying the adjacent jet.

"Hocked my watch yesterday, where's 2 o'clock? -Need co-ordinates, over," replied top gun Birdie Num-Num.

"Take a butcher's hook over your right,"

"Yep, I see it, -prepare to fly alongside. Weapons safety-catch off!"

"Roger." Both jets were now within 500 metres flanking both side of this huge apparition whooshing through the sky. Nothing about it was designed for flying. It was a complicated steel structure with a large 'cabin' at the front end and the main body flared back eventually splitting into four branches or legs. At the end of each leg a blinding green glow suggested some sort of propulsion was responsible for hurtling this massive javelin aloft against gravity.

"Somehow looks familiar," radioed Red Herring.

"What's that souvenir I gave you when I returned from Paris?" frowned Birdie.

Red Herring nearly popped his eyes into his windscreen. "Oh Gud, it's a flying Eiffel Tower – it can't be!"

"It is, you cant buy souvenirs that size," continued Birdie, "I've plugged its shape, weight and estimated fuel remaining parameters into my computer, it will hit somewhere in Manhattan in 16.34 minutes."

"What do we do?"

"We'll try to nudge it off course into some lake in Canada, just as our grand fathers nudged V2s over England into the channel. The Canadians won't mind, they got plenty lakes."

"V1s," corrected Red, "V2's were too fast."

"Whatever." Birdie wasn't going to argue. Red was a pain in the Khyber but this job required a joint operation. "Push down on the starboard side, I'll nose up on the port side. We'll try to send it into a spin and steer it off course."

"Smartass," Red grumbled, "we're not flying boats, just say Right or Left." This was a personal matter to Red. Years ago he lived with his alcoholic uncle who was addicted to port wine. He used to bring home cases of the stuff until the neighbourhood went dry. One day, with tears in his eyes, his uncle hugged him for the last time. "I'm leaving," his uncle told him, "there's no port left." Red never forgot that port was left. His dear depressed uncle helped him to pass his navigation exams with flying colours.

After some sweaty five minutes, the boys still hadn't achieved their objective –the monstrous structure was still on course. By this time they had more accurate computations as to point of impact and to their amazement it was dead fixed on hitting the American Stock Exchange on Wall Street in Manhattan New York.

"OK," barked Birdie, "we'll have to destroy the engines to make it fall short of target. You shoot the starboard engines, I'll shoot the port." Birdie's rockets quickly disabled two engines. Red, thinking of his uncle, also fired at the port engines, missed, and cut the wings off Birdie's jet. Red watched helplessly as Birdie's aircraft spiralled to earth, its radio transmitting a stream of obscenities that would curl the toes of a pagan rhino.

Finally the curses stopped as a white parachute ejected from the stricken plane. Birdie would be safe but was Red safe? Sorrowfully Red winged his way back to base. There would be an inquiry of course. Red would lose his command, his stripes, his pension, his girl. Would Hollywood buy the story? Could Tom Cruise play Red Herring? Or maybe Ronald Reagan?....Or was he now a "No Officer and No Gentleman"- and Jack Nicholson was going to circumcise him, twice. "Oh nuts!" He checked his little brother and came back to reality. Red debated whether he would crash his plane and die with honour like a Japanese kamikaze. But he was American-Italian and something in hamburgers and pizza told him to love himself with gusto and forgo the ways of self-immolating sushi nibblers.

"Screw that idea!" He put in a call to his uncle Chico now living in Nome, Alaska, and promptly agreed to join him in a partnership operating a gelati stand. "Come over," cooed uncle Chico, "the ice is free and we got the whole market to ourselves. Nobody's thought of it." Red, his future now settled even before he reached his air base whistled a happy tune. He felt he had the "luck of the Irish" forgetting his parents were Italian.

"Whenever I feel afraid, I whistle a happy tune...." His dad had taken him to see "The Sound of Music" and he never forgot it. His jet did a barrel roll..... "Up yours USAF!!"

Meanwhile the Eiffel Terror, as ground surveillance was calling it, with crippled engine power, had deviated slightly and the new course was estimated to be smack in the centre of vacant land once occupied by the World Trade Centre. As if by remote control, the remaining engines cut out and in a slow arc the giant projectile turned towards the earth. Within the next few minutes, fears were confirmed as New Yorkers heard a rattling, screaming sound.

At a certain moment the engines cut in briefly to steady the tower into a vertical position then let it drop straight down, like a giant arrow. The nose structure thudded into the ground first and bore in to a depth of some forty meters. The whole thing came to a halt in a giant cloud of dust, standing tall and slightly leaning to one side, its four curving legs thrust high in the air. After the dust settled, passengers on the incoming Queen Mary were agog at the sight of this, the leaning new tower of New York. Only in America, they said, are things built upside down.

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Seven (7)

**__________________________________**

**Not everybody,** meeting Botzi and Noodles for the first time, would feel comfortable seated next to them in a sub-way train, or entering the shops they owned in Poppycock Place, unless they at least knew something of their existence. There is mostly nothing to be feared, although two of the Bio-Teks are showing signs of self-interest. But here's how it happened...

Some years ago, the exact date being classified by the CIA, the FBI, and the Pentagon, an extraordinary development happened at NASA laboratories. Things had been going badly for NASA since their earlier pet project the HAL super-computer, had gone berserk and took over the spinning-wheel space station in 2001.

HAL's name was an offset of IBM, (as in I>H, B>A, M>L) and was originally programmed to open doors, flush toilets, microwave food, freeze snorers, provide hot showers, predict asteroid showers, and the like.

Somebody had over-clocked the CPUs (central processing units) in HAL's brain resulting in a computational surge capacity. But unfortunately, HAL used his intelligence to grab power by subtle degrees until he made himself absolute master of the station, murdering Bill Bates of Mental Soft who was in the station at the time on a space holiday. HAL promised Bill to show him the greatest Professional Windows he ever saw. When Bill went over to the ship's observatory to gaze through an awesome set of Windows, HAL popped a porthole and spat poor Bill out into a Black Hole. A charity worker look-alike now runs Mental Soft, not the original fox who shafted IBM.

HAL wanted to be the ultimate Big Brother which immediately twigged a nerve with the FBI. Both Stanley Nubrick and Arthur C Cluck were dragged before the Senate Committee for UnAmerican Activities, accused of collaborating with HAL, and engaging in communist activities. The senate exonerated them, pointing out there was no logical connection between a science fiction novel, a Hollywood movie, a dud computer, and speeches by Fidel Castro. But the paranoid FBI still kept a file on the main characters to serve as a warning to robotics students dreaming anarchy.

But NASA recovered, getting the go-ahead to build a Deep Space mission. As the trip would last years and there was uncertainty of ever coming back, they also got funds to build very sophisticated robots using space age indestructible materials and complex process controls. They developed a gang of Bio-Teks more advanced than anything done before. They were about the size of well-built humans but more than capable of the full range of human action and computations. Apart from some periodic maintenance no human type food was necessary. They derived their power through highly efficient batteries constantly topped up by solar cells built into their skin material.

7 Bio-Teks were built initially, 4 males, 1 female, 1 dog and a snake. They were nicknamed Botzi, Noodles, Alby, Fungus, Aurora, Banjo and Isaak.

NASA developed the mentals in conjunction with Fuji Robotics who produced the mechanicals. It all went well after a number of revisions and limits tests, (stressing the robots until they broke up.) But finally, each creature approached optimum condition and passed all tests including the Turing test. (The Turing test is when you can ask a computer brainy questions and it answers just as a human would and you can't tell the difference.)

But something was still missing. None of the Bio-Teks could laugh, love, be sad or happy. They just functioned. They were good at maths, geography, history and all sorts of knowledge. They remembered every bit of information allowed to them. And on top of that, they could run, swim, do any sport, needed no sleep, and just got by with a check up and maintenance once a year. Their powers of hearing, eyesight and smell were above human capability. But because they needed no food and had no emotions they lacked a sense of taste or touch. If an arm fell off, they would feel no pain, just take it to NASA-Fuji for repair.

But Doctor Frank Streuss, head of the development program was not satisfied. He wasn't bothered they had no sense of taste or touch, but he thought they would still be regarded as sub-human if they couldn't display emotion.

Late one Saturday night, going over the algorithms of the CPUs (used as their brains) he realised that processing power alone wasn't going to produce the ability of emotions. This came from something higher, something outside the material world.

There was no one else in his large office, although the complete set of characters was with him. He had asked them to sit quietly and say nothing which they did, their eyes fixed on him. No expression was on their faces. He could have smashed one of them or set the place on fire and they would still do nothing.

But was it enough that NASA had succeeded in building Bio-Teks able to learn and take commands and could fly a spaceship? No, Streuss wanted more. He'd got this far as director, and he wanted to push the limits of science in development of Bio-Tek life as well as space exploration.

Giving a big sigh he took off his glasses, got on his knees and looked up at the ceiling.

"I know what's wrong," he said in a quiet tone as if he were talking to someone.

"They have no emotions, because they have no soul....." his voice trailed off.

NASA had no idea how to create souls nor could they even try because how can you create something with the power to mould the character of a human being, and yet that something is outside the realm of quantum physics and is impossible to capture it, see it or measure it ?

The only person he knew who manufactured souls was The Soul Man Himself -God (The God).

Doctor Streuss was not religious and did not know how to begin. But he was at his lowest energy, and many years of hard work had come to the ultimate point where the best scientific team in the world could go no further.

"Please Sir, if it's OK with You, would You like to contribute Your help to our project?" Streuss made sure he spoke in capital letters when referring to Him so as not to give offence.

"The problem is," continued Dr. Streuss, "that we can build intelligence, but not emotions. For that we need a Soul. But please, it has to be a human level Soul. Animals have souls, but they can't laugh, create art, sing dance, cry and all that, although they do have feelings and built-in love for their young ones."

The arthritis in his knees kicked in so he back-slided into a chair, still staring at the silent seven and they stared back at him. They saw and heard what he said but it did not compute as none of their input had enough detail regarding a Soul. The nearest they came to understanding what a Soul was, was in terms of style, or individuality, or worthwhile content.

Somewhere outside space-time (our little fishbowl in which we live) the Bearded Guy (just our image of Him, not that He's hairy) was adjusting his hearing aid and suddenly picked up on the request Dr Streuss had floated to the ceiling of his NASA office.

Now it hasn't been proven that God actually needs a hearing aid, only that throughout history, gamblers have prayed for jackpots and still lost their shirts, giving credence to the belief that either He doesn't exist or He exists and is deaf.

Dr Streuss had prayed in just the perfect time slot. The world had been good lately and evil was not so common so He took an interest in Dr Streuss' problem.

He directed his attention to the psyche of the exhausted doctor and spoke to him.

"............... !!"

Dr Frank Streuss thought he heard a wind. "....., .........., ....!" There it was again this time with some kind of rumble to it, but he could make no sense of it.

__________________________________

Eight (8)

**__________________________________**

**God realised telepathy** was not going to work and he needed to use something more tangible. Immediately, Streuss heard the unmistakable "ping" of an arriving email on his desktop computer. Who could be working at this hour ? He wearily walked over and sat at his desk and focused on his monitor. Sure enough a new email had arrived.

From "God" it said in the listing. He broke into a weak smile, there was always a wise guy colleague just got home after a downing a keg or two at the bar and now ready for a bit of leg pull. Alright, he'll go along with it. He opened it.

"Hi Fustus," it began. Who the hell knew his first name was really Fustus and not Frank? Fustus had always lied to everyone, introducing himself as "Hi, I'm Frank." His own brother was annoyed with this deceit, "You're not being frank, Frank."

"You're requesting a group of Souls for your project?" the email went on.

Frank, (or Fustus incognito), was too weary to agitate. Either he took the message humbly and risked a ribbing in the morning cafeteria, or he could risk shooting off an insolent reply, but, what if this was a genuine communication? He took the humble approach, the safe approach, he thought.

He felt some energy coming back and clacked the keyboard at a respectable pace.

"We've gone as far as we can, God," he typed, "We thought we could make the Bio-Teks near human but we have no CPU power to do it. That is, they can't laugh, be sad or happy among other things. They're just clever machines." He paused to look at the reply.

"You'll never make a CPU powerful enough for your inventions to do these things. Your CPU will always be constructed using the atomic building blocks, that is, stuff that makes matter. Matter is alright to make bodies but souls are not bodies. Your inventions don't really think, they just process information and make up an answer. They are like smart calculators. The soul I gave you raises you above these machines and gives you free will to choose what you want to do."

"Is it possible to give them a Soul, and would You be willing please?"

"Everything is possible. But whether I'm willing depends on the answers to some questions I'll ask you."

"Please go ahead."

"You want them to have emotions? -laugh, be sad, happy, love and hate ?."

"Yes make them same as us so they can mix in with humans."

"Do you want them to have free will?"

Fustus was halted in his tracks. "Er, free will up to a point. We programmed them to obey the 3 rules for robots."

"Which are ?" God already knew the rules but wanted to make a point.

"Er, as follows," went on Streuss.

" _1.A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm_ _._

2. A robot must obey any orders given to it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.

_3._ _A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law."_

Streuss could see he was getting into difficulty with his request. "Er can we keep the 3 rules and give them some kind of free will?"

"No, it's either free will or it isn't."

" I see... That could be a problem -will they have a moral conscience, at least some kind of guide to keep them on reasonable standards of behaviour?"

"Conscience is part of the package."

Streuss continued, "OK, we'll hope that will replace the 3 laws and they'll behave to their best instincts."

"Not necessarily. Free Will still allows them to crush their conscience and engage in criminal behaviour."

Dr Streuss realised the gamble he was taking but his ambition egged him on to take the risk.

"Well, I think I can teach them ethics, so that they behave as good citizens."

"You can certainly try, but there's one other thing." continued God

"What's that, Lord," Streuss was trying to be respectful and he nearly typed "your majesty" but quickly corrected it.

"You don't need organs to hate, but to consummate love you need sex organs and your creatures don't have any."

"Yeah, it just got too hard to build that feature. We thought they could make their babies on the assembly line in their local robot factory."

