![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
r_scribblesFinal chapter! Little bit of sex at the start. Hope you've enjoyed, and thanks for the comments so far. Now to tidy this lot up & post it to the comms xx
Nine
-x-
The rules of Sex Countdown were deceptively simple. It was still a game that involved an awful lot of concentration, and certainly couldn’t be interrupted once it was under way. They let Molly’s phone go to answerphone as the Countdown clock tune chirruped cheerfully above them.
‘Hello?’ Arthur’s voice came through over the answerphone’s speaker – cheery but unsure. ‘Hello, Skip? Or, Skip’s Girlfriend if you’re the one listening to this – Hello, Skip’s Girlfriend! It’s me, Arthur. I was the Steward for yourself when you flew MJN Airways, remember? I brought you coffee and you said no thank you, water would be fine and then I brought you tea instead by accident? Remember? Anyway, if this is Skip’s Girlfriend, could you play this message to Skip, please.’
The Countdown clock ‘Biddi-diddi-diddley-boo’d, and Martin pulled out, striving to control his laboured breaths.
‘Anyway,’ continued Arthur, ‘well, first of all, I’m glad you’re not dead, Skip, and I hope you’re all right, I mean, it’s a bit horrid, being kidnapped and all. I was going to make you a “sorry to hear you were kidnapped and tortured” cake, but Mum said better not, you’ve been through enough trauma as it is…’
‘What did you get?’ Martin breathed.
‘Five,’ Molly replied. ‘You?’
‘Six. “Fruity”.’
‘Show off.’ Molly picked up the cleanser and started wiping the letters off Martin’s chest.
‘But as I was saying,’ Arthur continued, ‘Gertie’s all fixed now, Mum says you’re to be at Luton airport at midday tomorrow, because we’re flying some Ballerinas to Ivangrad. I don’t know why Ivangrad needs 14 Ballerinas, or why Luton needs to get rid of them. I suppose we’ll find out!’
Martin finished cleaning the letters off Molly’s shoulder and picked up the eyebrow pencil again. ‘I wonder why it’s in Luton.’
‘I think it’s a number round next,’ Molly said. ‘Might stand a chance of evening up the score a bit. What was that about Luton?’
‘The plane was grounded at London City,’ Martin replied. ‘What’s she doing in Luton?’
Molly shrugged. ‘Picking up 14 Ballerinas, apparently.’
‘Don’t worry about them needing extra room for their tutus,’ continued Arthur, ‘I asked Mum about that already, and she said they didn’t wear them all the time, which is a little bit disappointing. Anyway, ooh, what does it mean when your phone beeps at you, Skip…?’
The line went dead.
From upstairs, the numbers round began, and Martin raised the eyebrow pencil to write the numbers down. Molly closed a hand around his.
‘Numbers go on the knees, remember?’
‘This isn’t fair.’ Martin started writing the numbers upside down on Molly’s knee, as she did the same to him. ‘I have trouble with the numbers round as it is.’
‘That’s funny,’ Molly replied, ‘it’s my favourite one.’
‘If I end up having to forfeit the whole game, I’m blaming you.’ He turned himself so that he was lying top-to-tail on the floor with her, kept an eye on the numbers on her knee, and dipped his head as the Countdown clock started up again, determined to make it all the way to the credits.
-x-
Rested, showered, shaved and filled with a cooked breakfast, Martin made it to Luton airport on Sunday with plenty of time to spare. His ordeal on Friday night seemed like a world away. He saw it as more of a near-miss than a full-on disaster, now, and goodness knew he’d had plenty of near-misses before. Besides, it was already shaping up to be an excellent anecdote.
Of course, he expected the pitying stares from his colleagues… perhaps, he thought to himself, he might even be able to use it to his advantage. Wrangle the better pudding off Douglas – maybe even get the camembert for once.
He hadn’t expected Carolyn to look sharply up from her coffee and say: ‘Ah, here comes my favourite Amnesiac. Tell me, are you actually fit to fly my plane today, or do I have to give you some more bops to the head until whatever was dislodged from your memory on Friday rattles back in again?’
Martin frowned, bewildered. ‘I’m fine to fly, if the plane is…’
‘Of course Gertie is fit to fly! It isn’t Gertie who’s suffering from concussion.’
‘Still got concussion, Skip?’ Arthur wandered in to the room, carrying a stack of DVDs. ‘I saw something on telly once where the thing you do to cure that is hit you on the head again…’
‘Arthur,’ Carolyn told her son, ‘firstly, that was Tom & Jerry. And secondly, I have already offered to do just that for Martin, but he tells us that he’s fine now.’
