Zod

Taken from the Book of Zod, twelfth edition, year of our Zod, C’1764

The doors drooled open and a cloud of chill emptied itself into the throne room.

A face from screaming nightmare entered, and with a rolling walk like sidled to the rear of the silent chamber. Here, it turned and took a defiant stance; arms crossed and draped in its heavy dark overcoat and loosely fingering a very unconcealed concealed weapon. Eyes that knew no rest bore intensely ahead and all avoided its dead gaze, choosing to examine hitherto unnoticed dust particles on sleeves instead, lest they sink into and perhaps glimpse an image of what lay behind those eyes. Zod however, sighed impatiently.

A slightly smaller figure, actually, drastically smaller, but were not sizeist here, entered. His slow and short steps betrayed a deep arrogance as they rattled off the ocean of marble floor. Dressed like an upmarket pimp, with a hint of serious dangerousness, and clothes to die for, took the centre of the chamber and issued an exaggerated and sweeping bow. Zod idly pinged his fingers. ‘Sanguinario, must you persist in behaving in this doubly dramatic manner?’

If fear were present on his face, you wouldn’t have known it. The ghoulish figure at the rear of the chamber coughed like the dying gasp of a tortured soul and answered for its master, as it always did: ‘My client, Mr Sanguinario, feels that life must be treated with respect. And in particular the life of his beloved Emperor should be given the greatest respect of all.’ The sarcasm cut the air like a scythe. Emperor of the known universe he was, still this thing spooked out Zod. It was pointless to insist that Sanguinario spoke personally, Zod had tried once in the past, but failed. How can you terrorise something that has no fear? Actually, Zod had achieved just that:

‘Sanguinario, I hear that your brother, Pipistrello, still hasn’t returned from his… trip to the rim?’

Mr Sanguinario looked impassive.

‘My client expects that he will undoubtedly… turn up once our debt has been settled with the most gracious Empire.’

Zod didn’t like the sound of that. His face could have been carved in stone by a manic-depressive sculptor.

‘Your debt is to me, for permitting you to exist. Un-legalised extortion is illegal, you remember? The penalty is erm…’

‘Death?’ suggested Mercurius.

‘Yes. Death. Thank you Mercurius. Take another wage cut.’²⁰

‘Most gracious milord!’

‘My client is adequately aware of the crime that was committed.’

‘Good,’ hissed Zod, ‘and if you want Pipistrello to turn up in any form other than a Mac Zod burger, you’d better keep doing as I say! Not that his whereabouts are known, of course,’ Zod added coolly.

‘Of course, my Emperor.’

‘Don’t you mean our Emperor?’

‘Of course, out Emperor.’

Zod drummed his fingers. Pheasants, he thought, and then corrected himself.

‘I have another… task, for your convenience. If you agree.’ Zod leaned forward and raised his eyebrows in a ‘you can say no if you want to’ manner.

‘My client wishes to know if the payment will be of similar means as previous excursions.’

‘Of course, non-existent’ snapped Mercurius gleefully.

The ghoul turned slightly to eye Mercurius and gave him a curious look. Almost as if he was being measured.

Zod smiled to himself. Wildly. There was nothing he enjoyed more than antagonising hired killers. Unless, it was of course, antagonising unpaid hired killers.

‘Behold!’ spoke an immodestly clothed and deeply tanned slave grandly and directed towards a holo projection that shimmered before Zod.

Only the ghoul seemed to pay the remotest bit of attention and even that was an infinitesimally small bit.

‘Mercurius?’ called Zod.

‘Yes, my liege,’ came the slithery reply. ‘Here you see, a most despicable traitor of the Empire. Unknown only as Lady X, she commands a rebellion that is causing considerable… irritation.’ Mr Sanguinario looked impassive, but then, he always did. ‘She has been directly implicated in a recent attack on Planet Reginald and subsequent… irritation to the just citizens of Drydos advanced centre for poverty research. The cost is estimated at several trillion Zod’s and will have to be recouped through generous tax²¹ donations from other member worlds.’

Mercurius paused for effect. Though what type of effect he wasn’t sure. Probably not a very good one.

‘Examine this picture well gentlemen. I…we want her!’

The picture in question was obviously taken from some extreme satellite viewer and was about as clear as static through a snow storm. Needless to say, Lady X could resemble anything from an undersized Penguin to a ten headed giraffe.

It was an impossible task.

‘My client expresses concern about the possibility of Madam X passing for anything in the known and possibly unknown extent of the universe.’

‘Never the less,’ retorted Mercurius so sharply that the tip of his nose quivered with the effort of false rage, ‘You will find her and return her to me… us…alive!’

The find and return bits were standard procedure for the infamous Sanguinario brother(s), the live bit though…

‘Alive?’ said the ghoul.

‘Alive!’ repeated Mercurius with a snort.

There was a long chill silence.

Mr Sanguinario was impassive again.

The ghoul announced the decision without as much as a mild twitch passing between the two.

‘My client agrees, although the cost will be increased.’

‘Agreed’ replied Mercurius, ‘non existent it is.’

Spiff pressed his hand against the mottled exterior of what was presumably a spaceship.

It rippled.

Like oil-water, colours swam in churning swirls and cycled through all the visible frequencies, focusing on a warming cherry red about Spiff’s hand.

‘Gods, what wonder have we found?’

‘Holy bleep,’ uttered Rafe.

A group of symbols materialised on the hull in purest purple, edged with an encompassing gold border that flowed like veins.

‘It doesn’t feel like any metal alloy I’ve ever felt,’ said Spiff who was running his hands passionately over the undulating surface. Traces of cherry red followed his movements and faded after a moment to the background maelstrom.

‘It looks like empirical script…’ said Sknarf, ‘but, there’s all those additional symbols. It just doesn’t look right.’

‘Hmm…’ said Spiff. Who was almost at a loss for words, ‘It doesn’t correspond to any of the thousand dialects I know of.’

‘Has it got a door?’ asked Klaus.

‘Lets try,’ came Spiff’s reply as he slammed a mighty fist. Much to his considerable surprise, Spiff’s fist, arm and following body plunged through the hull that only rippled softly in retort. The group recoiled and half expected the thing to go ‘Burp!’ Spiff’s disembodied head rose from the surface and looked around.

‘Spiff! Are you all right?’ asked Sknarf alarmed and seriously doubting that he was, unaccustomed to detached heads as she apparently was.