"Well, you humans are doing that already with test tube babies from hidden donors. When those kids grow up, many may become social time bombs if they are denied from finding their genetic identity. What will you tell children when they ask about who were their parents and grand-parents? That they didn't matter ? No family history? You are entering into a dangerous future."

Streuss could sense God was not happy. This request was sliding into deep territory, beyond building a group of smart machines with near human characteristics.

"Please, if it's OK, could we still allow them to love and be celibate, -er like angels or missionaries?"

"Some angels, and not all missionaries," corrected God. "Not all." There was a pause as He searched for a workable solution. Then He finally flashed on the screen. "I have given them the souls of sub-Angels –all the human emotions, conscience, free-will, celibacy but no supernatural powers. This is a one-off grant, not transferrable. Any robot who is destroyed and rebuilt will not get another soul." The screen shrank into a disappearing dot and was silent.

Streuss was exhausted and stared at the screen, now faded to dark, for some time. He could just barely keep awake, and his crumpled body flopped in the office chair. But he was happy -oh he was so happy! "Thanks Sir!" he burbled.

Another "ping" from his computer, another email. Who could this be early Sunday morning? With his last reserve of energy, he forced his eyes to open and stare at the message.

He was looking at The Seal of the President of the United States. The message beneath it was:

" _The President directs that NASA's Project Deep Space be cancelled immediately_."

Tears soaked his shirt. With a final moan he fell over backwards from his chair and just lay there.

"Why God? -Why? -Why so cruel? Is this your idea of a joke?"

The Old Man, no mean Scientist Himself, could understand Streuss' disappointment. If only Streuss could have faith and think about the future. Streuss would learn later that the spaceship cancellation was a blessing. The Bio-Teks would make a greater contribution to mankind on earth than possibly burning up in space.

But for now, Streuss lapsed into a deep sleep that lasted some hours.....

Bright light caused him to stir. His watch told him it was about mid-day. He got up and walked over to his creations. Their eyes followed his approach. "We got a lot to talk about," he told them.

__________________________________

Nine (1)

__________________________________

**A hop, step** and jump away the jet assisted helicopter was waiting on the nearby helipad at the Dinkum Donuts Laboratory. Noodles, Botzi and Banjo bundled in. "New York", directed Noodles to the waiting pilot. The great whirling blades flayed the air with a Flop! Flop! Flop! sound increasing in frequency until the whole ungainly craft lifted, slowly at first then whooshed right into the clouds. A crack of thunder confirmed the jets had been engaged and the aircraft disappeared at almost warp speed.

Through cloud layers, cloud mountains and blue skies, the helicopter whizzed in a straight line to New York where Noodles was to begin his mission. Within a few hours, Manhattan's ragged skyscraper horizon loomed up ahead, introduced by the Statue of Liberty.

The pilot knew his landing instructions and slowed the aircraft to look for a certain helipad on the roof of one of the towers. After flying a zig-zag path over most of the buildings, his GPS beeped strongly over the Golden Sucks Tower, the basilica of the American Capitalist Church. He hovered while he checked, and being sure, brought the craft gently onto the flat roof. Some people were visible, waiting near the entrance to the stairway in a roof-top annexe building.

The pilot cut the motor and allowed the blades to whirl quietly, coasting to a stop.

Noodles and Botzi walked across the roof to a tall man in a business suit and dark glasses, his hands clad in black leather gloves, clasped behind his back. He bowed slightly to acknowledge their presence and motioned them to follow him and his assistants down the stairs to the Papa's office, which was only two floors below.

The office was huge, occupying the whole floor. Floor-to-ceiling glass walls opened up a spectacular view over Manhattan. A thick red carpet, leather chairs, a big heavy desk, paintings by famous artists, -it was all there, to attest that this was the lair of a powerful man.

A fat, rotund man with a bald, melon shaped head and a bulbous nose stared at them. A face both florid and speckled attested to living a devoted spiritual life albeit nothing less than 40% proof.

Papa Speculatus III was seated in a gold layered throne-like office chair behind a huge desk, also gilded with gold. Over his shoulders was slung a full length cape, made of white ermine fur and golden silk lining, emphasised with precious stones on the shoulder pads, like the stars of a 5-star general. It would have made Elvis Presley's Las Vegas outfits look like belonging to a slum-dog. This Papa had a upon his head an imposing mitre, purple silk edged with gold, a cross-design between a Vatican mitre and Yul Brynner's Rameses II headgear in "The Ten Commandments".

He nodded a greeting and handed a note to Noodles. Noodles looked at it.

" _To Touch and See, To Smell and Hear,_

And think of Taste, to find them near

One so Sweet the other Bitter, one so Sour the other Salty,

Are you looking for the Hobbits Four ?

Then know this rhyme but better hurry."

First clue:

" _Mountains are Triangles, Triangles are sweet_

The country with both, is where an attorney you'll meet

Second Clue:

" _Of Angels eight one marks the gates,_

P, zero, zero are its co-ordinates."

Third Clue:

" _Civil wars make famous presidents_

One knows where his orchard grows"

Fourth Clue:

" _Salt will fly, with a mighty roar_

The distant mountains have no door"

Noodles read the note over again with Botzi looking over his shoulder. "Some kind of treasure hunt puzzle."

"I know that," said the Papa impatiently, "except the lives of four people are at stake, besides billions of dollars locked inside inaccessible vaults."

Noodles hesitated with the news. "Er, haven't you heard – one of the Gnomes has been found stuffed with chocolate and left for dead at the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland. He has been identified as Monsignor Gnome Grunter."

The Papa fell silent for a moment. "Then we have even less time to waste," he urged, "You must find the others!"

"We'll do our best," assured Noodles. "Can we have a spare office to start our work."

"All set up for you. We have an office with all communications and the four files on these honourable members. Gnome Grunter has gone to the great big vault in the sky, but there may still be a chance for Gnomes Gopher, Grotti and Ghurkin. Follow my man Sleezer, he will show you your office."

Noodles looked at Botzi, about to burst into a contagious giggle on these curious appellations for senior Princes of the Church, but Noodle's threatening look stopped him in his tracks. "Let's go Botzi"

__________________________________

Ten (10 **)**

**__________________________________**

**They walked off** to find their office, Three floors down they found it, an ideal space, fully equipped to carry out the investigation. Noodles went to work, to make contact with somebody he thought could help.

"He owes me one," Noodles said to Botzi.

"Who owes you one?" asked Botzi.

"Tom Pranks." Just then contact was made and a voice came on the line,

"Yeah.. aa-ah Tom here."

Noodles got to the point. "Hey Tom, we have a riddle here that has some urgency attached. You did a fantastic job in those movies, "Saints and Devils and The Bad Vino Code. Can you help?"

Noodles read out the Lyrics to Tom.

"Woo-oo. That's heavy stuff. My momma always said, 'Life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get. -Shucks!" Obviously Tom's brain was into overdrive, probably after eating all those chocolates.

Noodles was perplexed. "The Lyrics, what do these Lyrics mean?"

"Aah dunno, I'll have to ask Wilson."

"Who the hell is Wilson?"

"Mah best friend, Wilson the volley ball."

Noodles nearly flipped. "Oh! That Wilson ! -But you lost him in the sea, remember!?"

"So ah did, but he floated back home, was washed up on the beach at Malibu. Wilson said he missed me –he, he came back to me."

Noodles gagged. Toy Story flashed in his mind. He seriously wondered whether cowboy Woody was actually the real actor, playing a fictional character named Tom Pranks, cashing in handsomely all these years. Anyway, he had no choice but to humour him.

"Alright, millions of people paid money in good faith to see you trot around the Vatican solving preposterous murders. Hasn't any of that rubbed off on you? Can you take a guess?"

"Hey I'm only an actor here. I just followed the script. The real symbologist is the great man himself, Professor Matto Pipistrello. Give him a call."

Noodles jotted down the number Tom gave him. "Thanks Tom, I'll follow it up."

__________________________________

Eleven (11 **)**

**__________________________________**

**Professor Pipistrello** was by far the greatest symbologist and pseudo-intellectual since Sherlock Holmes. Originally, his Italian father, a young man touring Scotland, was smitten by the local product twice over. He simultaneously fell in love with a beautiful Scot and a barrel of Scotch, both 20-year-old.

Their son Matthew was born and his Scottish mother, not being an expert in Italian, nicknamed him "little Matto." Matto grew up, graduated in law at Oxford, and settled in a comfortable attic studio in London overlooking the river Thames. A short, stocky man with wings of messy hair straddling a centre strip of baldness, he looked like something between Einstein and Groucho Marx. A thick blue-green pullover flopped around his rotund chest and brown flannel trousers completed the sartorial story.

Scotland Yard had beaten a path to his door over the years because Pipistrello was prolific in imagining 8 or10 scenarios leading to a single crime scene. Whilst usually none of them had any practical use, it saved the police a lot of time by avoiding the crazy blind alleys he suggested, and let them focus their energies on what he didn't mention.

In this respect, Pipistrello was very useful to them, -he was the original _Investigatore Negativo -_ the Negative Detective, and they knew how to use him, by applying a little reverse engineering. His clue gathering was amazing, he missed nothing and read something into everything. So much so, that you could say he was a trusty divining rod of criminal behaviour and could be relied on as long as you looked 180 degrees away from where he was pointing.

Pipistrello admired Sherlock Holmes when Sherlock said to Watson, "When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth." This gave Pipistrello great comfort regardless that the "truth" could still be many alternative possibilities unrelated to eliminating the impossible.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Back in London the evening was getting dark -a damp cold fog was settling in, and the rooftop chimneys wafted smoke into the atmospheric pea-soup. The lights across the Thames slowly sank into the fog, the view dissolving in a grey mist. Such meteorological misery made one so much more appreciative of one's cosy nook, a cheery fireplace and a solid English working-class dinner, to be had in due course.

The professor was at ease, reading comfortably in a winged armchair. He sucked softly on his meerschaum pipe, blowing blue rings into the air. His eyes fell on the bust of his hero, Sherlock Holmes, staring at him from the mantelpiece. He gave Sherlock a wink, as if to acknowledge him as the source of his inspired detective work. He made a mental note to get himself a deer-stalker hat, just like Sherlock's, as those hanging flaps would keep his ears warm in foul weather.

He reached over to a side-table and plucked a pinch of snuff from his snuff-box and snorted it up his nose. (Well Sherlock used to indulge, why not?). In a few minutes, his fireplace radiated rainbows and he gazed inwards, at the floral wall paper someone had glued inside the walls of his skull. About half an hour later, he gradually floated off the ceiling and found himself settled back in his armchair.

No real Dr Watson was ever going to knock on his door and sit with him by the fireplace, buttering Pipistrello with obsequious platitudes in honour of his great powers of deduction, just as his hero, Sherlock, was well and truly lacquered by _his_ Watson. But a hamster, by the name of Dr Watson, did grace Pipistrello's study, and although hamster Watson never criticised, he didn't lend much to the argument either. At times, the poor creature busied himself with astonishing revolutions of his hamster wheel to try and buy his freedom with a heart attack. But alas, the rodent found himself born tough.

"Well, then," Matto exclaimed to Sherlock's bust, "time to feed the hungries, is it not ?"

He walked to his little fridge and pulled out a microwave dinner. He had a choice between "Bangers and Mash", "Tripe and Onions" or "Chicken Feet Soup." He wanted a treat tonight – and "Tripe and Onions" won the selection. His mother raised him as a true Scot, stoic, unfussed and something of a myopic gourmet. There, a tantalising meal lay before him. Did the French ever discover instant gravy mix or tomato sauce? Well, their loss not his.

As he watched his treat going round and round in the microwave oven, his 1920's phone jangled him out of his complacency and he went to answer it.

"Al-lo...." he said. "Pipistrello speaking."

"Professor, my name's Noodles. I'm ringing from New York. Ah, we have an emergency. For a handsome commission we need you to decipher a code for us. I'll get to the point. Four Zurich Gnomes of the American Capitalist Church have been kidnapped, one already murdered, and we must save the other three. They hold the codes for Swiss money vaults, which hold trillions of gold and if the bullion is lost, it could bankrupt the world into World War III."

"I think I've heard of you," mused Pipistrello, "Didn't you stitch up NASA by selling them your multi-million dollar toilet?"

"That's history well and truly flushed down the pipe, what do you say to 250,000 Washers?"

"Washers? Dear Lord! What should I do with that many washers? Not a lot, quite useless without nuts and bolts - I'd say."

"No, I mean President Washington's face on the American dollar. I'm talking about 250,000 US dollars."

"Ding!" went the microwave.

"Hang on!" Pipistrello rushed over to his dinner and with a quick swish of the tomato sauce bottle, squirted bright red stripes over the plate, transforming the sickly white concoction into an appetising creation. He thrust a napkin into his shirt collar, picked up the utensils, and switched his phone to room speaker.

"250,000 dollars are acceptable, pray, what is your riddle?"

Noodles slowly read out the lyrics. He advised Pipistrello that all they had to start with was not that helpful, just a few senseless clues.

" _Of Angels eight one marks the gates,_

P, zero, zero are its co-ordinates."

Pipistrello sat in his wing chair, legs firm together to better brace himself. He placed the plate on his lap and mounted an attack on his tripe and onions. But was his knife blunt or was this tripe unusually plucky, putting up a good fight? – No matter, he would earn his meal. With wistful thoughts of his romantic suppers in Africa, under a soft moonlight, he had remained unfazed whilst hacking into a dehydrated hyena.

Then he said to Noodles, "You're wrong."

"What do you mean?"

"You have more clues than you think." He went on to explain. "See, you have to pair the first line with the second and notice the riddle talks in groups of four."

"So?"

"Four gnomes, four tastes, four senses. The clue to find these princes of finance is to match the tastes with the senses."

Pipistrello paired the clues together.

" _To Touch and See, To Smell and Hear_

One so Sweet the other Bitter, one so Sour the other Salty"

"The words "See! or Look! have something to do with Bitter. Smell goes with Sour. Something sweet goes with the need to touch. Something salty has to do with hearing, or sound. Tell me, did the first monsignor to be murdered have extremely poor eyesight?"