‘What do you mean, “now”?’ asked Martin. ‘I never had concussion.’
‘Wow,’ breathed Arthur, awestruck. ‘Your concussion’s making you forget that you’ve even got concussion. It’s trying to outsmart us!’
‘I haven’t got concussion!’ Martin protested. ‘Yes, I was cracked on the head on Friday when I was abducted… thank you for your concern about that, by the way… but I just blacked out for a bit, that’s all.’
‘Then why,’ replied Carolyn, archly, ‘did you claim to be so concussed yesterday that you didn’t feel confident enough to take the controls for any part of our trip to Dublin and back?’
‘What?’
‘Poor Douglas almost had a seizure – you know he isn’t used to doing any actual work.’
‘But… but…’ Martin tried to stop and collect himself, but only managed to come out with a third ‘but’. He took a deep breath. ‘But we didn’t go to Dublin yesterday!’
‘Didn’t we?’ Arthur looked and sounded just as flummoxed as Martin felt.
‘Of course we did!’ Carolyn snapped. ‘My God, in the land of the idiots, the brain damaged man is king. Martin, are you seriously telling me you’re so concussed that you just forgot an entire day?’
‘I haven’t forgotten anything, Carolyn. I spent the whole of yesterday at Molly’s. I had a really nice day. I now have a rather odd Pavlovian response to the Countdown theme as a result. I overslept, then Douglas called to tell me about Gertie being grounded…’
‘Grounded?’
‘Yes! The faulty fuel control valve.’
‘Martin.’ Carolyn pinched the bridge of her nose. ‘Douglas did no such thing, and Gertie is as well as she ever was. You didn’t oversleep – you got a taxi with Douglas to get to us bright and early, albeit oddly dressed, clearly still in shock and far too concussed to take the controls. You flew with us to Dublin and back as an emergency back-up pilot that, thank God we didn’t end up actually needing to utilise. Have you honestly forgotten all of that?’
‘But none of that happened,’ cried Martin, utterly bewildered.
‘It did,’ argued Arthur. ‘I remember. I remember worrying if you were OK. You were acting a bit strangely.’
A horrible little thought bit at the back of Martin’s mind. ‘”Strangely”…?’
‘Yeah,’ Arthur told him. ‘Your Martin was all off. All skew-whiff. And you didn’t really want to be too near anyone. And you sat strangely, like you were sinking in to yourself. And you were generally acting… I don’t know…’ Arthur blinked, his expression glazing over into a middle-distance stare. ‘Taller.’
‘”Taller”,’ echoed Martin.
Snippets of his conversation with Sherlock Holmes in that taxi replayed themselves to him in his mind. Holmes had known where and when Martin was due to be on Saturday, he was supposed to be some sort of master of disguise and he had the added benefit of looking a lot like Martin. Holmes could have been the one who made the calls to the MJN crew to tell them Martin was safe – found out their names… and then there's been the taxi ride with Douglas. Molly had mentioned Sherlock Holmes was a very good impersonator. What if it had been him who had called at half past six on Saturday, not Douglas?
What if he’d been tricked?
What if… he’d been tricked into actually having a really lovely day?
‘Arthur,’ said Martin, ‘did you call me at about 6 last night?’
‘Why would I?’ Arthur asked. ‘We’d only just gone off our shift, then.’
‘You didn’t ring me at Molly’s and tell me about a Sorry You Were Tortured cake, and the ballerinas not always wearing tutus?’
‘But I’d already told you about those on the trip back from Dublin,’ replied Arthur. ‘And a funny little story about your girlfriend, when she flew with us. About her wanting water and me bringing tea? Remember?’ Arthur blinked. ‘Oh no, you don’t remember, do you? I’ll have to tell you again on the flight today – you’ll laugh! Mum, do you think the ballerinas will like to watch Ballykissangel DVDs on the flight? It sort of starts the same as “Ballerina”.’
Martin walked away from the developing discussion about ballerinas not necessarily only being interested in series with titles that alliterated with their profession, and got himself a coffee.
It seemed that he truly was a part of that “crazy orbit” that Molly had talked about. He knew that this was serious. He knew that every rule he could think of had just been broken, and lives put at risk. He knew he shouldn’t smile about it.
So, why was he smiling?
-x-
John looked up from his paper at the sound of the key in the lock.
‘Evening.’
‘Evening.’ Sherlock flung a ginger wig onto the coffee table and stretched out like a man who’d been cramped up all day.
‘Do anything nice today?’
‘Piloted a jet.’
‘Oh.’