‘Quite dandy, m’dear. This ship appears to be of a most advanced design. Organic technology, looks like… and possibly tasty; quite unbelievable. Step in side and have a look.’ He vanished once more in a murmur of waves.

One by one, or two if you count the carried and still quite unconscious Yeldarb, they stepped through the swirling surface vortices and into an embracingly warm and soothing environment.

‘Wow,’ they chorused.

Inside, there could be no doubt. The ship was considerably larger than its exterior shell.

Considerably.

They stood in stunned silence. Except that is, for Spiff who had strolled off through the plushly carpeted interior in the direction of what was presumably the front of the ship.

He returned moments later, smiled and set off in the other direction.

A few moments more and he was back.

‘Erm… quite embarrassing chaps, I can’t seem to find the front.’

‘You had but to ask,’ came a soothing and at the same time, tantalising voice.

The walls dematerialised with a barely felt breeze and a glacial chunk of cylinder grew from the floor and ceiling to meet in a bulge about its middle. Four chairs and a bed also emerged from the carpeted floor and swam across the floor to present themselves to their future occupiers.

Klaus laid Yeldarb down with an ungraceful thump on one which promptly scuttled off and vanished through a nearby wall.

The chairs nudged and tired limbs gave way to a material as soft as the skin of a babe. Fortunately, it wasn’t, but something equally soft. ‘Dis is service,’ remarked Klaus as his chair trotted towards the cylinder, which was now seemingly ‘powering’ up.

More buttons evolved from its crystalline form and one in particular grew into what could only be described as a steering wheel. The wheel detached itself from its glassy confine and floated towards Spiff, who was grinning like a child on Zodmas morning—that hadn’t got a jumper.

‘Spiff, dearest, what do you desire?’ An uncomfortable amount of care had been placed on ‘desire’ by the disembodied and very feminine voice.

The cylinder glossed over briefly and then clarified to reveal in all directions, the view outside as a possible decision aid to Spiff’s ‘desires.’ As if this weren’t adequate, the cylinder then expanded to engulf each of the group in a surge of growth. Each involuntarily held their breath as the image washed over, but found that far from suffocating, were still consuming the same sweet air as before.

Except now, they were floating where the ship had once been.

Sknarf’s hands shot to the base of her chair and gripped tightly. Until that was, she noticed her chair was no longer visible either.

‘Wow!’ exclaimed Klaus again.

‘Spiff dearest, is this adequate for your piloting skills.’

Spiff was agog with amazement. ‘Erm… sorry for asking this, and stop me if its an impolite question, but how do you know my name?’

‘Spiff dearest, I cannot tell you, even if I knew.’

‘Hmm…’

Sknarf didn’t like this at all. Firstly, here she was floating apparently unaided over a substantial drop into a crater, and to add bleeping insult to injury, some over hormonified and body-less voice was making not only a play, but also possibly an entire theatrical production, for her man.

‘Please Sknarf, don’t worry,’ came the intrusive reply.

Her eyes shot around looking for the source. No one else seemed to have heard.

‘How do you know our names,’ she called into space.

‘Please, you must accept, there are things I do not know. This is one of them,’ the voice cooed.

‘But how came you to be here,’ asked Spiff, who occasionally liked to reverse the order of his sentences.

‘I have been here for a million of someone else’s years, awaiting you… my dearest Spiff!’

It didn’t take a rocket scientist, or even a fireworks technician to work out something was a bit strange here.

‘A million years eh?’ asked Spiff.

‘A million, my dear.’

Sknarf fumed.

‘Hmm…’

‘And your name? If you have one? If you know that.’ asked Sknarf bitterly.

‘My name, is Deep Chima,’ the voice replied, ‘and I am yours and all to command.’

‘So can you fly?’ shouted Klaus like an excited puppy. A puppy with a voice, that is, but that’s about as different as they get.

‘I can travel at substantial speed through the atmosphere, and with almost unlimited speed… through and eventually between space.’

The last word hung in the air and swung to and fro a bit. They knew what they’d found here.

Escape.

Dingus meanwhile had not been idle. Finding the bore hole unexpectedly, and at speed, he had plummeted to a grinding rolling halt, near the edge of a crater that just shouldn’t of been there. Having been just in time to watch our heroes enter, he decided upon the only course of action available for his character. To follow. To apprehend; and to place in secure accommodation with a mislaid key.

‘Spiff dearest, a creature approaches from the East.’

‘Erm were underground, where’s that then?’ asked Klaus, although Spiff, with his in-built compass, was already indicating both the direction and the ‘creature’ in pursuit.

‘Sknarf?’ he asked.

She ignored him and folded her arms, opting to absorb the opposing view.

‘Sknarf, is that Captain Dingus, the one we erm… landed on?’ asked Spiff again, oblivious to the dark cloud hovering above her head.

‘He’s gonna get us!’ cried Klaus worriedly.

‘Fear not Klaus, not so dearest, I have taken preventative measures.’

Dingus stared at the ‘thing.’

It was black and opaque now, though he would have sworn at a blind person that previously it was awash with translucent colours of every hue. He scanned across its length. Shaped like a colossal egg, he wondered if it was just that, and unconsciously looked around for a great beak that might descend to peck him to death.

He snorted to himself. He was just being silly. This was their escape craft, strange shape though it was, and he had to get inside. Dingus swung back a mighty knuckle sandwich and propelled it against the door. At the same instant, an identical and opposite fist emerged from the hull and propelled itself with similar velocity into Dingus.

He grunted with the shock and fell back onto his rear portions. Of which there was a lot.

Dingus shook his head and waved a trio of arms that may not have been there at some twittering birds that also, probably weren’t there. He’d been punched for sure. Not for the first time, but certainly, the most unexpected.

Staggering to his feet, Dingus steadied his mountainous frame and flung his shoulder towards the hull. Obviously, he didn’t actually lob his shoulder, he preferred to follow it up with his body.

A similar form erupted from the hull and propelled itself against Dingus with shuddering force.

Great cracks sped down his shoulder and arm as this time, he rolled down the incline and came to a stop eventually in the centre of the crater.

‘Way to go!’ shouted Klaus, bouncing up and down like a chimp.

‘Going that way,’ was the leisurely reply.

With a sickly smooth motion, the ship rotated and drifted towards the tunnel entrance with increasing and potentially unwise velocity.

‘Erm…’

This ship is small admittedly, but the tunnel… thought Sknarf.

‘Erm…’ she cried, louder.

