h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

pasted it ver batum from the word file I'd saved it in. yes Sfret is supposed to be Slepp>

"It is most unconventional for me to be doing this." The Swiss premier said, thumping a hatch which seemingly joined to another corridor leading along. "A bodyguard normally accompanies me."

"Shouldn't that be only the ceiling? The door I mean." Arthur asked, looking past Sfret albeit with great strain.

"The bunker is shaped like a set of stairs, up then along," began the Prez, "in case of nuclear strike. At the end of each corridor there is a lead door. Each door would slam to block the other way leading down, containing any further spread..."

"So if there was a strike and we opened that door we could get a nuke in the face?! Oh that's great that is." X answered.

"It needs to be open anyway." Responded Arthur. "Sfret?"

Sfret pulled himself up so that he was standing on Arthur and X's shoulders and high enough to reach the door.

nah - I just been busy.

Sfret used his innate sense of technology to locate the activation switch and flipped it.

"got it!" he exclaimed "oh no."

Sfret's weight shifted. X felt his left foot slip. Then his right

"this is boing to hurt." - he reflected.

Sfret toppled he landed on Arthur right shoulder forcing him down on one knee.

X wished in vain for some purchase on the tiles.

Arthur fell as the pyramid collapsed, Sfret ended up performig perhaps the worlds most un-dainty forward flip as he continued to tumble.

He landed sqaure on X's head driving him downward into a painful attempt at the splits.

Arthur shook himself upright.

"Everyone okay?"

~mmmmmmm-hmmmm!~

whined X is a high pitch.

"Is your partner okay said Sfret dusting himself down."

"No. he's not." Arthur contemplated - "oh I se the splits thing. He'll recover."

"Where's the Swiss Premier?"

"I'm here." said The Prime Minister emerging from the shadows. "I had an awful feeling that was about to go hideously wrong so I hid out of harms way."

Stepping over his fallen comrade Arthur looked up and surveyed the hinge on the stuoobrnly imobile trapdoor leading to the next level of the bunker.

Suddenly there was a clunk and a small rush of air whirled around Arthurs sensible shoes.

It was followed by a pop not unlike opening a stay-fresh tuppa-ware box and the pre-war systems lurched into life huge cogs hidden heind the walls dragged the doorway open.

X clambered delicately to his feet.

Suddenly from without in the darkness there errupted a hideous low roar:

"RAAAAAAAAAAAAH"

Arthur pressed a hand firmly on the Swis premier's chest: "We'll hadle this."

"We - we will? yes we will" stumbled X fighting off a nasty case numbness in the lower extremities.

"on three." said Arthur

"Do you mean 1, 2 and go or 1, 2 AND 3 and *then* we go?"

"Just get in there!" said Arhtue giving his partner a shove.

"123!!" shouted X very quickly as he melted into the inky blackness.

Arthur leapt in behind him.


The Swiss premier and Sfret listened with faces of fascination.



"ow!"

"what" you standing no my hand."

"sorry"

RAAAAAAAAAAAH

"what was that?"

"mummy".

RAAAAAAAAAAAAH RAAAAAAAAAAAAH

"is that? ...."

"I think I found the light switch!"

*click*

X was stood alone at the far side of at the far side of a small room with a spiral staircase whihc lead up to a square of white light. They were nearer the surface that they had thought.

"Where is your partner?" asked the wiss president.

"I'm over here! cam Arthurs voice from behind the stair case.

He emerged dragging something behind him that was contesting his every move but was loosing.

"It's a.." said the Premier his mouth dropping open.

"sheep." said Arthur.

baaaaaaaah! baaaaaaah!!

Behind them the echo began and boomed dwon the corridor

The behind them they head the saound of footsteps coing down the stair well.

Arthur spun round as a small figure in dugarees appeared into view and stoppd surprised to find two gentleman in finely tailored suits at the bottom of this ong-forgotten stair well.

He pointed: "sheep." he mumbled in fractured english/

"hmm? said Arthur lookign surpirised." "oh this? yours? take it take it." and dragged the sheep bleating furiously to hand to the farmer.

"my name ist Hurtzel" he stuttered. (*in swiss *)

"what did he say?" inquired Arthur.

"dunno" shurgged X

He said his name is Hertzel - I think he can show us the way out of here."

The farmer looked aghast: "mister president!" he said affecting a srt of fold-cum-bow.

"He'll lead us back to the surface. " said The Swiss president confindently.

The sheep began tucking ito Arthur left trouser leg.

"hey! arg gerritioff! gerroff! shoo! look.. sod it - stop biting the - arg!"

Sfret wandered into the fray - "perhaps this gentleman could lend us one of his mo-hooter vee-hickle." he mis-spoke the unusal phrase.

