Harry Splutter & the Lure of Hollyweird

Episodah 13 (I hope you don’t have triskaidekaphobia) is from Alan Hutcheson. Drop by and see his Sketches by Plumboz.

“Do you think you might do that again?” Bumblebore said nonchalantly to Hermione.

“Do what?” Hermione said perplexedly.

“That little, you know,” said Bumblebore. He made a kicking motion and then tipped his head back. “In the backside.”

“You want me to kick you?” gasped Hermione indignantly. “You’re disgusting.”

“I’ll kick you, you old perv,” volunteered Ron vigorously.

“It’s not the same,” moped Bumblebore.

“Well then try this on!” chortled Randalf the Russet and Purple. He aimed a roundhouse kick at Bumblebore, but with no arms the technique he had learned at the Wizards’ School of Martial Arts and Sewing Machine Repair served him badly and instead of planting his size fourteen in the Headmaster’s tuckus the itinerant wizard missed by a good foot and a half and ended up on the floor himself.

“I should like my arms back,” he said morosely. “If you don’t mind.”

“How about a foot, you clumsy fake?” said Bumblebore, who seemed to have no problem with the concept of kicking someone when he was down. “Ow!”

Hermione intercepted his kick with a well aimed foot of her own at the back of his knee, flipping the Headmaster face down into Randalf’s lap.

“This is just not right,” muttered Ron queasily.

“Off!” shouted Randalf vociferously. He tried to bounce Bumblebore off his lap with no success; the wizened wizard’s head kept landing back where it started. “Oh my lord! Get off! Get off” Get off!”

“Maybe you two are, but it’s doing nothing for me,” groaned Harry droopily.

“Mmph, mrrhpr, keemph,” said Bumblebore incoherently into Randalf the Russet’s lap.

“Don’t do that!” screamed Randalf miserably.

“What did he say?” inquired Hermione with some interest.

“He said ‘Now will you kick me?’” said Harry, who owing to his unusual and generally hushed up genetic makeup could speak Face/Lap. It was a talent he was just beginning to appreciate fully.

“Fine,” said Hermione. She hauled back and gave Bumblebore a good toe in the hip, rolling him off Randalf the Russet.

“Thank you,” said Randalf gratefully.

“Thank you,” said Bumblebore breathlessly. “Would any of you by any chance have a smoke on you?”

“I say we leave them,” said Ron with finality. “We can find the Horcrusts without them.”

“Horcruxes,” said Randalf with conviction.

“Horcruxii, you blithering boil,” said Bumblebore with a look about him. Really, he said it while he was looking around. “Where have they got to?”

“If we knew that, we wouldn’t need you to find them,” said Harry exasperatingly.

“Not the Horcruxes,” began Bumblebore, but not before Randalf shouted:

“Hah!”

“Not the Horcruxii, I meant,” said Bumblebore primly. “The arms. My arms to be precise. Where are they?”

All of them looked about and saw that Bumblebore was indeed right. The four arms, manacled though they may have been, had taken advantage of the diversion and toddled away.

“My arms!” moaned Randalf piteously. “My hands! What shall I do without my hands!”

“You’ll have to find a chimpanzee who will do anything for a fiver, I suppose,” said Bumblebore mischievously.

Hermione thought briefly about kicking him again but saw the only profit would be his and kept her foot to herself.