‘Be calm, Sknarf, we will fit.’

The tunnel entrance loomed, it seemed that Sknarf would be driven into the wall.

‘Aargh!’ she cried out in what was becoming her foray, as hands sped to cover her eyes, her hands.

As if in response, the tunnel grew; larger and larger. They continued forwards, inside now, and then quickly shooting upwards with skill through mile upon mile of tunnel. They blurred past early morning shifters, shot up lift shafts and finally, burst into full burning daylight. Sknarf felt decidedly giddy and looked behind to see the ground rapidly diminishing at an out of control rate.

‘How…’ she formed the question, but the reply came instantly.

‘I have the ability to alter my dimensions to suit the surrounding environment, from a grain of sand on a beach to a… very big thing.’

‘Wow!’ said Klaus. It was fast becoming the only thing he could say.

‘I assure you,’ breathed the ghoul with icy and dark tones, ‘My client, Mr Sanguinario, does not take kindly to jokes.’

Mercurius weighed his words, found them a bit hefty and opted for the diplomatic lightweight reply.

‘It is no joke,’ he attempted sincerity, ‘the body cosmetics are required for you to suitably blend in with the population of Lady X’s current hideout.’

‘The clawed feet?’

‘Required.’

‘The beak?’

‘Definitely.’

‘And the feathers?’ the ghoul added incredulously.

A solemn nod was the only reply.

‘So, let me great this very straight,’ said the ghoul as it unfurled a sharp instrument of seemingly telescopic variety. In an instant, or perhaps less, said instrument was playing a little ditty on the vocal chords of Mercurius, which it threatened to sever at a quivers notice.

‘You are saying, that myself and my client, are to be genetically altered to blend in with…with,’ it was choking on the words, ‘a planet of giant chickens!’

‘Fraid so,’ squeaked Mercurius timidly as he craned his neck to avoid the ultra sharp blade.

If there ever there were a time for emotions, Mr Sanguinario would surely show them now. A withering stare was about all he managed. ‘If this is a lie, myself, my client and the unmentionable denizens of our world, shall return to extract your innards through the orifice of your choice… and then feed them back to you.’

Mercurius gulped and indicated frantically to a twisted figure lurking in the shadows that he hoped would distract some of this unnaturally close attention to his soft throaty bits.

‘Zis isse nothing to vorry avout. I can aszure vu zat ze transmogrification prozess shall be qvite painful—painless, ze ze, zust a vittle zvoke ov mine!’ Dr Aargh stepped forward from the shadows and grinned a nervous smile. ‘Vite panless, I assure vou.’

‘So, that’s settled then,’ said Mercurius without a trace of a smile, though his innards were hysterical.

‘Chickens it is!’

The ghoul clutched Mercurius’ throat.

‘There will be a reckoning for this.’

Yeldarb came around momentarily and then passed out.

Through screaming corridors of thrashing mud and dark despair, Zod glided. The dungeons of Mount Spiky were immense and those guests that frequented it were likely to be completely forgotten on some dank level. They were also likely to be tortured, left to starve, ritually abused, or if they were really lucky, all three.

He descended a further level and came to a latticed door which although heavy in age, was unlike everything else in these mould covered surround, as it shone with a brilliance and luminance of its own.

Zod waited.

The door rolled open and rays of intense light burst forth into the darkness, seeking freedom and finding death.

‘My friend, I have returned.’

‘Then enter,’ boomed a vast voice from the glow beyond. Zod stepped across the threshold, through the anti-magic barrier that protected the rest of the castle and at last, faced his closest friend, proximity wise.

‘Puff!’ he exclaimed, ‘I trust you are well.’

‘As can be,’ came the reply, ‘given.’

‘Ah, yes, well, can’t be helped I suppose.’

Zod sat on the singular chair provided for him on these talks. He leant across and patted the sphere that imprisoned Puff.

‘What further do wish of my tortured being?’ spoke the globe; the width of two hands. It pulsed a soft peachy cream with each word and lit the cramped room giving it an almost cosy feel.

‘Y’know,’ said Zod, ‘I do feel guilty about this permanent imprisonment of yours, but you see, you had to turn on me didn’t you?’

‘The people had to be told.’

‘Certainly,’ said Zod, who followed the politicians course of agreeing with everything, ‘But in time, in time.’

‘In whose time though Zod? I grew tired of the carnage. I learned. I turned from the darkness Zod. I saw the light. Can’t you? Join me in peace. Tell the people. They’ll kill you of course, but you’ll end your days a happy man… and more importantly, with a slightly cleaner soul.’

‘What the people don’t know can’t harm them. And if they did know, well… that would harm them too. I mean, I’d have to kill trillions to keep the order of things. So, you see, better all round if we just keep things as they are for another hundred thousand years or so.’

‘They deserve to be told. So many years, and yet still here you are.’

‘Yup, here I am.’

‘And as long as there are more bodies for you to infest with your soul?’

‘Then I will continue to be Emperor,’ he said with finality.

‘Puff…dearest Puff. We two could be so good, you and I, ruling the stars as we once did. Won’t you relinquish your decision?’

The sphere glowered and presumably considered the offer.

‘Very well, Zod, I agree, release me and we shall rule again.’ Zod rocked backwards in deep raucous laughter releasing all the excess air stored in his lungs.

‘You still humour me Puff! Let you out?’ he sat forward and peered into the smooth surface. ‘You know as well as I do, if I let you out then…’ Zod leaned even closer and whispered, ‘you’d kill me and tell them all!’ he hissed and then continued his crazed laughter. ‘If not to torment me, then what of this visit of yours, what do you want this time Zod?’

Zod’s laughter appeased, he regained his Emperors composure and held out a tome of more dust than cloth.

‘Fill ‘er up!’

Mercurius stared ahead and thought intensely of the unfunniest experience of his life. It was still no good. He sniggered.

‘My client and I do not find this an amusing situation.’ The larger chicken ruffled its feathers in a menacing gesture that almost looked like a desperate attempt at flight.

The smaller chicken looked impassive.

‘Mr, erm… what is your name actually? I mean, he’s Mr Sanguinario. Whom are you?’

‘My name is inconsequential,’ spoke the ghoulish chicken.

‘Ah…Well, Mr In…’

There was a sudden flap of wings and a thump that terminated the end of Mercurius’ sentence.

Yeldarb tried again. There was do doubt about it. He was in orbit. Could this be the after life, he wondered?