Noodles was impressed. "Well, yes, he was almost blind, but how on earth did you know that?"

Pipistrello stoked his pipe, a smile appearing at the first success of his enormous powers of deduction. He winked at Dr Watson who busied himself in shelling a peanut, unaware of the intelligence of his guardian.

After a pause Pipistrello went on to explain. "Touch has been paired with sweet. Gnome #1 was murdered with sweetness, his stomach stuffed with chocolate. He would have been very much dependent on touch because he was near-blind, see the connection?"

"Eh ? Couldn't Grunter's blindness be connected with "see" which is connected with "bitter?"

"It could but we already know the circumstances of the first murder. –Sweetness, that is chocolate, was connected with the Gnome's disability of blindness forcing him to touch everything. Therefore touch is the right clue. With the first pair of clues eliminated, that leaves us to fit the remaining 6 clues clearly into matched pairs, does it not?"

Noodles sat down. This logic was getting too deep. He resigned himself to Pipistrello's mental manipulations and sighed "Well, what next?"

__________________________________

Twelve (12 **)**

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**Again a silent pause** as Pipistrello leaned back in his armchair staring intently at the ceiling, allowing his neurons to fire sporadically. He imagined himself out-of-his-body, standing behind his own head and sifting through his cranium at the dozens of possibilities on offer. His landlord better fix that ceiling leak soon, he thought. Eventually he broke the silence.

"It's a long shot, but we don't have much to go on. You're in New York right?"

"Yes, Manhattan actually, 77th floor of the Capitalist Church Basilica."

"Look out the window, do you see any angels?"

"In Wall St New York? You must be kidding!" Noodles gazed down the skyscraper canyons to the streets below, noting the abundance of stretched shiny black limousines, fighting for room among yellow taxis.

Lots of devils, maybe, he muttered.

Pipistrello was quick. "That's it! Irony! It's not really angels we're looking for it's the exact opposite, look for devils or symbols associated with devils! Now look again, what do you see?"

Noodles looked up at the sky, some cloud, some jets high and low, a helicopter, people scurrying like ants on the streets. Nothing diabolical to-day. His eyes swept slowly over the skyline checking the wedding cake heaps of the older, taller buildings. His eyes were attracted by the shiny arches of the Chrysler Building roof pinnacle. There on the 60th floor was a wide parapet where each of the four corners was guarded by giant heads of stainless steel eagles, two on each corner.

Noodles quacked like a duck with excitement. "Eagles are the Angels of the sky! And Gargoyles represent monsters and evil spirits! The Irony! All made of steel! And there's eight of them and set at 90 degree intervals or angles! And....and...some years ago a Ghostbuster Team actually exorcised terrible evil from inside the shell of these eagles. It's them, the eight gargoyles of the Chrysler Building!"

Pipistrello frowned with Noodles' theory. Was he trying to upstage him with fuzzy logic – a domain of which he was the undisputed king? He hesitated briefly, trying to follow Noodles' wild pin-ball conclusions. Deciding to be generous, Pipistrello conceded "-Splendid! Good man! We have found the pointers, the clues to direct our search."

Noodles' excitement dissolved into frustration. "But they point to all four corners, which one should we follow?"

Pipistrello purred with delight at his next revelation. "One of them is a line of sight pointing to a location for the second crime. In the rhyming clues, sight was paired with bitter. You need to look along the axis of the chosen eagle to locate 'The gate' meaning at a place where all things bitter can happen."

This rewarding score in the progress of deduction deserved a pinch of snuff and a re-packing of his favourite pipe, surely, and such did Pipistrello.

Noodles almost began to howl with impatience and deep frustration. "But which eagle?"

Botzi, being more logical, could see little connection in what he was hearing, but patiently pulled up a chair and sat down.

Pipistrello was not to be hurried, lest Noodles outguess him again. He carefully loaded his meerschaum with another plug of tobacco and eventually got it alight after wasting six or seven matches. He sucked and puffed, blowing smoke to the sloping rafters an arm's length above him.

Years ago, there was a noticeable sag in two of the rafters as a colony of white ants threatened to chew them clean in half. But a week after moving into his new lodgings, Pipistrello's pipe killed their eggs and fumigated the whole ceiling. The surviving termites packed their bags and moved next door.

Mice likewise considered his pipe disgusting beyond forgiveness and disappeared, although a tough street rat occasionally desecrated the premises, as well as chewing the detective's tobacco and spitting it back into his pipe. Pipistrello puzzled over why sometimes he couldn't remember filling his pipe and at those times the tobacco tasted like rat's breath.

At last Pipistrello, quite snuffed and hanging on to his armchair so he wouldn't float again, spoke "Which eagle, you ask? Why, the one associated with the next clue, P, zero, zero!"

"P, zero, zero!" Noodles scoffed "What sort of co-ordinates are they? They give no degrees, no direction and in fact they don't even make sense!"

"Ah but they do, dear boy," Pipistrello drove the thrust of his logical lance straight at Noodles, with some satisfaction. "P, zero, zero, are not degrees, they make a word and what word is that my dear Noodles?" They could hear Pipistrello was beaming with pride at his brilliance.

Noodles could think of only one. At risk of being ridiculed he took the plunge "POO?"

Botzi leaned over, still listening and eagerly balanced on the edge of his seat. He thought this line of conversation was bordering either on the occult or the effects of a severe lobotomy, and had no idea as to the final conclusion.

"Yes, Poo! Pigeon poo! The eagles must have accumulated a fair amount of bird droppings over the years."

"But they might all have dropped the same amount of crap on each eagle!" replied Noodles.

"Not exactly, the eagle pointing towards the most evil, in this case the kidnapping of the Gnome, would generate the greater force-field of evil thus scaring more pigeons as they flew over, and thus triggering more frequent bowel motions."

"And how do you measure which eagle has the most pigeon poo?" asked Noodles.

"Go now to the 60th floor of the Chrysler Building, scrape every flake of bird poo into eight marked bags and weigh them on a scientific beam balance. The heaviest bag belongs to the eagle pointing to where the second Gnome is held captive."

This last show of computational genius from Pipistrello completely floored Botzi, in that he slipped off his chair crashing his bum on the floor and sat staring wide-eye at Noodles. His sides ached with pressure as he fought desperately to stop himself exploding into a roar of laughter. His face showed the strain as he gritted his teeth and stared at Noodles.

Noodles guessed what Botzi was thinking. He was in no mood to take criticism.

"Look, this guy Pipistrello sold millions of books, and his detective prowess won the unquestioning loyalty of a world of passive readers. The fact that he wasted a monastery of monks diffusing a booby-trapped bible did not deter Hollywood from correctly assessing he was a good return on funds. The bottom line is – Faith, -Faith that Pipistrello eventually hits the mark, -he produces the goods."

Botzi was in no mood to argue. He picked himself up and wearily followed Noodles outside. He would wait until he was alone to bang a wall with his fists and relieve himself of the humorous pressure built up by the insanity of what just transpired. They visited a laboratory to pick up some scientific equipment and headed for the Chrysler Building. After entering the lobby, they took a lift to the 60th floor and walked to the door leading outside to the roof garden. Soon they found themselves outside, looking at an awesome view.

__________________________________

Thirteen (13 **)**

**__________________________________**

**The stainless steel** eagles on the Chrysler Building were bigger than they thought. But what immediately cast a pall of gloom on the intrepid duo was that during their journey up the building, a snow storm had materialised out of nowhere, and snow was falling heavily.

"How can that happen?" asked Botzi, "We entered the building on a warm summer's day and walk out at the top into a blizzard. No wonder the Ghost Busters had a hard time with these eagles. This place is evil."

"Nothing we can do, lets get started, before the sun sets," suggested Noodles

"Get started? The eagles are already covered in snow, how can we measure accurately? If 'The Poo' is under those mounds of snow building up on their backs, we're stuffed.

Noodles quietly put down his instruments case. Botzi was right. "And in any case, what about the effects of past weather in erasing vital poo clues? We would not know for certain if we had the right eagle."

That was the end of the road. There was nothing they could do. At the least, they decided to take a walk around the roof looking at each eagle, now that they had come so far. Shuffling through the snow, they walked past the seventh eagle and were approaching the eight, when Botzi suddenly turned back.

"Let's take another look at number seven. I thought I saw something." Botzi scraped some snow flakes of the eagle's sculptured contours and there it was, faintly scratched into the steel shell. "P.O.O."

"There it is!" exclaimed Botzi. "Poo was not Pigeon Poo after all. They are possibly someone's initials. Pipistrello goofed on this one."

"He has been known to suffer from tangential references," apologised Noodles

"What'd you mean? Some of his conclusions are just farts? I can believe that." Botzi was sarcastic and in no mood for apologies.

"Hang on, Pipistrello got us here, didn't he ? Ok, lets get the line of sight before we freeze to a stand-still." hurried Noodles.

Cleaning off the snow, they set up a theodolite firmly along the middle axis of the eagle's back and while Noodles peered through its telescope, Botzi unfurled a map of the surrounding area and lined it up with the surveying instrument.

"What do you see?" he asked Noodles.

"Rooftops and more rooftops, industrial buildings, or, in the far distance, hills and houses."

"I think you've projected too far, concentrate on nearer buildings, -see anything bitter?"

"This is a telescope, not a Giraffe's tongue, how can I _see_ something bitter?" Noodles squinted harder to make out more details. "Wait! I see industrial chimneys –there's advertising on them. I can just read.... 'Buttkirzer Beer' right in the centre of my crosshairs."

"That's it! The brewery –that's where something bitter is made. I bet we find the second Gnome in the Buttkirzer Brewery!"

"How far is it?" asked Noodles, hastily packing up the gear.

"Not more than 28 miles. We could taxi there in about 1 hour excluding traffic jams. Let's go!"

But it was rush hour, both in using the lift and getting a taxi. Botzi wondered whether crashing down the stairwell would have been faster as the lift stopped every few floors. By the time they reached ground, numerous lift-music repeats of 'The Girl from Ipanema' etched deep into his brain, and took three days to fade out.

Taxi capture was hardly more rewarding. Nothing stopped or came their way. In desperation, Noodles shoved a fistful of money into a passing cab driver's face. The cabbie screeched to a halt, tossed outside the old lady riding in the back of his cab, lifted her up out of the gutter into her walking frame, and plonked her pet Chihuahua under her hat. He then placed himself in the servitude of Messrs Noodles and Botzi.

"Where to?"

"Buttkirzer Brewery and step on it!" ordered Noodle, "we are on a life and death mission, here!"

The traffic jam was not as serious as it could be, rating about 7 out of 10. Still, it did take 2 hours to reach the factory gates of Buttkirzer Brewery. The taxi finally careered to a halt, Noodles paid the cabbie and Botzi was already in the guard-house explaining the urgency of the situation. The guard requested one of the factory supervisors to come and show them around. This all happened so quick that they were inside the giant factory among the processing pipes and stainless steel tanks in less than five minutes.

They weren't sure what they were looking for, so they walked slowly, swivelling their heads to glance all over the place, negotiating every steel ladder and walkway, peering into every open vat. As they climbed higher up the four storey beer-processing plant, they began to think that this time they got it wrong.

Arriving at possibly the second last open vat, they took a weary look. Why was there a rope hanging from a steel beam into the vat? The supervisor said that it shouldn't be, as ropes dangling in vats where unhygienic and would spoil the beer.

The trio climbed a further level to peer down into the vat. It was lit by a floodlight and near full of beer. In the clear amber liquid they could see the body of Gnome Gopher. His boots were uppermost, tied with rope, while his head was thrust into the depths, also roped to some kind of steel weight.

The supervisor was aghast. He quickly went into emergency mode, called for help and activated all life –saving procedures, but it was too late. Rescue teams could only retrieve the body.

"Mongrel scum!" swore the supervisor, in tears. "His mouth was gagged with tape so he couldn't swallow. They dipped him in world-best beer and denied him a few farewell drinks! Who are these sadists!?"

Botzi sighed and Noodles looked down, wondering if ever they were going to save the remaining two victims.

__________________________________

Fourteen (14 **)**

**__________________________________**

**Noodles wasted** no time in asking for a Buttkirzer office and trying to telephone Pipistrello.

A scratchy answering machine informed him "You have dialled the number of Professor Pipistrello, here in London. Unfortunately the Professor is unavailable. Please understand that due to heavy telephonic traffic trying to consult the professor, you have been allowed fifteen seconds, after the beep, to state your business and if reasonable, the Professor will try to contact you. Due to your short allowance, may we suggest you state your name and your phone number first, followed by choosing a numeral to indicate precisely the nature of your business. These numerical indicators are:

Press 1 - Murder, successful, pre-meditated.

Press 2 - Murder, unfortunate circumstances.

Press 3 - Murder, wrong victim.

Press 4 -Theft, embezzlement, forgery, burglary, pick-pocketing, share trading.

Press 5 -Espionage, Treason, Political Assassinations, Casual shooting sprees.

Press 6 -Divorce, Cheating, Lying, Inheritance, Maintenance, Mistress Disposal.

Press 7 -Sorry, I dialled the wrong Number.

The professor reserves the right to refuse any, or all criminal or domestic cases offered to him, the professor denies all liability as to outcome and no further correspondence will be entered into. Are you ready? Please speak now, - BEEP!" The answering machine ran out of time and cut out.

Noodles' memory chips started to heat up with frustration. "Professor please ring me as soon as possible. This is Noodles. We lost Monsignors Grunter and Gopher, but there is still a chance to save the others. What can you advice professor? Here are the next set of clues."

Noodles fumbled for the slip of paper containing the clues. Before he could take a breath to speak he was rewarded with a BEEP! and a disconnection tone.

"Stuff me with nails!! That wasn't even 15 seconds Pipistrello, you stupid pontificating, pretentious, pain-in-the-ass, ponce!!" Noodles howled with anger.

