1FF The Collaborative Multi Author Chain Novel

[Martino Knockavelli]

The bald man stood in the alley way, smoking a roll up cigarette, plaintively. His heart no longer ached. He had known sorrow, and sorrow had known him. But such emotions were a vestige, a limb lopped from his meat, disregarded. The strains of Scott Brown echoed in his ear holes, a tinnitus as a reminder of the life he had sought but now knew was not for he. He turned himself to the cruel wind, and felt its finger tips explore his visage; flawed, sallow, shaved and soft. For the artic blast to find him was to find himself, a confirmation of his existence, meagre as it may be. The night was heedless, dumb, mute and dark - it did not judge. Or so he thought. For behind and beyond those finger tips lay an ancient presence steeped in the blacked, furred teapot of the night. An immemorial evil known to modern, mortal men as Pagnell. And that Pagnell had sickening designs upon his innocent flesh.........

 

[Craig]

He began to regret turning down their invitation, but deep down he knew he had made the correct choice, it would have followed him, as it did everywhere he wandered, there would have been snide unholy comments regarding the choice of food and beverages, stinging critiques of the entertainment on show. He thought back to that night, the night it all began, the tortured faces of his long since departed friends, he'd be damned if he was going to allow that to happen again, the burden was his, and his alone. He turned toward the old tower block at the end of alley, a distant faceless behemoth casting it's ominous shadow over him, only there would he find his salvation.....

 

[Son of Cod]

Chapter 1
September 2013, an outlying suburb of Milton Keynes

"Rachel, come on!" he called for a third and hopefully final time. "If we don't get going soon, they'll have given the wifi password to so many people!" She knew he liked to be the first guest to access the network, but still she persisted to drag her feet when leaving the house. Even though there had seldom been any concrete research published on the matter, he was still convinced that being the first person to access the network resulted in the fastest connection from a public wifi router. He had his suspicions that this was not of paramount concern to Rachel. Yes, he had to compute a way to broach this subject at a later date. He pushed it to a folder in the back of his mind, right clicked and marked it red. For now he had to focus on the drive down to Totnes. The wifi situation would become clearer when they check into the guesthouse. However, it wasn't easy not thinking about it. What if one of his apps needed to be updated en route? As he shuddered at the thought of using his own data for such tasks a faint breeze swept a solitary leaf across the lawn. What was taking her so long?!

 

[D B Disco]

He turned to shout for Rachel again, but as he turned he saw her standing at the top of the stairs. The words caught in his throat, and his eyes widened at the sight of her, she was white and visibly shaking, clinging to the rail as if her life depended on it. He rushed up the stairs, any thoughts of WiFi vanishing like mist. "Rachel, what is it, what's happened?" he managed to croak when reaching her. Rachel looked at him with confusion in her eyes, but slowly recognition dawned and she leapt at him, flinging her arms around his neck so tightly he could barely breath. After what seemed an age, he managed to slowly prise her arms away, and gently stroking her hair asked again, "Tell me Rachel, what's wrong, what is the matter?"
"The wardrobe" she muttered, "it spoke to me!"
He was sure he must have misheard, and asked again, "Rachel, just tell me please, what the hell happened?"
Rachel slowly lifted her head and looked him straight in the eyes, "Our wardrobe spoke to me, and it told me it's name is Bob"...............

 

[Stevencc]

"Ignore that voice" Pagnell spat, suddenly displaying a coldness, a harshness that was not present a moment ago.
"But Pagnell, as you keep asking me to call you, the wardrobe spoke to me".
"I'll tell you one more time, ignore that c*** voice!"
A vein began to visibly pulsate on the right-hand side of Pagnell's temple as his fists clenched and a foamy globule of spit sagged from his quivering lips.
A small, laminated card was pushed from under a small crack in the wardrobe door. Pagnell bolted to the card and attempted to hide it from a confused Rachel. In his haste he fumbled and dropped the card onto the floor.
Rachel gasped as she saw a blood-soaked identification card which read "Bob Clarke, IT technician - We can fix any PC problem".
"He...he locked me in here" an exasperated voice exclaimed from inside the Ikea mahogany-effect wardrobe.
Rachel glanced over to Pagnell, who by now was smiling and nodding his head with a detached stare that seemed to go through Rachel, through the wall and through the electrical cabling he had installed himself, looking for some kind of explanation.
"You gave me no choice".

 

[silkyman]

He looked at her for a moment. "Are you sure you're not mistaking the goldfish for a wardrobe again?" He ventured, somewhat cagily. It wouldn't be the first time. He had lost count of the number of fish he had lost to coat hanger related injury. Not to mention the valuable koi carp massacred on the 'night of the insufficient shoe storage'.

"No." She replied. Adding; "I hardly ever do that these days" as she glanced nervously at a large tank with three Shubukin, some cleaning shrimp, a small plastic treasure chest and her wedding dress... 'No... It's not that. It was the one we got from IKEA and it's called Bob.