That question at least was answered when Satan himself appeared and matched towards him, beaming a horrible smile. The same Satan that had ended his life, destroyed his beloved machine and… and… we’ll probably a lot more nasty things also.

‘Hallo there old chap!’ it bellowed and shook him vigorously about his personage. Yeldarb’s head lolled about weakly.

‘Thought you were a bit of a goner there old chap. What? What?’

‘I didn’t say anything,’ said Yeldarb as he sheepishly, peeked over the edge of his bed. No doubt about it at all he thought, no floor!

‘Ah! Your wondering about the lack of walls… floors and things?’ anticipated Spiff, ‘Chima?’

‘Yes dearest Spiff, focus of my life.’

‘Erm. Yes… Can you do something about this lack of opacity?’

The floor, walls and deep shag carpet returned as if they’d never been gone. Yeldarb gingerly tested a toe against the carpet in the belief that it would vanish once more.

Spiff grabbed him by his charred lapels and hauled him onto the floor.’

‘Aargh,’ he cried and hopped back onto the bed, heart pounding audibly and his eyes bulging at the floor.

‘It’s still there isn’t it?’

‘Am I an aubergine?’ asked Spiff.

Yeldarb looked at him. The lunatic was mad. But then, what lunatics aren’t.

‘That humour?’

‘Come on old chap, people to meet, things to see, galaxies to release from dictatorial bondage.’

‘Sounds disgusting,’ said Yeldarb.

Dr Aargh surveyed his work. And his work surveyed him with two pairs of beady eyes and considerable amounts of contempt. ‘Ah! Vood. Vood!’ he cackled to himself as he tested the feathers for ‘stayonability’ and the beaks for ‘peckability.’

‘Vermarkavle, if I didn’t zow it vyself, I’d even vink vou zickens.’

‘Watch whom you are calling chicken sir,’ said the taller one with a ruffle of plumage.

Mercurius sat before them, nursed his sore head and allowed the slightest of grins to introduce itself to his face; Dr Aargh had once been head food sculptor for the Mac Zod burger chain, but had been dishonourably discharged for gross acts of indecency to the ‘livestock.’ Apparently his half squid-half infant masterpiece wasn’t quite the image Mac Zod’s wanted to portray at the opening of their range of branches to cater for the kindergarten market. The squid part was fine, but the infant… The only work he could find now was either in pain technology or transmogrification; the art of modifying one being’s genetic structure, or sometimes lack of it, into another’s. Transmogrification was often practised (and Dr Aargh practised a lot) as a form of torture reserved for the particularly offensive offenders. Extra unsightly tentacles and reversed heads were the norm, but given the chance, Dr Aargh liked to excel and create something really special.

‘Cluck!’ went the voice, its head bowed in what could only be a look of disbelief at its current situation.

‘Zat is to ve exsvected,’ chimed Dr Aargh proudly, ‘The transmogrification is zo complete, vou even tink like a zicken!’

Mercurius looked at Mr Sanguinario. To the trained eye, he was to all purposes, a giant chicken, perfect in every feathery detail. His body guard, the same, just taller and skinnier; the sort of chicken that would live long. Even one of the same afflicted race probably couldn’t tell them apart. It was whilst pondering the surgical brilliance of Dr Aargh that a moment of inspiration hit Mercurius, and despite his education, he failed to avoid it.

‘Dr Aargh?’

‘Zes?’

‘Is there anything, or anyone you can’t do?’

Yeldarb stood, floated and felt giddy amidst the stars; and smiled. Okay, so the crews led by a nutter, the ship’s obviously stolen from somewhere… but by the maker, this is good, he thought. ‘And you say, you just found it? Behind that little door… something the size of… well, this couldn’t have made it through the door for sure.’

Sknarf nodded in agreement, ‘Yes and no. The ship can resize itself. We keep telling you. You don’t believe us do you?’ Sknarf too floated in the infinity of infiniteness. The floor and walls had the external viewers piped onto them, and to all intense purposes, it really felt as if they were in space. Orion was setting over her left shoulder; she looked like a goddess; Yeldarb didn’t know if there was a constellation called Sknarf, but he thought there should be. Who the buggery was Orion anyway, he thought.

Yeldarb sat down over what had once been Europe, France to be precise; and only improved it.

‘—And you want me to… pilot it?’

‘God’s no!’ interrupted Spiff from the adjacent room, his arms hugging the steering wheel like a crazed racing Baron.

‘What then?’

‘We want you,’ said Sknarf, ‘to work out what else it can do. And then explain to Spiff why he was told to find you.’

‘Spiff? Ah, the mad bleeper. Why would he want to find me, other than to torment my poor soul?’

‘Well, we still need a technical mind of sorts—’ The sounds of someone imitating a race car cam from the other room. ‘—actually, a mind of any sorts will do.’

‘I’ll try my best,’ he said sincerely.

Sknarf strode through the emptiness of space to the small door that led to the main compartment. With a swish the door closed and left Yeldarb in a perfect rendering of the heavens.

‘Cool!’

He looked across at the mind consuming vastness of the world below as white clouds churned in endless broil. Far below the covering he could almost imagine the huge sweeping landscapes of blasted, toxic and for the most part very flat land. Blackened cities with their empty, shadow populated streets added dull grey hues and still, easily discernible was the enormous hole where A’merkin or something had once been. How many years had it been he wondered, for a world still to show the scars of its rebirth into an insignificant corner of the Empire.

‘Computer?’ he announced to the vault less heavens.

‘Yes Yeldarb dear?’

‘What else can you do?’

A gloved hand extracted itself from the heavy folds of an overcoat and had its knuckles cracked fiercely. Content with this, and the voidness of the streets, the ghoul returned the hand and released the double length passenger door. It hissed open and the air of the compartment introduced itself to the clean night air in much the same manner as one would present faecal fondue as the main course for a party of fruitarians.

‘Mr Sanguinario… we are here sir,’ announced the ghoul with a breath like the chill fog drifting over a grave at dead of night; a cold night.

There was no reply.

‘Sir, the de-constructive surgery was highly effective, and we are now… indistinguishable from the indigenous species of this world.’

There was still no reply and a longer pause made itself at home.

The ghoul sighed quietly over the roof and then crooned his head into the interior of the vehicle.

‘Sir, I promise no one wunderstood.

‘You snu...'