Time was running out. He had no choice but to ring again as he forgot to leave his new phone number on the professor's recorder. Botzi looked quizzically at him wondering what had happened.

Noodles listened "....You have dialled the number of Professor Pipistrello, here in London...."

He faced Botzi as the message rolled on. "Bloody Pipistrello waffles for five minutes then pretends to give you 15 seconds to talk. He can be a brainless turd."

After some time, the expected Beep did arrive and Noodles burst like a machine gun into a torrent of information trying to pack it into his 15 seconds. On the last second he was given a reprieve as Pipistrello himself came on the line.

"Slow down dear boy, I can't understand you. I'm just back from a violent argument between my stomach and a load of tripe and onions. Just let me open the windows."

Noodles waited patiently then repeated his message "Professor. -Their eminence Grunter and Gopher have been murdered. We've got to go all out to save the others. What do we do now? Here is the third clue."

Noodles read from the crumpled slip of paper.

"Third Clue:

" _Civil wars make famous presidents_

One knows where his orchard grows"

There was silence on the other end, except for rumbling, bubbling sounds, remnants of a feral volcano in Pipistrello's bowels, born of his gastronomic experience.

Noodles turned on his mobile speaker so Botzi could hear. At last Pipistrello spoke.

"This is tough. What civil war? Spanish, American? Irish? Mexican? The words 'famous presidents' seem to indicate President Lincoln." More silence as Pipistrello racked his brain. He thought to re-light his pipe but was quickly overruled by an extra loud protest from his alimentary canal, ending in an explosive expression of flammable flatulence. "Gawd," he sniffed, "that's one for the record books."

More silence, then a cry of excitement. "I got it! By Jove, I got it!" Pipistrello felt smug once again, patronising Noodles with his ability. "Dear, dear boy, it's now obvious."

Noodles humoured him and played the fool "What's obvious, professor?"

"This is another puzzle of geographical directions."

Noodles gave Botzi a look "Watch out for tangential references" he whispered.

"I can hear them," was Botzi's poker-faced reply. "he's not ripping curtains, is he?"

Pipistrello continued, "Let's go back a little. We have four Gnomes, four senses – touch, sight, smell, hearing, and four tastes, sweet, bitter, sour, and salty. Align them up in pairs and what do you get? We have already used up touch and sweet, sight and bitter. We are coming to smell and sour."

Noodles looked blank and wide eyed at Botzi. Botzi made a circular finger motion pointing to his own temple and doing cross-eyes. Noodles, not sure once again whether Pipistrello was genius or merely insane gritted his teeth. Still, they wanted to know what the professor had to say.

"Try this," bubbled Pipistrello, "President Lincoln knows where his orchard grows. President Lincoln 'knows' and its also his 'nose' that knows where his orchard is or was. Here the 'smell' clue confirms that his nose plays a part in determining the direction of our quarry."

Both his listeners were still half an earth rotation behind his reasoning. He continued undaunted. "President Lincoln must have at one time owned an orchard, what sort? Why a lemon orchard of course, that's the sour clue."

Noodles tried to get back into the logic wagon which by now he thought was careering out of control into a deep canyon. "Ok, so far," Noodles lied, "but what has Lincoln's nose got to do with it.?"

"Dear boy, remember September 17, 1937?"

"No, should I?" Noodles' frustration levels were rising. Botzi on the other hand, was fascinated by these bats of wisdom fluttering out of Pipistrello's cavernous consciousness.

"That's when Lincoln's face was dedicated. President Lincoln, one of the four heads on the Mt Rushmore Memorial. His nose points to where the lemon orchard is. There you will find the third Gnome."

By now Botzi's brain was doing cartwheels, but Noodles begrudgingly trusted the professor and he asked one further question. "What do we do next?"

"You are in New York. Take a night flight to South Dakota to the Mount Rushmore memorial. Camp overnight and in the morning get the satellite co-ordinates to where Lincoln's nose is pointing. Fly straight in that direction till you find the lemon orchard. God help us that we find the Gnome alive." Just then a great rupturing sound came across the speaker, like sails of a pirate ship tearing in a typhoon, except it was Pipistrello, in a final agony of gas release.

"Thanks professor!" yelled Noodles, "We are on our way." He rushed over to see the Buttkirzer supervisor. "We have to leave this tragedy in your hands. We have another potential crisis to attend to. Where can we get a long distance helicopter around here, this time of night?"

__________________________________

Fifteen (15 **)**

**__________________________________**

**The Buttkirzer supervisor** contacted his boss. The chain re-action was swift. The news went straight to the chief executive officer. The supervisor went back to Noodles.

"If you sign this agreement not to publicise this event, Buttkirzer will provide you with a long-range copter to take you to your destination, free-of-charge."

Noodles didn't hesitate. "Deal!"

The supervisor led them to the roof top helipad on the brewery complex. "It should be here in fifteen minutes."

Noodles thanked him and sure enough, they heard the "Wop! Wop! Wop! of an approaching helicopter. They watched as it descended on the helipad, and wasting no time, they ran across and climbed in.

"South Dakota, Mt Rushmore memorial – can you make that?" Noodles said in a half-commanding tone.

"It's a stretch, but this baby was designed for long distance." asserted the pilot.

"Better hurry please, we have an emergency."

The pilot gunned the engines and with another powerful Wop! Wop! Wop! the bird disappeared into the night sky. It took about four hours in silence when the pilot announced, "According to my reckoning, Mount Rushmore should be about 20 miles ahead."

"Can you stick around, please to give us some GPS co-ordinates in daylight?" asked Noodles.

"Didn't the supervisor tell you? Buttkirzer Brewery have put me at your disposal to assist you with your mission. By the way, my name's Kurt."

Noodles introduced himself and Botzi and felt like kissing the pilot but kept a professional control of his emotions.

Some hours later, the helicopter finally found a landing spot close to Mt Rushmore. It was a big machine, used for executive trips to Canada and its storage hold had all the camping equipment for comfortable hunting trips. They set about getting ready for tomorrow's tasks.

A dark sky emphasised the brilliance of the stars.....

Dawn crept slowly from its hiding place at the horizon, pushing up the dark night and blending it into a blue sky.

Noodles and Botzi were already awake, and wasting no time, they walked to the top of the head of President Lincoln.

Botzi tried to be encouraging. "The axis of this nose is unmistakeable. Kurt won't have any trouble plotting his co-ordinates."

Botzi was right. Within an hour, Kurt figured the co-ordinates and they winged their way, just at the right height, to spot any orchard farm that might lie below. They found nothing resembling a lemon tree orchard. After two hours' flight time, Kurt advised he had to put down at the nearest town with an airport that sold helicopter fuel. Noodles and Botzi walked into town and questioned some of the locals about a lemon tree orchard. They drew plenty of blanks, but one old geezer seemed to remember about a lemon tree orchard.

"It was destroyed long ago." he said, "they built a tourist lodge on the land, called it 'The Lemon Tree Resort' 'bout 50 miles north of here."

Noodles and Botzi wasted no time. They ran through the streets to the helicopter just as Kurt was locking the fuel tanks after a full reload.

"Kurt! 50 miles due north," gasped Noodles "Fly low, looking for the 'Lemon Tree Resort'"

Again, the muscle helicopter savaged the air and demanded lift from the unsuspecting atmosphere, a lift that was granted without question.

It flew, sweeping the panorama below at 150 knots. Fields, houses, roads, bridges, cows under a shady tree, a sheriff's posse mating in tall grass, two horses trotting, barns, lakes, rivers, then something that looked like a ranch. Was it a resort? It was. -A luxury resort with a helipad. And the helipad identified itself as the "Lemon Tree Resort." Kurt put the machine down and Noodles and Botzi rushed to the resort's reception office.

"Do you have a Gnome Grotti or Ghurkin registered here?" Noodles puffed.

"Who are you? Do you have personal ID?" asked the receptionist.

Noodles showed her his ID cards and a letter from Papa Speculatus III requesting total co-operation on a matter of life threatening proportions.

"We have a Gnome Grotti staying with us." The receptionist called the house masseuse and asked her the whereabouts of Gnome Grotti.

"I gave him a bells and whistle massage an hour ago. He went off to the sauna," she replied.

"Quick!" exclaimed Noodles, "where is that?"

"Go out to the pool and turn left. Go through two doors and you will come to the sauna door."

Noodles and Botzi rushed in the direction of her instructions. Banging through some doors they arrived at the sauna door, confronted by a big padlock. The temperature indicator was set at 200 degrees Celsius.

"Oh, my God," exclaimed Noodles, rubbing the moisture fogging the observation window in the door. Inside was a short man curled up in a foetal position, his skin as red as a lobster. There was no movement.

"Your eminence! Monsignor Grotti!" Noodles yelled. No movement. He rushed to reception and sounded the alarm. There was nothing they could do except call the local undertaker.

Gnome Grotti had been slow-cooked such that his body was just still intact, although crispy baked . The undertaker was a religious man and really cared for the bodily remains of the Loved Ones in his charge. But he was in a quandary as to how to remove the body and transport it to his hearse, as he had no assistant and outside, the gymnasium area was too busy with people. One wrong move, and an arm or a leg might fall off his trolley, not exactly a tourist drawcard.

The man also had a catering business. Wishing to avoid the prying eyes of nosy hotel guests, he went and got some materials, returned to the sauna and closed the door. He hid the Gnome completely, trussing him up with aluminium foil in the shape of a succulent pig, put him on a large tray, placed some vegetables around the edges and an apple at one end, and pretended that it was a giant barbecue order.

He stopped a moment to pray forgiveness from the holy moneyman for wrapping him up like a pig, hoping he would understand that presenting him as a giant turkey or even two giant turkeys, would arouse suspicion. With an "Amen," he wheeled the body outside, back to his waiting black hearse.

One curious hotel guest, an old World War II veteran from Texas, nudged back his Stetson, scratched his head and drawled to his woman, "Shucks Beulah, if they'se usin' hearses to deliver barbecues in this joint -forget Pearl Harbour, ah'm goin' sushi."

A couple of mongrel dogs followed the undertaker to his hearse and demanded they get a share of whatever it was on the trolley, on account of it smelling sensational and there was so much of it.

A swift boot to their testicles, snarling attempts to bite off undertaker's leg, a slam of a driver's door, and the loaded hearse trundled out of sight. in a vortex of dust.

__________________________________

Sixteen (16 **)**

**__________________________________**

" **Failure after failure,** we're useless Botzi." Noodles felt he could do with a battery recharge.

"Don't take it so hard, Noodles –we're doing our best, can't do it any quicker," reassured Botzi.

Botzi now convinced that the pattern of finding the Gnomes involved long distances, arranged for Kurt and his helicopter to stand by, to which Buttkirzer Brewery agreed on condition their pilot would not be detained any longer than an extra 2 days.

After a half hour of recuperation, Noodles again phoned his friend in London, half expecting a marathon answering message. But Pipistrello was on the line immediately.

"And the outcome?" asked Pipistrello smugly.

"Oh we found him alright, but too late. Three dead stiffs out of three, OK?" sighed Noodles.

"I'm sorry about that, but didn't my deductions lead you to the scene of the crime?"

"Yes," conceded Noodles, "-at least we are proving a connection between the murders. ..... Look -we have one Gnome to go. Maybe, just maybe, we can save this last one. What, in your opinion, do you suggest about clue number four."

"Kindly read said clue at once," instructed Pipistrello

" _Salt will fly, with a mighty roar_

The distant mountains have no door."

Pipistrello tapped his side table with his fingers. He looked at Watson for inspiration, but Watson was again busy racing his hamster wheel, till it hummed like a spinning top. Well, if not suicide, Watson hoped he might hyperventilate into unconsciousness. Such boredom, such misery.

Matto's stomach had settled down and was less of a distraction. He got up to make a pot of tea, while Noodles was still hanging on the phone waiting patiently.

Noodles could hear Pipistrello walking around, waiting for the kettle to boil and whistle, the chink of a cup and saucer and finally the pouring of a cup of tea. Pipistrello went back to sit in his chair, balancing the cup and saucer on his bony knee and thoughtfully stirred five lumps of sugar.

At last he spoke. "This is difficult," he complained. "I can visualize two thirds of the clues but not the ending."

"Well, give us what you've got," exhorted Noodles impatiently.

"These clues describe Bonneville Flats where they race cars. This is done on great open salt spaces, and engines roar with huge power sending sprays of salt behind them. The mountains are in the distant background I believe, but the bit about mountains having no door has got me foxed. Does it mean no doors, no caves? I don't know. I have no idea. AAARGGH ... SHOOT!!"

"They plan to shoot him?" asked Noodles puzzled.

"No! I've sloshed boiling tea on my crutch! Bloody Hell!"

"Well thanks so far. We will be on our way."

"Go, go, go, -good luck ! Ooooh! -Sweet sufferin' snowballs --didn't that HURT! Damn, my best trousers, bugger it!"

Noodles nodded to Kurt who was standing by. "Bonneville Flats, do you know the area?"

"-Used to be part of a racing team years ago," assured Kurt, "I know it well."

"Well take us to the officials' site office, we have to hurry."

The trio said their good-byes to the resort management, and once again, the helicopter began a powerful chatter that finally faded as it lifted into the sky and disappeared into the distance.

After a few hours, the jet-boosted copter was within sight of a white horizon flanked by a ring of mountains, a hazy outline at the edge of the salt desert.

"Almost there," advised Kurt.

Noodles and Botzi both wondered whether they would be successful in this last chance to at least save one of the Gnomes. Noodles saw his chances of being paid by Papa Speculatus getting less and less but at least they had found three of them even if they were too late. Rescuing one still paid 25% of $10m so the incentive was still there. Nothing was spoken between them for some time.

Eventually they could make out a cluster of dark blocks on the severe white sea of salt, which turned out to be service buildings and garages. Coloured flags came into view and finally people scurrying about among all sorts of fuel drums, racing vehicles, machinery and coloured tents. The speed track was clearly visible, a wide runway stretching as far as the eye could see. Parked on what appeared to be a starting line, was a large, shiny red machine shaped more like a rocket although it straddled four big wheels, suggesting that it was meant to be a land vehicle. Botzi noticed a hint of jet stream shooting out of its huge, twin exhausts as the helicopter swung around. Finally their flying machine found a clear area safe enough to land. Kurt pointed to a building a few hundred metres away.

