Robert Rankin - The Brightonomicon

'Home again, home again, jiggedy jig,' the Count cackled. 'Bring that Chronovision, Mister Mate. And all the rest of you, me hearties – you've earned your rum tonight.'

I peeped down and beneath me saw the Count doing his foolish dance as he pranced along, followed by the pirates who had once sailed under Captain Moulsecoomb on The Saucy Spaniel. They presently vanished into one of the many tunnels of the great sewer system.*

'It would be nice if we could climb down now,' said Mr Rune.

And as if at a magic word, the nails came away and we all tumbled down from the rooftop.

'Ouch,' I said. And so did Mr Rune. Tobes did silent chucklings.

'And so what now?' I asked of Mr Rune when he and I were on our feet and rubbing at our bruised parts.

Mr Rune had a firm hold upon his stout stick. 'Follow the villains,' said he.

'Well, yes,' I said, in a hesitating fashion. 'But actually I do go to the cinema as often as I can. And I do notice all the plot holes in the movies. Now would be the time to disable Count Otto's ark, to be on the safe side.' 'Exemplary dunking,' said Mr Rune. 'Lead on.'

I led on and did so with caution, for there might still have been some pirates on board.

Now, you have to picture this really, or it makes little sense. Picture, if you will, Noah's Ark. Everyone knows what Noah's Ark looks like. It is a big ship with a house on the top. Myself, Mr Rune and Tobes had been snagged on the roof of this house, and when we dropped down, we did so on to the deck of the ark. From this deck ran a lowered gangplank, by which Count Otto and his pirate crew had most recently taken their leave.

The only truly noticeable differences between Noah's Ark and the Count's was that the actual ship parts of the Count's were constructed from riveted steel and there was a hefty great revolving blade arrangement on the front that enabled it to dig through the ground. And it was nuclear powered, of course. Though I do not actually know what powered Noah's. * Built in 1840 by the renowned engineer and mystic Isambard Kingdom-Come and still reckoned to be one of the finest in England. Another triumph for Brighton.

Oh, and there were these big caterpillar-tracks beneath Count Otto's. Oh, and some rather dangerous-looking guns mounted on the forward part of the deck. Oh, and 'Pacey-pacey, Rizla,' said Mr Rune, 'for surely as the quixotic seagull of haste besmirches the tart's handbag of time, so too does the spaniel of hesitance foul the footpath of destiny.'

Which I took in the way it was meant, I suppose, and pacey-paceyed along. With care.

We found ourselves first in the bar, of course, which brought great joy to Tobes. He took himself straight behind the counter and helped himself to a bottle of gin. We followed him and then I led the way below, although I do not really know why / was leading. I had no idea of where I was going. Although of course, it had been my idea, so I suppose that I should have done the leading.

Below was lit by bulkhead lights and looked like the inside of an ocean liner. Animal noises came to us and we soon found ourselves moving stealthily between countless cages.

'Damn me,' said Tobes, stopping at one. 'That's my cat, Coldean – I wondered where he'd gone.'

'The Coldean Cat!' I said. 'What a cop-out. That has to be the most tenuous link to the Brightonomicon ever. And half of the others have been pretty duff.'

'Which reminds me,' said Mr Rune, 'it seems like months since I've given you a badge.' 'It matters not,' I said. 'I have lost all the others.'

'Then you'd better have the full set.' And Mr Rune dug into his leather-coat pocket and brought out a handful of badges. He counted them into my hand. 'You didn't have these,' he said, counting in several, including one of a Morris Minor, the Saltdean Stallion. One of the Chronovision. Another with a gaudy representation of Jesus – 'For Lord Tobes here, the Wiseman of Withdean,' Mr Rune explained. And a final one with the portrait of Count Otto Black. 'Something for you to remember him by.' 'Well, thank you very much,' I said and I stuffed the badges into my pocket. 'But the point of these badges has always been lost upon me. And now is hardly the time for such trinkets, surely?'

'Their time will come,' said Mr Rune. 'Now let us proceed.' And so we proceeded, until…

'I think we are in the engine room,' I said. 'Does that, or does that not, look like a nuclear reactor to you?'

'It looks like three nuclear reactors to me,' said Tobes, and he giggled foolishly.

'You are drunk again,' I said in horror. 'You have drunk that whole bottle of gin.' 'Drunk, but happy,' said Tobes. 'If a mite sleepy.' 'Oh… my… God!' I said. 'What can I do for you?' asked Tobes.

'What do we do?' I asked of Mr Rune. And my hands were starting to flap.

'Keep him conscious,' said Mr Rune, 'while I position the bomb.' 'What bomb?'

Mr Rune unbuttoned his coat and drew it widely open. Within were many sticks of dynamite. 'Forward planning' said the Lad Himself. 'One must be prepared at all times.' 'Plah!' I said, for I had always wanted to say it.

'I shall set the timer for, what shall we say, fifteen minutes?'

'That will be cutting it somewhat fine,' I replied. And, ' Wake Up, Lord Tobes!' I continued.

'Fifteen minutes should be enough,' said Mr Rune, pulling sticks of dynamite from the lining of his coat and linking fuses together. 'Time enough to leave this vessel, confront Count Otto, destroy the Chronovision and kill the Count.'

'Fifteen minutes will not be long enough for all that. And hold on here,' for a terrible thought had just struck me terribly. 'This is a nuclear reactor. If we detonate it, will there not be a nuclear explosion? We could destroy all of Brighton.' 'Tempting, isn't it?' said Mr Rune. 'No, it is not. I love this town.'

'We will not destroy Brighton,' said Mr Rune. 'This sewerage system was built in the days when men knew how to build sewerage systems. It will absorb the blast. All will be well.' 'But not at all well for us if we do not get out in time.' 'Have faith,' said Mr Rune. 'Have I ever let you down?'

'Well…' I said. But nothing specific came to mind. ' Wake Up, Tobes!' I shouted once more.

Mr Rune had linked up the dynamite sticks and primed a rather high-tech-looking timer. 'Digital,' he said to me. 'They'll soon be all the rage.' 'Tobes!' I shouted. 'Tobes, we have to be going!'

Tobes awoke with a sober start. 'My but I'm thirsty,' he said.

'We have fifteen minutes,' I told him, 'before the big bomb goes off. We really have to be going.' 'Big bomb?' said Tobes. 'What big bomb?'

'We are blowing up the ark so that Count Otto cannot escape in it. Forward planning, you see,' I said.

'Oh, very good,' said Tobes to me. 'But what about the animals? You're not telling me that you intend to blow up my pussy?' I paused and waited, but there was no sound. Not a single small 'Oooh, Matron.' 'The animals!' I cried. 'We cannot blow up the animals!' 'Casualties of war?' said Mr Rune. 'No!' I said. 'We have to free the animals.'

And we did. And can you imagine how long that took, releasing all those animals?

We must have used up, well, at least three minutes of our precious time.

'I'm having trouble getting these spaniels out of their cage,' said Tobes. 'There just seems to be more and more of them.'

'Out! Out!' cried Mr Rune, shaking his stick at scurrying ferrets and foxes and wolverines.

Getting those polar bears out was not easy, either, but I will not dwell on that.

"They are all out,' I said, 'and I think we should be following them.'

'You're so right,' said Tobes to me. "What are we waiting for?'

So we left the ark at the hurry-up and hurried-up down the gangplank. Animals were fleeing down the many tunnels. I waved them a little goodbye.