Tailors make suits for many kinds. Small men, tall ones, round ones and even, women. However, some statures were just never genetically predisposed to weather that bastion of the desk-bound class, the suit. Mr Sanguinario hopped onto the heat-cracked pavement, his tailored garments straining visibly at the confines of its chicken form. He paused for a second and seemed to be participating in a strange mental duel as he held back the urge to peck and scrape the dirt. He sighed sorrowfully at the ghoul. What form was this for the galaxies most feared bounty hunters.

‘We will have our revenge sir,’ said the ghoul solemnly. ‘But first we must assure the return of our long gone associate, your brother, Mr Pipistrello.’

Quite unexpectedly, and an event which would surely require the forming of a daily bulletin of gossip and information. a dust ball bounced eerily down the wind swept street and trundled off into the endless desert beyond.

‘Mr Sanguinario?’ gestured the bodyguard and indicated the way to the entrance of the fine establishment of refreshment, the glass door of which could be seen to be shaking a-rhythmically to the tormented howls of some inner wretched beast.

The ghoul hopped awkwardly forwards with as much dignity as he could muster and stood before the entrance to Lenin’s Bar. The cold presence of Mr Sanguinario arrived shortly after behind him.

‘Now sir?’

The ghoul slammed a set of well co-ordinated toes into the door; it didn’t so much open, as fall down and indeed took a considerable amount of frame with it. He stepped inside and through the cascading dust into the lurking haze that was currently sitting in for fresh air. The music continued unabated, the bar staff kept doing bar type duties and the rest continued to sample the local brew.

The ghoul coughed sharply. Still, no one looked up; not even the slightly worse for wear figure sprawled on the hyper-spatial pool cube. Crazed jungle hard-core gargling tortured the smoke heavy air with its longitudinal waves and threatened to permanently reconfigure not only the customer’s ears, but possibly the walls also; had most of them not already been rendered thoroughly deaf. Those prevailing individuals lunged unconscious or otherwise undeterminably over the bar, a selection of pool cubes and a colourful box that one-day perhaps, aspired to play music. The bar displayed all the signs of a pre-industrial, possibly pre- stone age prosperity right before the big time hit; but then, by looking at the walls, something big had already hit. Said décor mainly consisted of a collage of stained portraits of various avian rednecks of presumable notoriety. These bedecked the up-lit walls, their beady eyes focused on the pair of newcomers and gave the presence starved dwelling an air of occupance. Of final note, was a suspicious looking figure who eyed the ghoul singularly and with restrained anger whilst allowing his mind to examine the cost of a replacement door. He polished an already gleaming glass that threatened to wear through any time soon, before an expansive mirror that cast myriad coloured reflections of various lacking liquid contents bottles.

‘Good evening gentle-birds, anything I can supply you good sirs with? Joinery equipment perhaps?’ He squawked in the piercing language of these parts, and thankfully, nowhere else as he continued to observe them beadily. Though it has to be said, he couldn’t help it. It was the only look he had, besides, his other eye was patched, and badly at that.

‘Do I have the pleasure of addressing Lenin sir?’ asked the ghoul as he strode purposefully towards the much smaller man—chicken. The barman’s eyes rose ever higher as the steps resounded closer.

There’s a mean looking chick if ever I seen one, thought Lenin.

‘Lenin’s out Sir. Anything else perhaps? Korn perhaps? Perhaps some…’ their beady eyes met, ‘Perhaps?’

A gulf of dead air swept across the barkeep. It frosted the glass and caused him to restrain a gulp.

‘Peanuts?’ he suggested with an over hopeful air.

‘We have been reliably been informed that Lenin knows the whereabouts of a certain Lady.’

‘Fraid I don’t know the whereabouts of any lady sir. If only I did eh? Some Korn sir? Or perhaps for your lady friend?’

The ghoul’s eyes widened.

‘Then you are Lenin.’

‘Lenin? Oh sorry sir, Lenin’s my nick-name, on account of me an Lenin looking so incredibly similar.’

Lenin resumed polishing. The ghoul eyed him calmly.

A wing shot forward and grabbed the barkeep by the dangly fleshy neck type bits, applying pressure that whilst suitable for the majority of life forms, was quite excessive for one of this planet. Lenin did the polite thing and collapsed unconsciously onto the bar, spilling the drink of a muscular chicken that had been surveying the developing scene with vision so clouded, it shamed the average gas-giants atmosphere. Mr Sanguinario gave a look of displeasure; or rather a look that gave displeasure to others.

‘I do apologise for this inconvenience Mr Sanguinario, I miscalculated my strength application threshold for this particular… species.’

The ghoul leaned forward and felt for a pulse. A limp throb persisted.

‘Possibly the gentleman may be out for a lengthy period of time sir.’ Mr Sanguinario drifted to the Earl box, still wailing its dreadful tones, which now had drifted to a kind of weird Japanese harpsichord. He paused, surveyed the list of session artists and then slammed a fist through it.

There was a long slow screech of a chair being dragged back.

‘Why don’t you’s picksh on someone your own size,’ spoke the voice of the muscular chicken that now stood peering at and up into the shrouded form of the ghoul.

In a slow swish, the ghoul turned and faced the unsteady drunk who was now apparently reconsidering the brash statement on the reasoning that he looked a lot bigger now. A lot.

The ghoul edged forward with a step, ponderous like that of a funeral march.

‘Like him?’ suggested the drunk, pointing to a shadowy hulk in the corner, possibly a drink’s machine. In that instant as ghouls eyes were averted, he tried to return to the relative safety of lurching over the bar, but found his vertical freedom now somewhat restricted. His feet swung erratically and kicked at the ghoul’s shins, whilst his hands clutched at the vice grip now inexplicably about and mostly around his neck.

‘Erk!’ was about all he managed before the gloved hand closed about and crushed his vocal chords. The ghoul paused a long moment and then shook the figure like a cloth doll.

Stone dead.

The music gargled to a stop.

The ghoul turned and saw Mr Sanguinario in the vicinity of the Earl box and quite unexpectedly, sinking through the floor. Three thunderous strides that flexed the timbers were all it took and the ghoul flung itself headlong through the now closing gap.

Yeldarb finished annotating a checklist of features that any ship from any decent sci-fi book ought not to be without and held it aloft. ‘Can you read this?’ he asked, not thinking that an intelligence gifted enough to navigate a ship might also be blessed with the ability to read.

‘Yes Yeldarb, dear. I already have. And the reverse side too.’

‘Oh… well, what do you think of it then?’