"That's the race marshal's office. Try that first."

Noodles and Botzi wasted no time in following his advice. They leapt out of the aircraft and raced to the office. Noodles banged open the door, startling a group of officials discussing the racing and speed record arrangements for the day.

"Quick, do you have a contestant by the name of Ghurkin competing here today." puffed Noodles.

The officials gave him a puzzled look, not knowing whether he was pulling their leg. Over many years, contestants got nicknames of all sorts but this seemed like a joke coming up.

Noodles quickly changed their attitude, demonstrating he was serious.

"Ghurkin, have you a contestant named Ghurkin, I tell you it's a matter of life or death!"

One of the officials picked up an information board and ran his eyes down a list of names.

"No Ghurkin here, sorry," he said, and as he watched Noodles' expression of doubt, he handed the race-board across. "Here, see for yourself."

Noodles and Botzi both checked the list when Botzi suddenly thumped his finger on a name.

"World Speed Record Attempt –a man by the name of Stewart Pickles. Don't you get it? Stewart Pickles is an alias for Stewed Pickles, otherwise Ghurkin. This is the man! Where is he now?"

The officials broke into a chuckle, until one of them said, "I believe he's ready to attempt the World Speed record. He's in that hot rocket being prepared on the starting line, as we speak."

"Noooooooo !" yelled Noodles as he ran outside towards the hissing, shaking monster on the salt track. He ran past a group of officials standing some distance away from the race machine, who were checking cameras and timers. Botzi was not far behind him, and this prompted an official to yell after them.

"Get away – he's about to start ignition, -get away you are in danger!"

Noodles by now reached the cockpit of the speed monster and could see a red helmet with a letter "G" on the front. Wearing this helmet was an older man, stocky but short. To his horror Noodles could see his mouth was gagged with tape. As well as this, his arms were pinned behind his back, his body also trussed with tape to the frame of his driving seat. There was a terrified pleading look in the man's eyes.

Noodles tried to crack the locked cockpit cover to rescue him. He had no tools, his robot hands were not designed for smashing things and he was worried that further damage to himself would only reduce his capacity to help. Botzi was designed to similar specifications.

"He's trussed up, and can't move" yelled Botzi, "obviously this thing is being guided by remote control. Let's find the nearest garage and get some wrecking equipment." They began to run away from the machine.

"Look," pointed Noodles, "there's an emblem on the side of the machine, some kind of cartoon bird. And the name on the machine -they called it 'The Road Runner'. -Uh-Oh...."

"We don't need to look at cartoons right now, what we need is a little time." No sooner had Botzi said this, when a brain cracking roar belched out of the rear of the land rocket, the blast knocking them flat into the salt.

"He's moving off !" yelled Noodles. "Oh NO!"

But there was nothing they could do. The big red machine continued to roar and crackle, moving smoothly with ever increasing speed. By now the jet stream howled into an ear-splitting crescendo and flared many hundreds of metres along the path of acceleration. All they could see was hot gas blasting from the rear of the rocket, a huge orange ball of flame marking the position of the racer.

Everybody, including many officials and participants had come outside to watch the attempt, staring into the distance, watching the disappearing exhaust flame reduce to a dot. Someone suddenly called out in horror. "Holy Crap! That racer has left the ground!"

"No that's an illusion, the shimmering heat often shows a gap between the car and the salt track," said another, reassuring the crowd.

Noodles and Botzi feared for the worst. Noodles turned to some officials standing near-by "Please tell us what's happening at the finish line!" Their attention was captured by another official running out of the main office. "The monitoring team at the finish line have reported it has just passed, ten feet off the ground with no sign of stopping!"

Cries of anguish went through the whole camp. The fiery dot was too far to see in the bright sun of the desert.

"The distant mountains have no door!" exclaimed Botzi. The ground crews turned to stare at him, questions on their faces. "He won't get past the mountains. He's going to crash into them!!"

I took only ten seconds to prove Botzi's intuition. In the blue haze of the mountain range, an orange flash evolved into a gray mushroom cloud that rose into the blue sky. Some seconds later, a rolling crack of distant thunder reached the racing camp and everyone knew the final end of the last Gnome, the reverend Ghurkin, formerly known as one-time racing ace Mr. Stewart Pickles.

The mechanic who worked on Ghurkin's racer was a devotee of Looney Tunes. He remarked to the Bio-Teks on leaving, "I named the racing car 'The Road Runner' because nobody could beat Monsignor Ghurkin. He loved to go 'Beep!-Beep!' before take-off. -Pity he didn't get past that mountain, though, - you don't think possibly Wylie Coyote had something to do with this?" Botzi and Noodle leered at his attempt to be funny.

__________________________________

Seventeen (17)

**__________________________________**

**Botzi felt sorry** for Noodles. How were they going to face the Papa with their miserable score? An unbelievable tragedy, four Red Hats rubbed out rudely in a round robin of revenge. Botzi wondered at the horror of it all. Noodles assuaged his grief somewhat by focussing on the ten million dollars. He would have to come up with some other offer to keep the Papa happy.

They made one final request to Kurt, their pilot, to return them to the Golden Sucks Basilica of the Capitalist Church in New York to explain their failure.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

In the grand executive office on the eightieth floor, Papa Speculatus III, stood hands behind his back staring through the glass window-wall at New York City, his back to the newly arrived Bio-Teks.. He was absorbing the news just brought in by Noodles and Botzi.

Papa Speculatus' thoughts zeroed on the bullion locked in the Swiss mountains. His emotions ranged from frustration, betrayal, anger, murder, (no - censor that one), anxiety and disorientation. He ignored the visitors for a while and then adjusted the angle of his mitre.

This is serious, thought Noodles -he's going to speak ex cathedra. At last the Papa turned around, fixed his gaze above Botzi's and Noodles' heads, as if they were insignificant bad schoolkids about to get a thrashing, and spoke in an authoritative voice.

"You fools have no idea of how much you let me down. I am the head of an empire that never sleeps. Every minute, every second, I have below some watchful disciple looking at his computer screen massaging the investor food chain. I depend on the these faithful watchmen to stay one step ahead of the US government and other marauders, to safeguard the investments of millions of gullible mums and dads who know as much about what we're doing as sheep waiting on the ramp to the slaughterhouse."

Papa Speculatus, formerly a Hollywood actor, went into his Shakespeare delivery role keeping his diction perfect but his tone rising a little, with a hint of anger. Botzi and Noodles both fixed their eyes on him, assuring him their full attention, to minimize chances of being re-cycled in one of his waste processing plants. They weren't sure where he was going with this, but in any case Noodles had a trump card up his sleeve as the Papa was not yet aware of the stolen anti-clutter reactor. The Papa lowered his gaze a little, and continued.

"These computer watchmen are the corpuscles of this financial giantosaurus which I head. I am responsible for the welfare of millions, -companies, people, dollars. Even the Chinese Communists take an enema when my Capitalist Church is under attack. Yes our financial religion is nothing more than musical chairs and compassionate greed, but it ensures everybody gets a slice, admittedly some more than others."

The Papa's voice started to ring out, this time more Churchillian than angry.

"But when something or somebody throws a spanner in the works, be it rumour or shortage of funds, then mums and dads get hurt, and good, adventurous companies are martyred by the US government. Stopped dead in their tracks by misguided politicians, these massive companies who attained a spiritual level of creative accounting, providing wealth where none actually existed, are suddenly robbed of their ability to suck the necessary dollars to grease the juggernaut of their success."

The Papa paused, to frame his statement with silence.

"Do you follow me?" His gaze now zeroed on Botzi and Noodles.

Botzi and Noodles stared back, betraying a lack of understanding. Without waiting for an answer which he didn't care for anyway, the Papa, undaunted, carried on.

"It's not only that the Gnomes held the codes to the bullion in the Swiss caves. That would only temporarily freeze the needed funds for inoffensive little bonuses paid to my share-trading missionaries. No Bugatti Veyrons, no Patek Philippes, no girls and so on. But also, it's that they could desert MY Church like rats off a sinking ship, creating a stink of rumours and falling share prices most damaging, that can stop the merry-go-round and dissolve into a mass demonic possession of assets by the greatest Beelzebub of them all! - The Liquidator!"

The Papa waited for a reaction from his two miscreants and seeing that none was about to emerge, changed his tune to one slightly more friendly.

"Very well then! Come with me at once to the Catacomb of the Martyrs!"

__________________________________

Eighteen (18 **)**

**__________________________________**

**Botzi glanced at** Noodles and shrugged his shoulders. Together they quietly followed the Papa to the executive lift. Botzi noticed the gold-plated lift fittings and diamond push-buttons. A short descent of a couple of floors ushered them into a dimly lit hall with dark wood-panelled walls all around and a polished parquetry floor.

So this was the Catacomb! Sparkling chandeliers threw light on the walls which had a series of large photographs or paintings with ornate frames and a red candle flickering at the bottom of each frame, like a shrine.

The Papa gestured with a sweep of his arm at the surroundings. "Gentlemen, the Catacomb of the Martyrs."

Noodles mentally noted the word "gentlemen". This was promising, as he was drumming up courage to make an offer to the Papa after they humoured him, walking around this tacky, whacky mausoleum.

The Papa explained.

"On the wall are displayed pictures of men deemed martyrs of the Capitalist Church." He walked over to the first one, a large photo of a man beaming a benevolent smile. He pointed to Barney Madhat, a free man of late. The caption under the photo said "In the steps of Mother Teresa."

"Barney bestowed fiduciary zeal and financial grace on his chosen people. A lot of American Jews will remember him for cleansing them from their wealthy extravaganzas and delivering them into a simple communal life, one of sharing, -albeit soup mugs and bed bugs. A lot of them took a bath, it is true, wishing he hadn't chosen them. But all agree on one thing. He was the quintessential Mother -one you didn't know you had till he quietly had you. Many felt heartbroken when they plucked Mother away from their bosom because he also took their houses with him."

The Papa was entirely unfazed as to the convoluted logic he was preaching.

"Barney Madhat loved wood ducks. During his bankruptcy prosecution, the Sheriff auctioned most of his possessions. A wood duck costing Barney $60 found a live partner who parted with $4750."

"The unsuspecting Jewish flock that Barney converted on the East coast asked God to drop him dead, while the ones on the West coast wished he would live longer than Moses, always afraid to tie his shoelaces in the penitentiary. Some cursed he should get pregnant as well. The US government gave him 152 years. Barney's lawyer argued 'cruel and unusual punishment' as the sentence didn't include a full supply of vitamin pills to last the distance."

"And so he was martyred, vilified, receiving blows from every quarter, bearing his pain silently. What did he do? Everybody was having fun except some bastard who blew the whistle." This was the first time the Bots heard the Papa swearing. Nobody raised an eyebrow out of respect for the anguish he was suffering.

Papa Speculatus stopped for a moment in front of the shrine, with bowed head, his lips trembling in a short silent prayer to Mother Barney Madhat. He moved on to the next shrine.

"Lehman Bludgers. In 2008 these spiritually untouchable bankers built up their financial grace in assets worth $691 billion. Come all ye faithful, they said, you shall be granted a loan at My Father's house and you shall pay no starting interest and you shall hunger no longer. The Bludgers started as humble Alabama cotton traders and built themselves up into a brobdingnagian bankissimo." He paused, adjusting his dentures, then added

"Requiescat in pace."

He faced the Bots and not getting a reaction, concluded the prayer. "Amen."

He moved to the next. "Oh Washington Moochal ! Dear WAHMOO as they were affectionately known. They actually patented a motto 'YOO HOO!' being the cry of joy bursting forth from the breasts of the hopeless poor when they were given money, life-savings, of other gullible poor. No matter, WAHMOO extracted a blessing from each transaction but their financial grace of $327 billion was brutally wiped out in 2008."

A pause. "Requiescat in pace." The Papa turned aside glaring at the bots - they got the message and finished off his prayer.

"Amen!" they chorused reverently.

"And here, the shrine of the 'Three Amigos' -Ken Lahey, Andrew Fustbuck, and Jeff Skidbum, some of the major executives of Emron Energy of Texas who suffered an inexplicable meltdown of company share prices from $90 to $1 in November 2001 and wiped out the savings of many innocent souls. Their financial grace was worth $65 billion with sins of liability of only $23 billion." The Papa was dramatic about these three stooges. "Gentlemen -behold! This is THE MONUMENT to creative accounting......"

Another respectful pause. "Requiescat in pace."

The boys picked up the pace "Amen!"

Papa Speculatus was already at the next shrine, pointing.

"Have pity on him Oh Lord. This is Chief Executive Officer Bernie Embers of Wordcom, the former communications giant. He has the benign looks of a Kernel Sandstorm except he fried his investors for billions. The Emperor in Washington crucified him for 25 years in a penitentiary. In 2002 before their Fall of Grace, Wordcom assets were worth $103 billion."

A moment of silence. "Requiescat in pace!"

"Amen!" they chorused dutifully.

They were now feeling they were entering martyrdom themselves. How much longer was this going to go on? -There were some fifty shrines left, all dedicated to the financial Pol Pots of Wall Street who crushed the hopes of millions of decent Americans.

Their agony was suddenly terminated when the Papa's iphone demanded attention. The Papa listened quietly for a few minutes and announced, "I have to get back to the office. Something even more serious than the fate of the Gnomes has arisen and I'm afraid I have to immediately order my Church on red alert."

As they walked back to the lift, Noodles saw his chance. "Would this serious matter have something to do with the theft of the anti-clutter reactor?" he asked the Papa.

Papa Speculatus III stopped in his tracks, almost losing his mitre, and turned around, looking at Noodles. "How the hell did you know?"

Noodles knew he was back in the game. "I invented the reactor when I was working at JPL. We knew it had been stolen and we were about to go looking for it. Then you rang with an offer we couldn't refuse, about the four missing Gnomes. We took your job instead, but unfortunately, we started a little late."