Sherlock stuck his feet up on the coffee table. ‘Make us a cup of tea.’
-x-
THE END
Nine
-x-
The rules of Sex Countdown were deceptively simple. It was still a game that involved an awful lot of concentration, and certainly couldn’t be interrupted once it was under way. They let Molly’s phone go to answerphone as the Countdown clock tune chirruped cheerfully above them.
‘Hello?’ Arthur’s voice came through over the answerphone’s speaker – cheery but unsure. ‘Hello, Skip? Or, Skip’s Girlfriend if you’re the one listening to this – Hello, Skip’s Girlfriend! It’s me, Arthur. I was the Steward for yourself when you flew MJN Airways, remember? I brought you coffee and you said no thank you, water would be fine and then I brought you tea instead by accident? Remember? Anyway, if this is Skip’s Girlfriend, could you play this message to Skip, please.’
The Countdown clock ‘Biddi-diddi-diddley-boo’d, and Martin pulled out, striving to control his laboured breaths.
‘Anyway,’ continued Arthur, ‘well, first of all, I’m glad you’re not dead, Skip, and I hope you’re all right, I mean, it’s a bit horrid, being kidnapped and all. I was going to make you a “sorry to hear you were kidnapped and tortured” cake, but Mum said better not, you’ve been through enough trauma as it is…’
‘What did you get?’ Martin breathed.
‘Five,’ Molly replied. ‘You?’
‘Six. “Fruity”.’
‘Show off.’ Molly picked up the cleanser and started wiping the letters off Martin’s chest.
‘But as I was saying,’ Arthur continued, ‘Gertie’s all fixed now, Mum says you’re to be at Luton airport at midday tomorrow, because we’re flying some Ballerinas to Ivangrad. I don’t know why Ivangrad needs 14 Ballerinas, or why Luton needs to get rid of them. I suppose we’ll find out!’
Martin finished cleaning the letters off Molly’s shoulder and picked up the eyebrow pencil again. ‘I wonder why it’s in Luton.’
‘I think it’s a number round next,’ Molly said. ‘Might stand a chance of evening up the score a bit. What was that about Luton?’
‘The plane was grounded at London City,’ Martin replied. ‘What’s she doing in Luton?’
Molly shrugged. ‘Picking up 14 Ballerinas, apparently.’
‘Don’t worry about them needing extra room for their tutus,’ continued Arthur, ‘I asked Mum about that already, and she said they didn’t wear them all the time, which is a little bit disappointing. Anyway, ooh, what does it mean when your phone beeps at you, Skip…?’
The line went dead.
From upstairs, the numbers round began, and Martin raised the eyebrow pencil to write the numbers down. Molly closed a hand around his.
‘Numbers go on the knees, remember?’
‘This isn’t fair.’ Martin started writing the numbers upside down on Molly’s knee, as she did the same to him. ‘I have trouble with the numbers round as it is.’
‘That’s funny,’ Molly replied, ‘it’s my favourite one.’
‘If I end up having to forfeit the whole game, I’m blaming you.’ He turned himself so that he was lying top-to-tail on the floor with her, kept an eye on the numbers on her knee, and dipped his head as the Countdown clock started up again, determined to make it all the way to the credits.
-x-
Rested, showered, shaved and filled with a cooked breakfast, Martin made it to Luton airport on Sunday with plenty of time to spare. His ordeal on Friday night seemed like a world away. He saw it as more of a near-miss than a full-on disaster, now, and goodness knew he’d had plenty of near-misses before. Besides, it was already shaping up to be an excellent anecdote.
Of course, he expected the pitying stares from his colleagues… perhaps, he thought to himself, he might even be able to use it to his advantage. Wrangle the better pudding off Douglas – maybe even get the camembert for once.
He hadn’t expected Carolyn to look sharply up from her coffee and say: ‘Ah, here comes my favourite Amnesiac. Tell me, are you actually fit to fly my plane today, or do I have to give you some more bops to the head until whatever was dislodged from your memory on Friday rattles back in again?’
Martin frowned, bewildered. ‘I’m fine to fly, if the plane is…’
‘Of course Gertie is fit to fly! It isn’t Gertie who’s suffering from concussion.’
‘Still got concussion, Skip?’ Arthur wandered in to the room, carrying a stack of DVDs. ‘I saw something on telly once where the thing you do to cure that is hit you on the head again…’
‘Arthur,’ Carolyn told her son, ‘firstly, that was Tom & Jerry. And secondly, I have already offered to do just that for Martin, but he tells us that he’s fine now.’
‘What do you mean, “now”?’ asked Martin. ‘I never had concussion.’