‘The paper is of a poor quality, essentially third generation recycled and with a large degree of heavy pollutants and a slice of undeterminable insect in the top left corner’

Yeldarb stared at the unoffensive splodge.

‘The writing, what do you think of the writing?’

‘It is obviously written by a left-handed person with a flair for poly- dimensional physical mechanics although suffers from irritable bowel syndrome judging by the erratic spikes. Father probably ate too many onions.’

There was an exasperated pause as Yeldarb grasped for words to describe his intent.

‘Can you please tell me what you think, that is, you, personally, here now, what you think and possibly how you would reply, about the content of the writing when collated together to form general ideas and questions. Please?’

‘Certainly dear. It’s fine.’

‘Thank-you,’ he relaxed, ‘and can you do them?’

‘Of course,’ came the over swift reply.

‘Hmm…. You sure?’

‘Yes.’ Again too quick.

‘So you can travel at any speed?’

‘Yes.’

‘Any where?’

‘Yes!’

‘And in any shape?’

‘YES!’

‘Hmm… Weapons?’

‘Loads of them.’

‘Where are they then?’

‘In for cleaning?’

‘Whose cleaning them then?’

‘The service droids?’

‘You don’t have any service droids.’

‘They must be in for cleaning too then.’

‘You sure you have some weapons’

‘Of course, millions of them. An entire ship load!’

‘Alright then, shoot something. Just a small thing, say a speck of dust as it wanders past.’

‘Can’t.’

‘Why not!’

‘It would be against my pacifistic nature.’

‘You don’t really have any weapons at all do you?’

There was a long strained pause. Yeldarb could almost imagine tape wheels spinning round, smoke and flame issuing forth as a cabinet the size of a small saloon car tottered back and forth uttering ‘DOES NOT COMPUTE!’

‘Well?’ he persisted.

‘Not a jot,’ came the eventual reply.

‘Sorry?’

‘Not a jot, alright… no weapons, none at all. Not even enough to damage a particularly violent piece of vacuum.’

Yeldarb stroked his lower lip and pulled it out, to let it fall back with a plop.

‘But you said you could do the whole list.’

Yeldarb waited an impolite time for any reply. ‘Didn’t you?’

Still no answer. Ticker tape spilling onto the floor, flashing lights on overload.

‘So you basically lied then?’ Valves vomiting onto the floor. Voice getting ever high-pitched.

‘Sorry Yeldarb, I was programmed to please. I was just hoping you wouldn’t ask me any details.’

Yeldarb sighed.

‘But you can travel, right?’

‘Yes.’

‘And quite fast?’

‘Blindingly so.’

‘Any idea how fast?’

‘Erm… no.’

‘Ok, so let me get this straight. Someone built you, we’ve got to assume that at least. They didn’t tell you anything about where you came from, what your abilities where, and not even a receipt so we could take you back.’

There was no reply.

Yeldarb decided to try a different approach.

‘Defences then?’

‘None,’ came the sheepish reply. If it had been any more herbivore like, he might have expected a ‘Baa.’

Yeldarb strummed his lips.

‘Except, well, there is the hull of the ship Dear.’

‘The hull of the ship! Of course there’s the hull of the ship! So, do you have any idea why we’ve been left with less defences than a naked porcupine?’

‘I believe dear, my original designer thought it would make it too easy and the story somewhat dull.’

‘Ah, well that does makes sense I s’pose. Still, means we’d better be damn careful about what we do.’

‘Agreed Dear.’

Spiff burst from the other room and boomed proudly with the air of any one of history’s mad generals, ‘Have no fear Yeldarb, I’ve decided upon our course of action!’

Yeldarb looked at him expectantly, perhaps as a small otter does slavering jaws of a hound, moments before the main event.

‘Were going to re-conquer Earth. Hurrah!’

‘Mr Sanguinario, a discovery I see?’ said the ghoul, casually fixing a disjointed limb that had snapped off during the fall. Mr Sanguinario uttered nothing, but his look said it all as he gazed at the slimy sewer juice that enveloped his highly expensive designer ²²designer shoes. Unfortunately, the ghoul couldn’t actually see his look, face, body or indeed anything at all, not being blessed with the unholy gift of infra-vision²³.

‘Mr Sanguinario, may I take this chance to apologise for the situation you, we are in.’

Silence.

‘I feel it is my responsibility and mine alone that has led yourself and additionally, my worthless being to this…’ he paused, not quite sure how to describe what he stood in, ‘place.’

Mr Sanguinario stood in silence and probably thought about something highly ingenious and cunning. Then again, maybe he didn’t. Blind luck had led them to Korn World and then Lenin’s Bar, alleged hideout of Lady X and now, scoop out your eyes and paint them black luck had taken them right to the front door; or trap. One thing was for sure, Earl boxes don’t often send you through the floor, unless they play some really bad music that is.

It was dark, really dark; and ahead, whichever way that was, it was just as dark.

Mr Sanguinario coughed twice.

The ghoul snapped his fingers rapidly. Eventually, they ignited and cast a pale light, which revealed amongst little else that he was facing a wall.

He turned to face Mr Sanguinario who was already indicating the way ahead. A quite sigh and the ghoul began sloshing down, but hopefully up the rancid tunnel.

Spiff mulled the information over in his mind. There wasn’t much competition in there and it could be likened to a marble trundling abut inside a basketball.

‘This puts a most serious damper upon my plans for world liberation,’ he mused.

‘I apologise dearest Spiff,’ crooned the computer.

‘Can’t you at least tell us who this creator was, or were you came from?’ asked Sknarf for the n’th time.

There was no reply.

‘Dam machine gone in sulk,’ huffed Klaus.

They sat in thoughtful silence as the Earth in its blue glory swam beneath them. Storm clouds churned over what they didn’t know was Africa and the vast and endless lifeless savannahs of Europe were now catching the first glimpses of dawn. It had an enticing, almost tranquillising effect.

‘Perhaps we could try a more peaceful approach,’ suggested Rafe.

The ghoul paused and sniffed the air. He was sure he could hear voices.

True, he thought, It’s getting lighter also.

He turned and looked questioningly at the emotionless glassy eyes of his employer.

Mr Sanguinario nodded.

The ghoul extinguished his finger and, assuming a stealthy crouching position, crept forward slowly through the noxious waters, dredging up considerable amounts of something as he went. Its times like this, he thought, that I’m glad I’m undead.