"Good idea said X"

"So where do we go now?" said Sfret with a quiet innocence.

"Up there." said Arhtur indicating the light small sqaure of blue cky studded with whispy couds.

"....Up?" said Sfret his voice breaking only slightly.

The Swiss Premier made a strangled noise of frustration, and rounded on Sfret.
"This is no time for your chronic agoraphobia, old friend! Gahh..."
He punched the wall.
"Do you have any *idea* how often this kind of thing happens to me?" he snarled to the startled Agents. "I am sitting quietly at my desk trying to decipher the legal phrasing on some new economic appropriations bill, and all of a sudden there's a hostage crisis downstairs. Special forces won't move in till they meet with their union leaders. Police are on strike for more cheese. Boo-hoo. So who ends up storming the room, shooting the terrorists and freeing the hostages? Just bloody guess. Sometimes I think I'm the only one doing *any* governing around here..."
Arthur raised a polite finger to suggest that they move on, but the Premier wasn't finished.
"And then there was the time those Armenian extremists took control of my plane. Vice-Premier wants to shoot it down. The Parliament wants to accede to their demands. So who has to creep through the innards of the plane armed only with their native wit and a shoe-horn, taking out the bad guys one by one through stealth and sheer nerve until the crisis is averted? Me, that's who. And I could go on..."
He yanked his tie (with its small Swiss flag motifs) from around his neck and tied it ceremoniously around his head, bandana-style. The Premier now presented the appearance of a short, balding kamikaze warrior in a three-piece suit.
"But right now there's a plot to foil and a girl to save. Lock and load, gentlemen."
With that he shot up the ladder and strode off into the forest.

Arthur, X and Sfret exchanged bemused glances. Hertzel clucked.
"Don't look at me. I voted for ze ozzer guy."
Sfret clicked his fingers excitedly.

"That's it! Just a moment..."
The monk ripped a strip from the hem of his ragged robe, indecently exposing a striped sock, and tied it around his head as a crude blindfold.
"Now, as long as nobody mentions anything about wide, open spaces or rolling vistas, I should be...how you say?...'laughing'. Yes. Onwards and upwards!"
He sprang into action.

Arthur sighed, and turned to X.
"Better give this a minute. Got that hip-flask of yours?"
The Agents shared a quick non-regulation nip to warm their bones, and X shivered.
"Look at this. Our allies: a loony monk and a senior politician with testosterone leaking out of his ears. Personally, I think things would be a good lot better if we still ruled the world."
Arthur grimaced, and half-nodded.
"But then, think of all the paperwork."
"True, true..."
They stood in silence for a moment, stamping their feet and jigging up and down in the concrete cold.
"Think we should tell Sfret he's trying to climb Hertzel?"
"It would be kindest, wouldn't it...?

Moments later the group, which the Premier insisted on calling Strike Force Schwarzwalderkirchtorte, had re-assembled, and were moving through the dusky undergrowth beneath the trees.

<>

The traffic policeman, armed with notepad and pen, bent down so that his head was level with the window. He looked at Daltmooreby.

"Haven't I seen you from somewhere before?"

Dalmooreby fidgited. "No, I shouldn't think so."

"I'm sure I have..." said the polis-man. He placed his pen to his lips in concentration. "Were you on TV?"

"No." Daltmooreby blunted answered.

"Give me a moment, it'll come...Now, what are your names?" He put his pen to pad.

Von Trapp considered this. "Erm... I'm... erm... Josef. This-" he thumbed Daltmooreby, "-is Herman. And that-" to Sreka, "-is... ... Rudolph?"

< What is that? >

"And you sir are?", continued the officer in the direction of Vanderveer.

"Karl Grey" he said without batting an eyelid.

The officer looked at him suspciously for a moment, then nodded and waved them on. "On your way then gentlemen"

When they had travelled a short distance away. Vanderveer, feeling slightly uneasy, looked back and saw the Police officer still out side his vehicle obviously reporting back to the police station.

"Do you think he suspected anything?", asked Vanderveer.

"Maybe", replied Von Trapp.

"I think we should take him with us", ordered Vanderveer. "Lets go back and 'deal' with him".

The car stopped, and in a quick manouver turned around and amost ran over the police officer. Sreka got out of the car and clobbered him over the head. He opened the boot where upon seeing daylight Anna started screaming again. Sreka then shoved the unconscious police officer in to the boot as well.

"I hope you know what you're doing Vanderveer.", said Daltmoreby.

"Let me worry about the running of this mission."

The car then went off again, with a new passenger.

"mmmffff mmmmnnngggmmmfffff?" said Anna to her new companion. She didn't get an answer.