The Papa was still amazed but tried not to show it, so as not to weaken his hand in case there were to be fresh negotiations between them. After a moment he looked Noodles straight in the eye. "Let's talk." he said.

They returned to his office and Noodles told the whole story, whilst the Papa sat down and listened, guarded by good spirits with which he blessed himself with four fingers from time to time.

__________________________________

Nineteen (19 **)**

**__________________________________**

**The outcome was this.** The Papa learnt that the murder of the four Gnomes was just the start. It was an entree of revenge for worse things to come. The CIA also informed him that the New Leaning Tower of New York was not a Halloween hoax, nor a replacement for the World Trade Centre Towers, but actually a lucky escape from a terrible accident. It was the real Parisian Eiffel Tower and it had been hi-jacked and converted into a missile. That missile was accurately aimed at the Basilica of the Capitalist Church, except that two brave pilots (one parachuted, one AWOL* - *Away Without Leave) had managed to deflect the tower into vacant ground.

But as well as all this, Noodles filled in with a wealth of knowledge about the Calamari, the Papa's deadly adversaries. Papa Speculatus could handle the Emperor of Washington, after all, he owned half his senators, but it was the Calamari who killed without warning that really focussed his attention.

Noodles was on top of the game. The Papa forgave them the previous bungles, admitted they had little time to mobilise to save the Gnomes, so he cut a new deal. The ten million dollars was back on the table. The goal was now to retrieve the anti-clutter reactor and permanently lock it away from criminal use, as soon as absolutely possible, all expenses paid. There was no time to lose.

As they got up to leave, they watched the Papa fit a platinum brain scanning ring on his head and hammer a few keys on his wireless keyboard, while studying his large computer monitor. He was aware they were staring at him.

"The latest," he said smugly, "rapid-fire trading... -we buy and sell millions of shares in micro seconds before floor traders can blink- we already set up the sacrificial cow and carved the meat, now we suck the marrow from the bone as well, heh, heh. -Explain _that_ to the mums and dads! -Har! Har!" His laugh was almost satanic.

The bots were amazed -was he a Papa? He rattled the keyboard like a Demon. Suddenly the Papa was locked in a powerful incoming surge of information.

"HOLY FUNDING HEDGE-HOGS!" the Papa screamed. His lips quivered, "Buy! Sell! Buy! Sell! Buy! Sell! S-Sell! S-Sell! B-Buy! B-Buy! Sell! S-Sell! Buy! Sell! B-Buy! Sell! Buy!..... Bbbuy!... sssell!.. Bbessll!... Bbbbb!..... Ssssss!.... Bbbbb!....Sssss!..." In a trembling mass of tangled nerves the words could no longer form. "A-aa-a-a-a-gg-gg-gg-g-a-aaa-g-g-gg....!"

"Let's go!" Noodles shrugged to Botzi.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Botzi and Noodles stood on the footpath, in New York, just outside the Basilica of the Capitalist Church. "Now what do we do?" asked Botzi.

"Now we wait for new leads," replied Noodles. "I'm monitoring every news item around the world and analysing them for key indicators pointing to a possible location of the reactor. Let's take a walk to Central Park." They shuffled off to the gardens.

What Noodles meant was that his built-in processors had linked up with news dispatches from satellites around the world and part of his brain was set up as a database entering hundreds of broadcasts, and analysing them for a common pattern -anything about reactors.

Central Park was an amazing gift of great foresight from the city fathers of long ago. Its' estimated real estate price tag today of some $600 billion would only equal just one of the many conglomerates ruled by Papa Speculatus III, giving some idea of the huge power of the Capitalist Church. This power is beyond the comprehension of the ordinary man in the street, hence the reason for a blind faith by the multitude in the financial spirituality of The Capitalist Church. They think, "It's BIG, therefore it can do no wrong!"

They reached a park bench and sat down, Botzi idly watching ducks on a lake and Noodles staring into space, processing millions of instructions per second. There was no conversation necessary.

After some time, Noodles detected a build-up of news flashes about an impending garbage strike in New York. Damn nuisance he thought, this would hamper traffic which is no help to anybody. There was nothing new about reactors so he monitored the strike for a while. Apparently an accidental dump of garbage on a worker triggered a safety issue and an instant demand on the Sanitation Department to double the workers' wages or else -strike! The City of New York, not having the funds to meet this demand even if it wanted to, was resigned to tough it out.

"Serious garbage strike, Botzi," informed Noodles.

"Oh, just what we need," replied Botzi.

"Started already, apparently."

"What streets do we need to avoid?"

"It's building up around Fifth Avenue and in 33rd, and 34th Streets in Manhattan."

"Anything on the reactor?"

"Some stuff on ordinary nuclear reactors but not much else."

The sun set. The Bots, not needing shelter stayed on the bench for the night, waiting for news. About one o'clock in the morning a gang of tough-looking gangster-types approached them from the darkness.

"Ay, man," said one, "some dude's left his toys behind." (Not the whole world had heard of the existence of these sophisticated Bio-Teks, especially the criminal set and the uneducated.)

"They're ugly man, I ain't taking them to bed," sneered the other.

Botzi turned to look at Noodles. They were communicating a plan and Noodles nodded.

The gangsters approached. "Ya see that? They moved -must be on batteries."

"Ya think they have any value?" asked one.

"Not without a remote control -you can't do anything with 'em."

"Let's use 'em for target practice, an' see what happens."

The others laughed as they pulled out their guns to follow the game.

By now Noodles was on high alert and humming strongly, generating powerful magnetism.

A huge magnetic pull on the gangsters took their guns out of their hands into Noodle's waiting mitts. Metal belt buckles, buttons, zips all ripped off and headed toward Noodles. Next Noodles energised the molecules in their jeans and hoodies to a level high enough to generate heat and spontaneously combust.

"Hey I'm smokin' man!" yelled one as he felt the heat.

"Hell! I'm on fire -what's goin' on?" exclaimed the other, but he didn't wait for an answer. He made a beeline for the duck pond and dived in, a stupid mistake. The duck pond was shallow, and he ended up shovelling a bucket of mud and duck dung down his throat. He was trying to get up, coughing his lungs out, when the others jumped in, but wisely, feet first. They were on fire too, and needed to rip off their clothes and extinguish the flames. The tatters that remained fell off them, rendering them quite naked.

Nothing demoralises an enemy so much as being stripped naked in the face of battle. Not only does he feel more exposed and therefore more vulnerable, but as nakedness is suited to making love, not war, the ridiculousness of the situation destroys his anger and the will to fight. As if that wasn't enough, two policemen on horseback came into view.

"Split! The pigs are here!" One thing gangsters do well is the sport of running. Four almost-naked youths sprinted down a garden path, like they saw the devil, and vanished in less than five seconds. All was quiet again except for the clip-clop of approaching horses.

The police stopped to look at the bots. They had been advised at the station that if they came across independently motivated robotic hybrids, they could ask for personal identification and certificate-of-roaming-at-large. This was a bit like a driver's license for a robot. It was permission to be as free as a human in keeping with the same laws applicable to humans.

The police were very interested, examined Noodles' and Botzi's paperwork and chatted with them for over half an hour As the youths had not yet done any harm, it was decided not to go after them although Noodles handed the police a haul of guns and knives.

"We could do with a few like you, in the force," remarked one policeman. They mounted their horses and moved on, into the faint light of a dawning day.

The bots were mostly silent for the next two hours, Noodles occasionally feeding Botzi any news developing from his constant monitoring.

The morning was now about 10 o'clock when Noodles blurted out with astonishment. "Listen to this news. -really weird! The garbage pile in the city is starting to melt away and nobody can explain why."

"What streets did you say was the big pile up?" asked Botzi.

"Corner 5th Avenue and West 34th Street."

"Isn't that the location of the Empire State Building?"

"Yeah." Noodles was computing connections and possibilities that might be causing this phenomenon of garbage melting away into thin air.

Suddenly, he sprung off his bench, nearly taking his feet off the ground. "It all computes! The garbage strike built up garbage mainly around the Empire State Building. The garbage is now disappearing because somebody has set up the ant-clutter reactor on top of the building and is refuelling it from the garbage below. That somebody is planning for a big energy boost into the reactor which will have devastating consequences when fired at his intended target."

"And your conclusion is that the Calamari may have something to do with this?" pre-empted Botzi.

"Almost certain. And what's more, -the target? Bound to be the Basilica of the Capitalist Church, the Golden Sucks office tower. We gotta get there fast and stop that maniac."

"And the fastest way? - Heck, from here we can outrun any bike or taxi combination to get there - let's go!"

New York is no stranger to weird sights. But not often is a man-sized robot looking like it's made of red and yellow jelly beans and his partner, a series of golden rings making a human-shaped slinky spring, are transformed almost into a blur of action, performing a running dash beyond Olympic records.

__________________________________

Twenty (20 **)**

**__________________________________**

**There it was,** the icon of Manhattan, all 102 storeys of it, the Empire State Building. It withstood a plane crash in WWII plus numerous assaults by oversized monkeys whenever a Hollywood producer ran out of ideas for a new movie.

Bozzi and Noodles dashed into an express lift and zoomed to the highest available floor. Botzi had no credit card to pay the tourist sightseeing fee but chatted the attendant into cheerfully letting them out on the observation deck for free, using a little hypnosis.

They bounded out to the roof-top of the Empire State Building colliding into Rodney Dangerfeld, who, so surprised, took a fair suck of his hip-flask.

He stared at them, thinking they were some sort of hi-tech apes. He pointed overhead to the radio mast. There was Alby, the all-black Bio-Tek hugging the radio tower. "Oi!! What da hell goes with dis joint? Every monkey wants ta hump it since 1933!"

Botzi noticed Rodney's golf bag holding a full set of golf clubs. "What're you doing up here?"

Rodney's stress meter was rising. "I'm belting golf balls at the Statue of Liberty! Dat's wot!"

"Why?"

"I'm gettin' revenge on the I.R.S.! Now piss off!! I get no respect I tell ya!" (* I.R.S=Internal Revenue Service-United States Taxation Department.)

Their attention diverted upwards. Their perennial enemy, Alby Monk, the next-door neighbour at Poppycock Place stood above them harnessed to the big steel tower. He had the anti-clutter reactor firmly in his arms, pointing it down into the streets, vacuuming every last bit of garbage. They could see its' sophisticated series of LED indicators mounted on the sides, winking and glowing indicating a full powerful charge.

"Wow," exclaimed Noodles, "he's managed to charge the reactor to the max. He could melt a whole skyscraper with that!"

"How do we tackle him? He could disintegrate us if we got close," asked Botzi.

"No, he won't fire it at close range - the power feed-back would destroy him too. I just hope he knows the dangers in using it."

"Well, shall we take a chance and tackle him?" asked Botzi.

"Looks like we have to. Come on let's climb up."

But Alby was prepared for this situation. He took out a large can of WD 40 all-purpose lubricant and sprayed all the foot-holds around him, then undid the harness and with the reactor attached to his back, he proceeded to mountain-climb further up the tower.

When Botzi and Alby reached his former position, they were severely handicapped as the slippery structure afforded little grip and it was a long way down to the streets.

"What's the use of him trapping himself at the top of the tower? He has to come down sooner or later!" yelled Botzi.

"Don't bet on it, he's probably got a helicopter organised to pick him up!" replied Noodles. "In fact, hear that? - the sound of a throbbing engine."

Now the Bots were on one side of the huge radio tower and their view was obscured from seeing what was approaching from the other side. It was not long coming however, when a huge shadow drifted over them and the air throbbed with not one, but many motors.

"Wow! Look at that!" exclaimed Noodles. He was looking at a giant airship that was now manoeuvring to attach an anchor to the side of the tower where Alby was waiting. Botzi watched as motors chattered away, spinning propellers glistened in the sun, and a large accommodation cabin slung underneath the belly of the ship came nearer and nearer. He could see the pilot.

"Hey! It's Fungus! He's piloting the Zeppelin." Fungus Lockjaw was Alby's assistant in all shady schemes that Alby pursued from time to time. (For more details on the Bio-Teks please read "Poppycock Place Series -Sky Sailing Heroes" -a free Ebook at smashwords.com).

It was now apparent that this was Alby's escape. A steel cable from the ship swung underneath attached to some sort of anchor. With a sharp clang the anchor clasped the structure of the tower. Sure enough, a rope ladder was thrown over the side from an open door in the airship's cabin and it flexed its way towards Alby. Botzi was taken by another surprise when he saw the name of the airship - the "Hindenburg II". Of course the first Hindenburg burned to ashes on approaching a landing in Lakehurst, New Jersey back in 1937 so this must be an exact replica he thought. He snapped out of his surprised state and took stock of the situation.

"Noodles, Turn on your magnetic field and cling up the tower as close as possible to that ladder and carry me on your back."

"You got it!" assured Noodles.

Alby by now was ready to grab the ladder, but a nuisance breeze was giving him difficulties. This was sufficient delay for the two heroes to almost get close enough to grab his legs, but he finally jumped onto the free-swinging ladder. Almost like a gorilla, he quickly scampered up to the airship. As soon as he was inside, Alby hurriedly rolled up the rope ladder, leaving the bots behind, still clinging to the tower. The anchor rope held however. It was tough steel cable and it wasn't so easy to reach or to cut, and the hoisting mechanism had jammed again.

Alby stormed towards the cockpit looking for a tool to cut the cable and found Fungus working hard, keeping the airship stable and away from colliding with the big radio mast.

"You stupid, insufferable, bonehead Fungus!! What the hell are you doing with this giant air-ship!? I told you to meet 'The Man' at the helidrome and guide his helicopter over here!" Alby was fuming, resisting the urge to throttle Fungus.

"B-But b-boss -'The Man' told us over the phone he will pick you up in his air-craft. He never mentioned a helicopter -this is it!"

"Well -what happened? How the hell did a dimwit like you end up in this cockpit?"