The smothering darkness gave way to a choking midnight blue. It was enough, and ahead, the ghoul could see that the tunnel opened up beyond a collapsed grating to an expansive chamber of shadowy proportions. The murky waters slurped out of the tunnel and fell to form an almost solid waterfall that occasionally plopped and gurgled as various green brown chunks gave way to gravity’s urge.

He peered out through the tunnel head and for the first time, saw her.

Pontious Marcus rested his evil head on the back of his evil chair and placed a pair of truly diabolic feet on the back of a prostrate slave; and planned. Not the slave mind, he probably had his own plans, surely involving said foot oppressor and a number of pointy instruments of the pain inducing kind (violins perhaps).

Marcus passed the majority of days like this, devising means of increasing his own power and enticing his ego with the possibility of controlling Earth, all to himself. Given, it was an insignificant world, on the rim of an insignificant sector, but a Leech Lord had to start somewhere. After all, Zodicus wasn’t built in a day²⁴. Relaxing into the folds of his chair, he popped a fizzer into an imported Utuvian virtual wineglass, inhaled the merry bubbles and resumed plotting the demise of his nemesis and archenemy, Pontious Plodicous. A vile being if ever there was one he thought. The ground rocked following a violent boom and the Utuvian glass pinged out of existence, spilling its non-virtual contents all over the slave. Pontious rolled to the floor and took refuge, as he had been trained, under his desk. Unfortunately, the desk was virtual also, as was so much of the furniture and now, due to the rather obvious power cut, didn’t afford a great deal of shelter of the physical kind.

The ground shook again.

The prostrated slave was scuttling away.

‘You slavvve…’

The figure froze.

‘Ssshelter mmmeee,’ hissed Marcus.

Another boom and mighty spider cracks stretched across the ceiling, which most definitely was not virtual, and very, very there. A chunk of masonry fell and ended the miserable existence of the unfortunate slave, chosen just to bring a bit of mindless violence to the plot.

‘Ssselfisssh!’ he cursed.

Stonework was falling in torrents now and Marcus accepted the inevitable. It was probably safer outside.

In the daylight...

The three figures were obviously involved in some kind of dispute and were possibly approaching the point were bad language would give way to some pretty atrocious stuff. Lady X, presumably, was gesticulating wildly between two men whose bodies were not so much muscled, as constructed seemingly from boulders; and ugly ones at that. The focus of their heightened attention was a chest, a wooden one and brimming to its chesty brim with antique coinage²⁵ that glittered an intense lemon gold, spitting out speckled rays to illuminate the dark realms of the arched and vaulted ceiling high above. That Lady X would concern herself with hard cash was to say the least, an unexpected thing. However, the ghoul had witnessed far too many of high morals sink to the trough of greed to be surprised by this private show of emotion. Mr Sanguinario tapped him once on the shoulder and held aloft three fingers.

Then two.

And then one.

The ghoul burst forward and extracting his long claws, sliced through the arm of the nearest man. Continuing onwards and quite unable to slow, he grabbed Lady X about the neck and hoisted her high above the ground.

Except she wasn’t.

At the same instant, Mr Sanguinario had caught the other man and plunged his teeth deep into the ripe veins in his neck, ripping at the soft flesh and waiting for the warm gulf of blood to pump into his dead, thirsty jaws.

Except, it didn’t.

Mr Sanguinario stood as if in a passionate embrace with an invisible being, and likewise, the ghoul was giving a good imitation of a boxing referee announcing a non-existent winner.

Too late, they realised they’d been duped.

A slow handclap brought their attention to a long pair of shiny legs that unfortunately ended right below some interesting curves, hidden in shadows.

The ghoul gazed at where the holo-form dissolved in his grasp and realised that for the first time in their career, they were in the deep badly smelling stuff; actually, they had just stepped out of the deep smelling stuff, and were now back in it; and quite possibly up to their necklines.

‘Take care of them,’ the legs spoke.

A zap-stick and a hand, unluckily attached and seemingly well aquainted with each other, issued from the darkness.

A pair of shots rang out.

Peering into the burning, cloud obscured light, Pontious searched for the offending attacker.

Trolls cowered by the mine entrance and the automatic defence system was obviously turned off, judging by the idleness of the impact cannons nearby.

A veil of darkness thankfully obscured the sun and all eyes rolled to the colossal dorsal fin of hate that was the Megaman MX Star Crusher. Fully the size of a large city, it glided onwards, the ground shaking from invisible blasts that stabbed like the anger of God. And a pretty pissed God at that.

The ground quaked, the trolls wailed and Pontious Marcus seethed. His enemy, his accursed enemy had done the unthinkable. And worse still, had done it before he had a chance to.

‘You!’ he called at a group of trolls cowering beneath a cannon, ‘return fire you foolsss!’

As predicted, the trolls stayed put and got in some more cowering. There was nothing for it. The ultimate measure had to be taken. Oblivious to his own danger, Marcus slithered back into the crumbling building. Dust rolled in choking clouds and Marcus groped blindly until he found it. It was a small indentation in the wall, hand sized, or claw sized and gave way when pressed. Marcus turned and glared hopefully at the coffin-sized block of granite grinding its way out from the floor.

‘Pontious Plodicous wiiiiill pay for thissss!’ he hissed repeatedly as he activated each crystal embedded into the face of the rock.

‘ACTIVATED. LAUCH SEQUENCE COMMENCED.’

The ground shook once more.

Marcus waited, savoured the moment and then slammed his fist onto a large red cold war style button.

‘ENGAGED.’

There followed a number of smaller whooshes, followed by a torrent of banshee screams that rocked the crumbling foundations as an army of hypersonic missiles powered over head and onwards to their lucky recipient.

‘Time to leave I believe!’ rhymed Marcus.

Screeching, howling and manic clucking are not the best sounds to wake to, and alarm clocks boasting such features, generally don’t sell. Except that is, on Korn World.

The ghoul didn’t need to open his eyes, he didn’t have any eyelids, but he did bring them into focus; and not for the first time in death, wished he hadn’t.

Mr Sanguinario was sitting on his chest. Unusual, he thought. Possibly more unusual was the fact that he was surrounded by a teeming excited and quite unruly crowd of young Cock’s that, were pointing, clucking and laughing, in mostly that order and creating a mighty cloud of feathers that floated through the air.

He noticed what was wrong.

His genetically remodelled chicken skin was now without its feathery covering and so was Mr Sanguinario. In other perhaps less well- chosen words, they were naked and both were apparently attached by some means of secure sealant into what could be considered a provocative pose.

