A basic, hand-held surface-to-air or surface-to-surface ranged weapon. Elastic bands are the first lethal weapons that children learn to use, and with deadly efficiency do they do so. Suicidally, most major world governments do not consider the rubber band as a threat to international security, and the possession of elastic bands or elastic band-making equipment is not only legal, but frequently funded by the governments themselves as 'enterprising youth employment schemes'.

Hitch-hikers are advised to take advantage of these stupidly lax laws and have a rubber band about their person at all times: you can hunt with them, attempt to achieve immortality with them, or fire them with vicious decapitationary intent at people that you don't like very much.

An elastic band itself is made of a kind of plasticky rubber, and is usually brown, although they do come in a variety of colours (and quite possibly flavours - there's a way to make your first million). It takes a coil of this stuff to make a band.

You find the best types of elastic bands in industry: the great big thick ones. These are brown, not sort of 'oh - look - what - I've - just - stepped - in' brown but an 'ooh - look - at - that - nice - brown - papered - package - that - Postman - Pat - is - delivering' sort of brown. They are usually a couple of inches thick, and are really springy, and are perfect for firing tennis balls with.

The best way to fire an elastic band is to wrap one end of the coil around your thumbnail, and pull the other back to be level with your thumb-joint, where you can load your ammunition, whatever it may be. Suggested ammo types are bits of chewed up paper soaked in spit (which make a lovely sort of splat. Not an 'oh - great - I've - just - stepped - in - another - bloody - cowpat - I - hate - the - bloody - country' type of splat, but a satisfying 'there - goes - that - fly - that's - been - stopping - me - reading - the - paper' kind of splat), marbles (painful) or bits of chocolate (nice surprise).

The correct method for firing anything at someone is to sneak up behind them with the rubber band primed in the aforementioned manner, fire it and run away very quickly indeed before the person that you have fired your small object at regains consciousness. The person that you have fired your projectile at will likely be rightly miffed, so make sure that you have your escape route planned and checked well in advance, or you may well recieve a nasty crack about the head from your victim (not a 'nice - wholesome - crack - of - willow - upon - leather - on - a - sunny - Sunday - afternoon - in - the - cricket - game - upon - the - village - green' sort of crack, but a sort of 'a - psycho - killer - has - just - caved - half - of - my - head - in - with - a - baseball - bat - which - means - that - this - film - is - now - certified - as - an - 18' sort of crack).

Happy ballistic missile flinging!