‘Wow,’ breathed Arthur, awestruck. ‘Your concussion’s making you forget that you’ve even got concussion. It’s trying to outsmart us!’
‘I haven’t got concussion!’ Martin protested. ‘Yes, I was cracked on the head on Friday when I was abducted… thank you for your concern about that, by the way… but I just blacked out for a bit, that’s all.’
‘Then why,’ replied Carolyn, archly, ‘did you claim to be so concussed yesterday that you didn’t feel confident enough to take the controls for any part of our trip to Dublin and back?’
‘What?’
‘Poor Douglas almost had a seizure – you know he isn’t used to doing any actual work.’
‘But… but…’ Martin tried to stop and collect himself, but only managed to come out with a third ‘but’. He took a deep breath. ‘But we didn’t go to Dublin yesterday!’
‘Didn’t we?’ Arthur looked and sounded just as flummoxed as Martin felt.
‘Of course we did!’ Carolyn snapped. ‘My God, in the land of the idiots, the brain damaged man is king. Martin, are you seriously telling me you’re so concussed that you just forgot an entire day?’
‘I haven’t forgotten anything, Carolyn. I spent the whole of yesterday at Molly’s. I had a really nice day. I now have a rather odd Pavlovian response to the Countdown theme as a result. I overslept, then Douglas called to tell me about Gertie being grounded…’
‘Grounded?’
‘Yes! The faulty fuel control valve.’
‘Martin.’ Carolyn pinched the bridge of her nose. ‘Douglas did no such thing, and Gertie is as well as she ever was. You didn’t oversleep – you got a taxi with Douglas to get to us bright and early, albeit oddly dressed, clearly still in shock and far too concussed to take the controls. You flew with us to Dublin and back as an emergency back-up pilot that, thank God we didn’t end up actually needing to utilise. Have you honestly forgotten all of that?’
‘But none of that happened,’ cried Martin, utterly bewildered.
‘It did,’ argued Arthur. ‘I remember. I remember worrying if you were OK. You were acting a bit strangely.’
A horrible little thought bit at the back of Martin’s mind. ‘”Strangely”…?’
‘Yeah,’ Arthur told him. ‘Your Martin was all off. All skew-whiff. And you didn’t really want to be too near anyone. And you sat strangely, like you were sinking in to yourself. And you were generally acting… I don’t know…’ Arthur blinked, his expression glazing over into a middle-distance stare. ‘Taller.’
‘”Taller”,’ echoed Martin.
Snippets of his conversation with Sherlock Holmes in that taxi replayed themselves to him in his mind. Holmes had known where and when Martin was due to be on Saturday, he was supposed to be some sort of master of disguise and he had the added benefit of looking a lot like Martin. Holmes could have been the one who made the calls to the MJN crew to tell them Martin was safe – found out their names… and then there's been the taxi ride with Douglas. Molly had mentioned Sherlock Holmes was a very good impersonator. What if it had been him who had called at half past six on Saturday, not Douglas?
What if he’d been tricked?
What if… he’d been tricked into actually having a really lovely day?
‘Arthur,’ said Martin, ‘did you call me at about 6 last night?’
‘Why would I?’ Arthur asked. ‘We’d only just gone off our shift, then.’
‘You didn’t ring me at Molly’s and tell me about a Sorry You Were Tortured cake, and the ballerinas not always wearing tutus?’
‘But I’d already told you about those on the trip back from Dublin,’ replied Arthur. ‘And a funny little story about your girlfriend, when she flew with us. About her wanting water and me bringing tea? Remember?’ Arthur blinked. ‘Oh no, you don’t remember, do you? I’ll have to tell you again on the flight today – you’ll laugh! Mum, do you think the ballerinas will like to watch Ballykissangel DVDs on the flight? It sort of starts the same as “Ballerina”.’
Martin walked away from the developing discussion about ballerinas not necessarily only being interested in series with titles that alliterated with their profession, and got himself a coffee.
It seemed that he truly was a part of that “crazy orbit” that Molly had talked about. He knew that this was serious. He knew that every rule he could think of had just been broken, and lives put at risk. He knew he shouldn’t smile about it.
So, why was he smiling?
-x-
John looked up from his paper at the sound of the key in the lock.
‘Evening.’
‘Evening.’ Sherlock flung a ginger wig onto the coffee table and stretched out like a man who’d been cramped up all day.
‘Do anything nice today?’
‘Piloted a jet.’
‘Oh.’
Sherlock stuck his feet up on the coffee table. ‘Make us a cup of tea.’
-x-
THE END