In the middle of the street.

A now, quite crowded street.

In daylight.

Then something happened that so far in the pair’s career, had never ever happened.

Mr Sanguinario spoke, though it was barely heard above the feathery commotion, ‘I’ll get her for this’ he hissed.

Powder mushrooms bloomed across the Australian Alps and issued waves of golden fire that spread like ripples across the tranquillity of an evening pond.

Pontious Plodicous was quite dead.

Deader than a dead thing left out in the desert for a week.

Really dead; and so was everyone else.

Thankfully though, electronic counter-measures had done their stuff and the well-received greeting from his fellow Leech Lordling was now, with full politeness, being swiftly returned.

With an extra bit for good measure.

‘Holy Bleep! He did it exclaimed Yeldarb.

‘Hey man, course he did,’ said Rafe in a rapture of relaxation.

‘Thirty seconds until impact,’ cooed Deep Chima.

Yellow tracers arced across the sky like ribbon rainbows and approached with alarming speed.

‘They sure ain’t gonna leave a pot’o’gold when they land’ clichéd Klaus, ‘Get us the flob outta here!’

He turned to face Spiff, hugging the steering wheel and with the other hand laying idly on the size-control they had used so effectively to bombard the surface with mighty blasts of wind.

‘Twenty seconds.’

‘Spiff?’ reminded Sknarf with a hint of haste, ‘we need to like, y’know, be elsewhere…’

Spiff looked to the sky and then to mineshaft. The trolls had gone now, probably skulked off down some shaft to safety, where, hopefully everyone else would be also. Still, would it be enough?

‘Fifteen seconds!’ Even the computer began to sound a mite concerned.

‘Sorry chaps!’

‘Thirteen seconds.’

‘What? What do you mean? Get us out of here!’ they all shouted in various differing forms, but generally mounting up to the same idea— panic.

‘Can’t!’ With that word, he yanked on the size-control and forced it all the way towards ‘SMALL.’ The ship shuddered as it dimensions warped. Air rushed in to fill the void and cracked like a whip against the surface. Or rather it would have done, had Spiff not rammed his foot, almost, through the floor.

‘Ten seconds.’

A lurch even the dampers couldn’t restrain hurled the crew backwards as Deep Chima screamed fury towards the mine entrance. As always, barely a sign of stress showed on a face so composed, Beethoven could have done it.

‘Possibly time to leave then chaps? Eh?’ sang Spiff as the ship careered into, or rather, through the mine entrance, clipping the walls and showering sparks. Here, one might have expected a drop in speed; not so. Pressing his boot further into the sagging floor, the ship flung forward again, ricocheting off the walls and heading for the only shaft that led to their co-workers, probably oblivious to the commotion on the surface.

‘Five seconds!’

Like a roller coaster straight from hell, Spiff yanked the controls one more time and sent the ship in a dive that developed into a flaming cartwheel of sparks down the shaft. Finally, the speed was such, they not only broke, but smashed into little bits, the sound barrier, emitting a sonic boom that thumped into the aged crumbling shaft walls. It was enough. The heat and vibration did their work and the shaft, after millennia of abuse collapsed in on itself, rubble careering behind the plummeting fireball of Deep Chima.

‘Three sec—’

KA-BOOM!

Bathing the surface in the plasma of suns, the explosion ripped into the mine, and through every gap, quaking the mountain and making like day, even the mile’s deep shaft.

KA-BOOM!

Out of control, which it was already, Deep Chima slammed into the shaft base, sealing forever the miners within and possibly the crew also. Rock continued to fall for the seconds before vaporisation hit them, as the indescribable atomic fury buried its way downwards. The crew, unconscious bar one, failed to witness the ships walls glow red, then yellow and finally, black, as the fires abated in rumbling discontent.

Spiff sat, in the dark and watched the sprawled bodies of his friends and thought.

True, we’re possibly buried beneath a billion tonnes of fused rock, and true, he’d probably also sealed the fate of the miners by not escaping the shaft in time, but all considered. Not bad for a days work.

Fingol floated in space like a sprawling jellyfish, its poisonous tendrils feeding the flotilla of parasitical destroyers that orbited her extremities. A lone outpost on the edge of the known Empire, it bordered a vast patch of infinite, known only as ‘The Unknown,’ where all that entered, never returned; or if they did, then in little bits. The fleet was massing, the invasion timetable was overdue and Zod demanded a report on this most resistant of regions.

Except, he would never receive one.

A ripple of space dispersed the stars and beckoned the appearance of something we won’t get to see for a few more chapters, as it drifted, effortlessly, towards Fingol.

Klaxons sounded briefly, and crews thought about jumping from their bunks, but didn’t quite get round to it.

A single sabre of laser-red light stabbed through each destroyer in turn, lazily slicing their hulks and spilling the wretched souls that dwelt within into the airless gasping vacuum. Sparks at first issued from the broken craft and precursed the silent explosions that now hurled spinning debris into the station. The might-less ships drifted softly and completely out of control and into the gravitational pull of the geodesic dome that was the habitation core. Countless triangular facets shattered, casting piercing rays as plasma in columns erupted, signalling that Fingol would take no more punishment.

In less time than it takes something from ‘The Unknown’ to obliterate the Empires strongest military outpost, Fingol and all her squadron were gone.

Space rippled, and the ship was gone.

²¹ An example of legalised extortion.

²² Designer shoes being much the accepted trend, designer-designer shoes came into being for those individuals who wanted something that bit special, whereby master designers would genetically design ever better designers which in turn would either go onto design shoes or screw up evolution completely and design even better designer designers or even perhaps just designers.

²³ The ability, whereby the heat of surrounding objects is visible to the viewer, permitting said viewer to travel in comparative safety through complete darkness. Doesn’t help you much if you find yourself stuck inside a fridge though.

²⁴ Though it was actually built in a week, at the expense of shipping in multitudinous slaves from their own past, through a time travelling device, effectively cloning the builder population. Repeatedly.

²⁵ In an early bid to curb exponential crime rates, all physical forms of currency were long ago outlawed, and hence all coins and such are essentially worthless, mineral content excepted. However, although the crime rate did indeed drop, the banks of the time found they had to increase charges considerably to alleviate lost profits. The belief that banks orchestrated most robberies as a way of commandeering currency from competitors at low interest rates, is not an officially supported view.

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