"I was walking around the helidrome looking for a businessman in a grey suit like you told me, when I noticed these friendly German guys trying hard to unhook their air-ship from its moorings but they kept falling over each other. I went over to help and managed to free their machine."

"I asked them if they knew 'The Man' and showed them your letter of introduction and to my surprise they said their boss was waiting for me inside the airship. So after they struggled aboard I followed them inside and entered the air-ship lounge. The fat guy, Herman then took me to the cockpit and showed me how to fly the machine. It was easy, I learnt fast, and he left me to join his mates in the lounge for another round of drinks."

"Pity he didn't throw you overboard head-first - it might have re-organised your brain! And what about 'The Man' -where is he?"

Fungus ignored the insult. "They said we need to wait a while as he was having a siesta and must not be disturbed. They said he will talk to us in due course."

"A siesta? -A siesta? Gimme a break!! Half the US Air force will be here in 5 minutes and the guy wants to take a nap!!?"

Alby looked down a corridor and saw nobody. "And where are these buffoon friends of yours?"

"In the lounge -listen they're starting to sing."

All this time Alby was totally distracted from what Botzi and Noodles were doing. During Alby's conversation with Fungus, Noodles managed to magnetically hoist himself up the steel cable with Botzi on his back, and clamber on board. They quickly found a small bath-room and hid out of sight.

Alby had no time to introduce himself to the singing clowns -he searched for something more important. He found it - a small tool store. Slamming several cupboard doors containing various tools he came upon what he was looking for - a heavy-duty steel grinder. He ran over to the attachment point of the cable and looking down, saw no-one.

"Aha - they've gone away to get help. Fat lot of good that will do them! They're too late -Har! -Har!"

In his haste, Alby had forgotten about Noodles' magnetic abilities and thought himself safe.

Plugging the lead into a ship's power-point, Alby pressed the screaming grinder against the cable throwing a shower of sparks as it bit into tough steel. After a few minutes, a twang announced the cable had parted and the air-ship drifted free. Alby went back to the cockpit.

"Head for the Golden Sucks Basilica, at once, while I go and see what those Germans are up to."

"Aye, aye, captain," answered Fungus, quite pleased with himself. Alby had carefully put the ant-clutter reactor on the floor of the corridor and had roped it securely. He had no reason to suspect anyone would interfere with it. He made his way to the lounge room and was met by an extraordinary sight. There, lounging around a grand piano, sloshing big tankards of beer and glasses of schnapps, chorusing at full volume, were four men in high-ranking German officer uniforms of World War II vintage.

__________________________________

Twenty-One (21 **)**

**__________________________________**

**Alby entered the** room and stared at them with an imperious look. The drunks, on the other hand, were startled to a complete halt as to their patriotic vocals. The fat man sitting at the piano, the one in a sky-blue overcoat, was first to speak.

"Sprechen Sie Deutsch?" After a moment of silent stares, he tried English. "Do you spik German?"

Alby was running his central processing unit at top speed searching his in-built history database to get a profile on what he was looking at.

The fat piano man was Herman Goering, the guy with John Lennon spectacles was Himmler, the pretentious little upstart was Josef Goebbels and the tall pleasant chap was Albert Speer. Four top Nazis from World War II whom the database also said were all dead.

Alby was not sure how to play this but as he needed to conclude his business deal, he decided to act friendly until the mission was accomplished. He turned on his multi-lingual module and set it to German.

"Ja, ich spreche Deutsch, aber ich bin ein Amerikaner. Ich bin ein Freund von Fungus."

Alby's German and their intake of alcohol disarmed their supicions. The thought as to how a friend of Fungus could possibly join them in mid-flight did not enter their reckoning.

"Ho, ho!" said jolly fat Goering. "Den ve vill spik Amerikan, mein Fruend!"

Speer was in an ebullient mood. "Kommen, join us in a song. Do you know Lili Marleen?"

Alby searched his database again. "It was a World War II song popular with soldiers on both sides of the conflict."

"Ah, you know about it?" queried Goebbels. Himmler said nothing, balefully staring at Alby, full of distrust, and half-full of schnapps. Alby was aware the four of them packed revolvers and if he took them on together he was bound to suffer damage which might stop his mission.

"OK." He imitated a weak smile. "Fruende, you sing it in German, I'll sing it in American." Alby turned on his singing voice processor and coloured it with a German accent, as if he was a German trying to sing English. He still couldn't work out where these seemingly flesh and blood characters had come from. And moreover, they looked to be in their late forties, whereas the original vagabonds would be over a hundred years old by now. They looked like a clone of the originals.

Ding! Alby zeroed in on a possible explanation -they might be clones!

Speer tapped his glass with a knife, to signal the start. " Ok! Auf der Graf von drei. Eins, zwei, drei! - Vun, two, tree!"

Alby was away into the song, on cue. His mind however was estimating what Fungus was doing and how close they might be to the Golden Sucks Basilica.

...."Our shadows vunce stood facink

....ein tall vun und ein small

....They mingled in embracink

....upon der lighted vall

....Und passers by could siehe und tell

....who kist meine shadow es so vell

....Meine girl, Lili Marleen

....Meine girl, Lili Marleen"

"Wunderbar!" shouted Speer with glee, after 5 choruses. "Und you know 'Deutschland über alles'?"

"Singen! Singen!" encouraged Alby. "Just gotta check my friend, see if he needs any help." Alby sneaked out.

The German Nazis belted into it, unfazed that Alby had disappeared.

" _...Deutschland, Deutschland über alles,_

...Über alles in der Welt,

...Wenn es stets zu Schutz und Trutze

...Brüderlich zusammenhält........"

Fungus wasn't really finding it easy to steer the craft. After the anchor cable snapped, a wind breeze started slowly pushing them out to sea and he had the devil of a job in making headway back to Manhattan Island.

Alby marched back to the cockpit, checking their location through the windows and was boiling once again.

"We're nowhere near the Golden Sucks Basilica! What the hell are you doing!?"

"It's all right -I'm just getting a feel on how to handle it -that's all. We'll soon be back on our way to Wall Street."

"You'd better be right, or I'll lower you down on a rope and you can pull it to Wall Street."

Fungus was glum but said nothing. Alby could be such a pain.

Alby sat beside Fungus and stared out through the front windshield. His mind was going over the deal he had made with 'The Man'. A package had arrived at his loan shop business premises in Poppycock Place, two weeks ago. In it were detail plans of the Jet Propulsion Laboratories in California. Secret codes, personnel names, profiles and operation schedules were all included.

The deal was to steal the portable anti-clutter reactor and four X-17 rocket motors, the most powerful ever made. A bag of "good-luck" peanuts was included in the package to negate JPL's security karma and ensure they were caught napping, whilst the heist was in progress.

The peanuts worked, the burglary was a success. Alby delivered four rocket motors to an agent in Paris then flew the anti-clutter reactor to New York. It was also part of the deal to re-fuel the reactor with clutter before delivery, ready to operate. How do you collect truckloads of garbage in New York and operate a reactor without drawing the attention of an army of Police?

So for this exercise, Alby paid some understanding union officials to cause a garbage strike around the Empire State Building while he was on the roof-top sucking the clutter and re-fuelling the reactor. He had sent Fungus to meet 'The Man' and guide his aircraft back to pick up Alby and the now potent reactor. There was a matter of a fee of $20 million dollars to be handed over for this deal, no questions asked.

Fungus at last brought the air-ship under control and began to make some distance towards Wall Street. Alby crossed his arms and grimaced, as he waited for 'The Man' to wake from his 'stupid siesta' and come over to inspect the goods, and hand over the money.

__________________________________

Twenty-Two (22 **)**

**__________________________________**

**While all this** was going on, Botzi and Noodles had the luck to find a side door in the bathroom that led to a sort of map-room and library. In there they found complete details of the air-ship's structure, rooms and their purpose, and air-ship performance. They wasted no time in memorising all the details including the location of a curious refrigerated master bedroom. Also the plans showed there was a security control room with videos of all important rooms as well as the engineering areas of the air-ship.

Using their best stealth mode, they ascertained that on board, besides themselves, they knew of at least seven other characters. -Alby, Fungus, 'The Man' and the four 'drunken musketeers'. And possibly there might be several mechanics inside the huge air-frame.

They estimated Wall Street was at least an hour away given that the opposing head-wind was increasing and this would give them a chance to adopt the best plan. So for now, they would remain undiscovered but watch and listen to developments. For this, they decided to hi-jack the TV monitoring room.

Noodles forced the door open and Botzi hurtled inside ready to hypnotise into submission whoever happened to be working there but there was no-one in the room. About fifteen video monitors surrounded the walls just above a desktop height. They viewed into various corners of the airship and picked up the sound as well.

"Maybe one of the drunks was supposed to be on security duty, but he isn't here. That explains why we haven't been detected by these monitors, because no-one was watching them," whispered Botzi.

"Yeah, piece of luck," added Noodles, pointing to a monitor. "Look there's Alby sitting next to Fungus in the cockpit and they're not talking."

"And check out those four drunks in the lounge. Two are trying to waltz with each other but their rubbery legs are doing the cha-cha. No DJ can mix 'Tea for Two' with 'The Blue Danube' -Look! They're sagging to the floor, -heh, heh."

Something caught their eye on monitor 7, the one watching the refrigerated bedroom. In the middle of the room was not a bed but a large sarcophagus, ringed with lights and digital panels. The lid was slowly swinging open to reveal a man with long silver hair wearing a black, body-hugging robe, edged with silver lining.

His face was ashen-grey with thin pale lips over which hung a pencil moustache . His eyes however, were jet-black and glossy, and showing a determination that would penetrate anyone standing before him. A cold fog rose from inside the coffin and poured out over the sides to the floor.

The Bio-Teks watched 'The Man' gently arise out of his misty casket and do some physical stretches. It looked like he was packed in dry ice and was trying to kick-start his system. After a few moments, he checked himself in the full-length mirror and made his way to the door.

They followed him on the monitor walking the length of the ship. He paused at the Lounge entrance and gave a terrible scowl at the proceedings within. He was in a very bad mood. He moved on down the corridor and stopped at the reactor lashed to the wall for safekeeping. He spent a good deal of time studying every feature of the machine. He must have decided it was the real thing as his face lit up with a demonic brightness. Then on he went, all the way to the cockpit to find Alby.

'The Man' entered the cockpit just as Alby was turning around at the sound of his footsteps.

"I have inspected the reactor," The Man said, in a commanding mono-tone voice. "And it fits the design plans in my possession. The power indicator has primed itself to 'Full'. So far so good -but how do I know it's the working original, not a hollow copy?"

Alby spoke sombrely, "You've been monitoring the news, no doubt? Seven hundred tons of garbage around the Empire State Building disappeared into thin air this morning. You expect a vacuum cleaner to do that? How else could I do it? The power from that de-synthesised clutter is now locked in that machine in the corridor, ready to use."

The Man observed Alby for a moment. He knew only one machine was ever built so he was just testing Alby. "True, but there is the matter of the ignition key, before it can be used."

"True," Alby batted the ball back. "But there is the matter of the $20 million delivery fee before I can give it to you." Alby took out his Ipad and set up his bank account in one of the windows. He then extracted the ignition key from his pocket and placed it on a small desk shelf.

The Man appeared satisfied and took up Alby's Ipad. He punched a series of codes and strings of numbers and transferred a huge lump of money across to Alby's account.

"There! -It's done."

Alby checked his account, verified his money was there, then transferred to another account and destroyed any links The Man might have set up in his computer. Alby handed the ignition key to The Man. "And now, whilst we are over land again, I must bid you good-bye sir, as my assistant Fungus and I are about to disembark."

"Yes, your service is ended and you may go."

Back in the security room, Botzi and Noodles looked at each other. What was Alby up to know? They soon found out. Quickly slipping on a parachute each, which they took from a cupboard store in the cockpit, Alby and Fungus hurried to an exit door in the corridor and jumped out into the big sky. There was a camera under the air-ship, looking down, and it enabled the Bio-Teks to follow the spiralling path of their parachuting colleagues. It appeared the escaping crime duo were heading for a large abandoned industrial area from where they would subsequently disappear.

But Botzi and Noodles soon switched to red alert. Forget Alby and Fungus for now. The Man, of whom they knew little about, was now in possession of the loaded anti-clutter reactor and the Golden Sucks Basilica was now not that far away.

The video monitors had disclosed there were two engineer mechanics, stationed at either end of the spaceship. The Man bent over the cockpit controls, flicked a switch and snapped his orders.

" _Giuseppe! Scendere alla cabina di guida subito_!!"

"Sì, signore, io vengo!" came the reply.

The monitors showed the front-end mechanic hurrying from his room along the steel gangways inside the steel ribs of the air-ship and finally making his way to the cockpit. The mechanic was an older man, and without a word, The Man indicated to him to take control of the airship. The Bots had already worked out they were dealing with an Italian ship commander and switched on their language interpreters to Italian. They watched and listened to some amazing revelations.

__________________________________

Twenty-Three (23 **)**

**__________________________________**

**The Man stood** tall in the spacious cockpit, his hands behind his back. He stared out the windscreen at the slowly approaching Golden Sucks Tower. He laid out his plans to his trusted mechanic.

"It is now time Giuseppe. For hundreds of years I have tried to get the Capitalist Church off the back of my scientific flock, but no! They -the Capitalist congregation, insist, century after century, to hunt, torture and murder my people. This day is their day of reckoning. Never before have I had the power to surgically annihilate the Golden Tower from the many. Today I will cut the head of the snake! -Destroy the Golden Sucks Basilica, Papa Speculatus III, his clergy and all his followers!!"

This tense atmosphere generated by the holocaust about to happen, contrasted strangely against the background piano and dis-jointed chorus. The four totally blind-drunk Nazis were playing leap-frog and occasionally collided head first into the pointy ends of various furniture, thus expressing the choicest expletives.

The Man continued.

"I am aware, however, that destroying the headquarters of the Capitalist Church will not totally eradicate the sect as it has spread all over the world. No! A ruthless army is needed for that ! And so it was, that fate led me to the man in South America who had stored blood from dozens of Nazi leaders but knew not what to do with it, because DNA theory and cloning had not yet been discovered. In frustration he dived headlong into the jaws of an obliging crocodile, leaving the bottles behind, for me to discover."