He was stunned. Shocked. He couldn't find words and opened his mouth to speak only to close it again. "That's right", she said... "Bob."

A faint glimmer of memory, something to do with WIFI, flitted across his memory, but was soon forgotten like a memory of an unpleasant evening after a litre of vodka. In its place came a moment from his childhood. Half remembered, lost in the mists of his memory. Obliterated by decades of mental abuse from the staff of his local tabaconist - yes, that old story - he knew his past made him a living cliche - and a penchant for strong booze and even stronger Welsh cheese. It was a memory of his mother. Sat upon her knee as she told a tale of woe in a plaintive song. Shortly before she had been killed in that tragic accident involving a slice of cake, three gibbons and a gruesomly disfigured podiatrist by the name of Geoff...

The lyrics were coming back to him. The haunting melody and his mother's rasping, gravelly voice retching the words...

Beware my son oh hear me well
Of a wardrobe named Bob let me tell
Your future consigned deep in hell
Should bob herald the reign of Pagnell...

And instantly, he knew he had to act fast.....

 

[D B Disco]

"Narnia" he whispered.
Rachel gave him a puzzled look, "Narnia? what do you mean?"
He sighed deeply, his shoulders sagging as if a great weight had suddenly been placed on him. "Sit down Rachel, there's something I must tell you....something I should have told you long ago".
Rachel slowly eased herself down on to the top stair, and gently squeezed his hand, encouraging him to continue. She could see the pain behind his eyes.
Staring into the distance, he forced the memories that he thought locked away for ever, to slowly return. "I was about 18" he began, "when my best friend let me in on an amazing secret". A single tear rolled slowly down his cheek. Rachel kissed it away and said "It's Ok, tell me".
"Narnia, it's real!" he spluttered, "my friend showed me and......I left him there to die!"

 

[Habbinalan]

We were smuggled across the border in a wardrobe.

It was about two days ride south east, over the mountains, on the ugly nags we were able to borrow. I'd recalled pa's advice: "A goodlookin horse is like a goodlookin woman," he said. "They're always more trouble than what they're worth. What a man needs is just one that will get the job done."

On the second morning, we saw them - a legion of Outlaws, Conferenceforumers, Bermondsey Dockers and Granddads, hundreds in number, half naked or clad in costumes attic or biblical or wardrobed out of a fevered dream with the skins of feral animals and silk finery and pieces of Lonsdale and Burberry still tracked with the blood of prior owners, coats of slain stewards, frogged and braided high visibility jackets, one in a Bob Marley wig and one with an umbrella and one in white stockings and a bloodstained wedding veil and some in baseball caps or beanies or safety helmets that bore the horns of bull or buffalo and one in a Steve Evans size Manager's coat coat worn backwards and otherwise naked and one in the body armor of a Spanish riot policeman, the breastplate and pauldrons deeply dented with old blows of mace or sabre done in another country by men whose very bones were dust and many with their braids spliced up with the hair of other beasts until they trailed upon the ground and their horses' ears and tails worked with bits of brightly coloured cloth plundered from those who'd tried to punch them and one whose horse's whole head was painted Easyjet orange and all the horsemen's faces gaudy and grotesque with daubings like a company of mounted clowns, death hilarious, all howling in a barbarous tongue and riding down upon us like a horde from a hell more horrible yet than the brimstone land of Christian reckoning, screeching and yammering and clothed in smoke like those vaporous beings in regions beyond right knowing where the eye wanders and the lip jerks and drools.

There may be no such joy in the tavern as upon the road thereto but our chances of supping at that cup of joy were looking slim......

 

[Pleg]

pangle shat
hispants

 

[Stevencc]

Again.

 

[D B Disco]

Being totally surrounded by this mixed bag of hellish freaks, we had no choice but to meekly give ourselves up. They tied our hands and threw us over a horse, carrying us for half a day until we reached what seemed to be a temporary village.
They dragged us from the horse and left us lying in the dirt, while a few of them spoke quietly together, occasionally glancing and pointing in our direction.
"Aaron" I hissed, "where are we, and who the fuck are these people?"
Aaron didn't reply, or turn to face me, but I could hear him softly sobbing to himself. "Fucking great" I muttered under my breath, not really caring if he heard me.
A group of small children, who had been playing some kind of game that resembled football when we arrived, had now gathered round and were chattering excitedly amongst themselves. One of them was standing holding the "ball" and was looking straight at me with a thoughtful look on his face. I had an idea and gestured for him to come closer. Slowly he inched his way forward until I could speak to him without the group of outlaws being able to hear.
"I have some milk in my bag if you want it" I said.
He screwed up his nose, replying "Milk, I no like".
I nodded to the ball and said "well if you don't drink milk, when you grow up your only going to be good enough to play for Bristol Rovers!"
"Bristol Rovers, who are they?" he responded.
"Exactly!" I answered.

 

[Dr Mantis Toboggan]

he woke up in a cold sweat, suddenly

for it had all been a fever dream