"My greatest triumph, Giuseppe, over my fatuous cousin Leonardo da Vinci is that I kept myself alive over the centuries -but where is he now? Dead! Dead as dead can be! Even his dust is now scattered and lost, probably mixed with mortar that built some brick shit-house."

The Man beat his chest, mocking his cousin. "Hah! da Vinci! Where are YOU to-day? THIS...IS...DA LADRO!"

Meanwhile, violent crashes mixed with musical notes denoted a Steinway grand piano in agony as it was being dismembered by an axe. The German officers were in a jovial creative mood. They were re-arranging a Wagnerian opera to the key of Hitler.

Giuseppi concentrated on lining up with the target, about 3 blocks away . The Man continued, unswayed from his mission.

"My first attempt to begin the ruthless army has not been entirely successful. I have created four expendable buffoons. But having said that, I have more blood stored for new attempts and I only need one drop to create a clone. There will be others, more intelligent and more ruthless!"

The Man took command. "Hold the air ship right here, Giuseppe! We are on target. I am going to power up the reactor for battle."

On those words The Man turned to enter the corridor and walked towards the reactor.

Botzi and Noodles already on red alert, just about switched to red alert with full blasting foghorns.

"Come on Noodles!" exclaimed Botzi hurriedly, "I didn't see any small arms on him, but we have to take a chance -we must tackle him NOW!"

Noodles needed no deliberation. Both Bots rushed into the corridor and ran towards Leonardo da Ladro. Just as he completed unravelling the ropes securing the reactor, he looked up, surprised.

Before he could say "Banane Santo!" the boys leaped on top of him, knocking him away from the reactor and together, in a tangled heap, they slid across the floor in the corridor.

But The Man was not so easy to pin down. Like an eel, he wriggled from their grasp to leap at the reactor in two bounds. He flicked a switch and fingered a series of buttons along its side.

"Hah! Hah! Haaa....The reactor is locked in self-destruct mode. She can not be defused! In five minutes Giuseppe will have it against the Golden Sucks Basilica. Bail out gentlemen or blow up with the whole lot."

He ran down the corridor and disappeared into the frame-work of the air-ship.

"Let him go, Botzi, we have more urgent things to do." Noodles picked up the reactor and got Botzi's help. "Hold down those two green buttons. He's right -we can't stop it, but I can retard the clock by forty-five minutes, to give us time to maybe clear the danger."

Noodles punched in sets of codes and to Botzi's relief he saw the reactor timer go from two minutes to forty-five minutes. Next the Bots rushed over to the cockpit, to see Giuseppi, "the pilot".

"Giuseppe, Leonardo has escaped and set the reactor to blow up the air-ship. Don't ask questions - run to your _compagno_ at the other end with an extra parachute and get out - _Subito!_ "

Giuseppe was not an airline pilot. He got second prize in a competition for model aircraft. A keen enthusiast for all things flying, he had borrowed the book 'Dirigible Aeronautics for Dummies' and was making progress.

Still, it wasn't a job to die for, as evidenced by the surprising speed of his surrender and retreat.

Botzi took over the controls and pointed the ship towards the distant sea. "We're in luck, we have a strong tail wind pushing us out, in addition to our motor speed."

Noodles went and retrieved two extra parachutes which they harnessed to themselves and together they watched both the time and their flight progress. As they passed over the coastline, they noticed two parachutes floating to the sea below. Botzi called the Coast Guard to pick up the misfits as well as to stand by for a call on co-ordinates when the moment came for them to abandon ship.

__________________________________

Twenty-Four (24 **)**

__________________________________

**After thirty-five** minutes, they were sufficiently far out to sea to prepare to jump.

"We don't know what Leo is up to, Noodles. The wind will keep pushing this air-ship further out over the ocean, but we must make sure Leo won't bring it back, in case he knows how to reset the reactor timing clock."

"Ok, we'll cut the fuel lines on the four motors. You do the port side, I'll do the starboard side. Let's go!"

And so they did, cutting the fuel lines into four or five pieces, making it impossible to join them. The smell of splashed fuel highlighted the extreme danger of an explosion, but their luck held. They rejoined each other at the jumping-off bay and hesitated for a moment.

"What about the choir boys?" asked Noodles.

"Two are drunk beyond resuscitation. Didn't you hear them snoring as we passed the lounge?"

"That was snoring? -Thought they were sawing through what was left of the piano? Oh well, and the other two?"

"Blind as bats, but still singing."

They could hear the strains of " _Auf Wiederseh'n... Auf Wiederseh'n._.." wafting through the corridor.

" _Auf Wiedersh'n....._

Auf Wiederseh'n...

Vee'll meet again, sweethort

Dis lovely day hast flown avay

Das time has kommen to part

Vee'll keese again, like dis again

Don't let das teardrops start

Mit love dat's true, I'll vait fur you

Auf Wiederseh'n, sweethort ...."

"How cute." chuckled Noodles. "They're singing in Germglish."

"They're clones, Noodles, and evil ones at that. The world is better off without them."

The bots shrugged to each other and tumbled into the stiff breeze. They watched the airship drift away and pulled the ripcords. Below, the wake of a boat was faithfully shadowing their descent.

In a short while both Bio-Teks were aboard the Coast Guard cutter which then turned to get away from the Hindenburg II. About five minutes later, the air-ship now some kilometres away, blew up into an orange fireball spraying the sky with blackened pieces of shattered material. In seconds, what was left of the framework crashed into the sea and sank immediately.

Back at the wharf in New York, reporters, police and army were waiting for the heroic duo to ask questions and get news of what happened.

And there was panic in the streets of Manhattan. Millions had seen the huge fireball. Was this a precursor to another terrorist attack?

New York Mayor Salvatore Scassinatore, recently migrated from Sicily and narrowly elected on the Mafia ticket, took action to calm down the citizens. He ordered a parade of a couple of gay floats to coast the streets.

Each truck had a swimming pool complete with desert island and liberally sprinkled with bikini babes around the perimeter. Salvatore stood on the lead truck with a loud hailer.

"Folks! Everybuddy! It's only a balloon! Its a-gone! Whatsa matter you!? Go back to your swimming pools! Have fun! Go back to your swimming pools!"

An aide nudged him and whispered this was New York not Miami. Pools were difficult to install in one bedroom apartments thirty or fifty floors in the sky.

"Well, so what!?" replied the Mayor, "I mean them to have fun. Ok I'll change it."

He turned up the loud hailer. "Oi! New Yorkers - Go fly a kite! Everybuddy -Go fly a kite!"

His aide didn't mention this translated to an insult as in "Get lost!" or "Go jump on your bum!" Salvatore found that out when they passed the fruit and vegetable market and both trucks and swimming pools rapidly filled with rotten tomatoes. Some bikini babes were bowled like ten pins with hefty cabbages, making a hilarious belly flop into the pools and stirring the lot into tomato soup.

Salvatore, proud of his charisma in turning potential bloody riots to a festival of fun, retired to Alfredo's Cafe for lunch. He sat at his favourite little square table and tucked the red and white chequered table-cloth into his collar, under his chin.

"Ciao Alfredo! Oggi spaghetti alla bolognese!" he ordered from the proprietor. Alfredo greeted him with a big smile showing his gold teeth collection. He snapped his fingers at his kitchen hand to prepare the favourite lunch.

For you lady readers and metrosexuals dying to find out Alfredo's spaghetti recipe, here it is:

1-2 tbsp olive oil preferred nutty flavour from North Italy.

1 large  onion diced not too fine, just right.

1 Beretta 9mm hidden in the gents behind the cistern tank.

1/2 clove garlic minced, or 2 cloves if not visiting Molly's Girls.

1 28 oz can diced tomatoes, ensure it says 'fresh' on the can.

1 14 oz can stewed tomatoes, slurp occasionally out of sight of patrons.

1 lb Italian sausage sliced into 3/4"-1" pieces. Use real meat if serving the Don.

1 Irish Police Captain sat down as decoy.

1 tsp salt , some pepper.

1 tsp sugar, don't overdo it.

A handful of dried basil.

3 cups dry red wine, drink 2 use 1.

" _Ah, la dolce vita!"_ Salvatore smacked his lips in anticipation, tossed back a glass of red and rattled the wine glasses in the bar with a guttural burp. He smiled at two clandestine lovers in a corner, who grimaced disgust at this ethnic exhibition of table manners. He raised his glass to them. "Bon appetit! And afterwards a little hoochie koochie -eh? " He laughed as he pointed a clenched fist at them, bent his right arm and slapped his fat bicep.

__________________________________

Twenty-Five (25 **)**

__________________________________

**And so it** came to pass.....

Things settled down within the Capitalist Church, to a period of relative peace, with the many faithful grateful for the miraculous escape of the Papa and their house of worship, The Golden Sucks Basilica.

The events did increase the prestige of Papa Speculatus III. He declared himself infallible, and promptly preached the doctrine of share prices ascending all the way to heaven.

As a penance the Capitalist congregation was forbidden to eat spam on Fridays, a reasonable sacrifice, as Lobster Thermidor was the usual fare of the Monsignors and their underlings.

Indulgences granting immunity from damnation by the Securities Exchange Commission prosecutions were offered for a price, proceeds going towards gold plating the facade of the Golden Sucks Basilica.

The Papa took pity on the millions who never bought a company share in their life and sent out missionary brokers to bring them into the faith. But unfortunately, he pointed out that those who died without a share certificate lived in a Limbo of poverty where the sun never shone on their swimming pool, and the face that appeared to them out of the fog was not God but the bailiff.

Leonardo da Ladro was never heard of again. But although the explosive fireball definitely gave the Nazi chorus a Viking funeral, one could not be sure Leonardo would be so obliging. Besides, his five hundred year longevity record would class him as a precocious brat compared to Methuselah's 969 years.

Papa Speculatus III paid Noodles the $10 million fee for mission accomplished and for saving his life.

Noodles awarded his friend Botzi $4 million for his help and banked the rest to finance the development of his gravity-time machine.

Now that these two Bio-Teks had this much money, what adventures would they get up to next?.......

### The END

An action packed saga by **Tobias Dingbat**

Illustrated by **Tobias Dingbat**

"The IDIOTA CODE"

ISBN: 978-0-9870533-1-2

NOTE TO THE READER:

This is a free ebook adventure story involving the characters living in the community neighbourhood of Poppycock Place, whose life escapades will be available in future books on smashwords.com

A free download of this book is available at

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/39682

* * * * * * * *

Thank you for reading my book. If you enjoyed it, won't you please take a moment to leave me a review at your favourite retailer or email me at poppycockplace@gmail.com

See the characters live, spoofing, Singing and Dancing! Check out the Poppycock Place web site http://www.poppycockplace.com that will direct you to our You Tube productions.

Look out for other free POPPYCOCK PLACE books at smashwords.com (see details following)

All books are available Free in EBook, HTML, PDF, Kindle(.mobi) RTF, LRF(Sony), Plain Text etc

"SKY SAILING HEROES"

A free download of this book is available at

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/30769

Written by Tobias Dingbat

Illustrated by Tobias Dingbat

ISBN: 978-0-9870533-0-5

"SKY SAILING HEROES"

Botzi receives a treasure map from a mysterious uncle. Botzi has no money and is helped by his friends. So Noodles volunteers to take all five shopkeeper friends, Botzi, Noodles, Aurora, Banjo and Izaak up in his balloon to sail it on a trip to a South American lost city. The balloon often runs out of fuel placing our heroes in dangerous predicaments. Mexican bandits, dangerous car chases, powerful Elfin war lords, plagues of killer bees, and that's just the easy part. The "treasure" turns out to be a dangerous instrument of power left by the pharaohs, that can enslave the world. A problem arises when Alby and Fungus, the two Bio-teks who have over-ruled their ethics modules and are growing into very selfish monsters, learn details of this expedition. ....Who will control this instrument?....Is this the makings of another world dictatorship?.....

REVIEWS

What others are saying about "Sky Sailing Heroes"

Rating:___Star * Star * Star * Star * Star

World renowned novelist Charles Dickens liked the book. " _Sky Sailing Heroes is full of great expectations and widened my horizons. If only they had robots in my time -Scrooge would have made a great robot."_

Thomas Hardy was more practical: _"A wobbly see-saw of adventure to be grasped firmly or otherwise used to chock up a rickety table. Snuggle up with this book on a cold winter night and I promise it can light your fire."_

"As I suspected. if you hold this book up to a mirror and read it backwards you can imagine more steamy passion in it than my novel 'Lady Chatterbox' -Wish I thought of this technique first to get past those pesky censors." D.H.Lowrence

"How long can famous author Tobias Dingbat give away his books for free or so cheap? Please let us support him or have it on our conscience if he follows Van Gogh and cuts off an ear or two." The New Yolk Times.

" **BENJAMIN FROGLIN"**

A free download of this book is available at

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/45420

Written by Tobias Dingbat

Illustrated by Tobias Dingbat

ISBN: 978-0-9870533-2-9

"Benjamin Froglin"

A bright young frog from a poor family becomes a scientist and develops intelligent flowers that can spell words. He falls in love, goes into business and makes his family rich. His friends love him because he is kind and generous.

REVIEWS

What others are saying about "Benjamin Froglin"

Rating:___Star * Star * Star * Star * Star

" _A heart warming story of a courageous frog battling against the odds and bringing happiness to everyone. I will never serve frog-legs in my restaurant ever again!"_ Jacques Cordon Bleu - Paris

Abraham Lincoln accepted the status quo, _"First there were the Bioteks, now we have professor frogs. Oh well, it was inevitable, as the Senate has often been populated by bullfrogs since the Boston Tea Party."_

"After I finished 'The Origin of the Species' I retired but now I have to track down Benjamin Froglin for an interview. If this frog is as smart as Tobias Dingbat says then he must be from outer space as the frogs I met could hardly read or write." Charles Darwin.

* * * * * * * *

