Nullius in Verba

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.

Episode 12…

“Harry, they’re not using wands,” Hermione shrieked shrilly.

Harry had indeed disarmed the battling wizards. Four arms now paired off and arm-wrestled at his feet.

“Brilliant, boy genius,” said Weasel as he refereed the match. “That put an end to the fighting….Not!”

For the two wheezing geezer wizards, it only meant a change in tactics.

Bumblebore clamped down on Russet the Potato’s er Randalf the Potato’s er Randalf the Russet’s leg with his teeth. Randalf the Rancorous er Russet head-butted Bumble the Bore (whoops, sorry got carried away) Bumblebore’s chest.

“Oh bother!” whined Hermione prissily.

She marched over to the two thumping thwacking thaumaturges and booted them both in the butts. “Stop it. Stop this, this instant!” she cooed consolingly (sorry again, I wanted to see if you could write an attribution that didn’t match the text. Nope. So why should I use it? The author queried queasily.) “You two are acting foolishly.”

Randalf untoothed Bumblebore’s ankle and Bumblebore’s head ceased acting like a battering ram on Russet the Potato’s skin, which now had purpling which would lower its value in the stores. The two wise wizards looked at Hermione sheepishly.

“Oh ewe kid,” said Bumblebore to Hermione. His eyebrows jumped up and down on his forehead like caterpillars practicing cheerleading maneuvers.

“Thank ewe, dear,” said Randalf the Red Faced Wizard.

Hermione stomped over to the arms, warily waved her wand at them, (Randalf’s right arm was up by two points), and put each set into handcuffs that she materialized out of thick air. “I’d give these back to you two old gits, but I’m afraid as to what you might use them for, if left to your own devices.”

Today’s episode comes to us from Lexi, writer, silversmith, repairer of rocking horses.

Episode 11

Bumblebore’s eyebrows knitted furiously, till it seemed they might produce a small sock or even a scarf. Following his gaze, Harry saw an elderly, upright man in brown flowing robes holding a staff, striding towards them.

‘You know who that is,’ gasped Ron, ‘it’s Randalf the Sepia!’

‘Randalf the Ridiculous,’ muttered Bumblebore.

The man had drawn level with them, and fixed his deep-set eyes on the glowering headmaster.

‘I am no longer Randalf the Sepia,’ he intoned gravely, ‘henceforth I shall be known as Randalf the Russet! I have been reborn, and besides, I always felt my name lacked something in the alliteration department.’

‘Be off, you old fraud!’ cried an incensed Bumbledore, rising on shaky legs and waving whatever container the Long Island Tea had come in at him, ‘there’s only room for one wise mentor in this narrative, and that’s ME!’

Randalf ignored him magnificently, and his piercing green eyes seemed to bore into Harry’s innermost being.

‘Harry, I am apprised of your quest for the Horcruxes…’

‘Horcruxii!’ shouted Bumblebore.

‘…and you must know, you face a terrible and dangerous journey. For The Eye will be upon you, and as you near Morrdorr…’

‘He doesn’t know what he’s talking about!’ yelled Bumblebore.

‘AS YOU NEAR MORRDORR…’ Randalf repeated louder.

‘Clear off out of here! Go and morris dance with some hobbits! Take up jewellery making with elves! Get back where you belong!’ Bumblebore was jumping up and down. Suddenly he swung a fist at Randalf.

‘Noooo!’ shrieked Hermione. ‘Do something, Ron!’

But it was too late; the two mentors were already rolling around on the ground, punching and kicking, robes and beards flying.

‘Let me handle this,’ said Harry. He pulled out his wand.

‘Expelliarmus!’

‘Harry,’ said Hermione, ‘neither of them are using wands.’

Episode 10

“As I was saying,” Bumblebore continued, “A Horcrux contains a piece of a wizard’s or witch’s sole.”

“S-O-U-L, right?”

“Nay, verily,” the wizened wizard whispered conspiratorially. “Like the sole of their shoe.”

He plunked his size twelve dirty canvas sneakers, complete with a huge hole, which let his big toe out to look around, onto the tabletop. “A piece of the sole is torn away when the miscreant magician micturates on the law against jaywalking. Lard Wal D’Mart has jaywalked hundreds of times.”

“Wow, so that means—”

“You got it wizard breath,” Bumblebore finished his Long Island Iced Tea and pulled a stogie from under his Washington Wizards cap and fished for a match within his voluminous gravy-stained raiment that he eventually found on the table. He said an incantation, to Harry it sounded like, well we can’t say that otherwise this blog would be flagged and our little soapbox would be yanked from beneath our cyber feet, rubbed it against his robe and the match magically burst into flame. “His sole is in a Million Little Pieces.”

Bumblebore lit the stogie and blew rings of smoke, which magically grew ever larger until they disappeared. “Pretty neat, huh?” he asked enthusiastically.

“Plih,” said Harry derisively. “That nutter Doodley used to light his farts on fire—flames three to four feet sometimes. Why onetime—”

“Oi!” yelled Weasel as he and Hermione came back into the story. “You’ll never guess what Hermione taught me how to do wi’ me wand!”

Hermione followed a few paces behind Weasel straightening her robe. “Oh, I’m pretty sure they can,” she said demurely whilst trying to get her hair to smooth out in back.

“Well, gotta go,” called Bumblebore.

The group looked up to see the last of Bumblebore’s robe disappearing magically behind the corner of the terminal.

“There they are,” cried someone.

Harry, Hermione, and Weasel looked to their left to see security wizards bearing down on them.

“Exit stage right,” hollered Hermione and she grabbed the collars of her companions and hauled them away.

Episode 9

“One Long Island Iced Tea coming up.”

Harry watched as the man pulled strangely shaped bottles from in front of a magical mirror that reflected the man’s opposite side than the one Harry could see, mixing different colored liquids together that magically changed into a blend of the colors they had been.

He set the drink in front of Harry. The surface of the glass magically misted with wetness and water trickled down the side.

“How much is it?” Harry asked quietly.

The aproned man blatantly* blew into a handkerchief, “That’ll be five quid Mac.”

“Five quid for a glass of iced tea?” Harry cried shrilly.

“Long Island Iced Tea, kid. The best tea in the world.”

Harry picked up the magically sweating glass. “Effing better be,” grumbled Harry glumly.

“Whud you say, you little twerp?”

Harry pulled out his Olivander 6000 XL wand and wiggled it. “Stupidfly!” Since it had been quite sometime since the running gag about misquoted spells had been trotted out to take a bow.

The aproned man flew into the air flapping his arms madly. “WTF, Mac?”

Harry set the magically sweating glass on the table in front of Bumblebore. “Ah, Larry—“

“Harry.”

“Harry, my boy. You’re a wonder.” Bumbelbore took an enormously big swig of the brownishly potion then smacked his lips flagrantly and trembled slightly. “G—oo—ood. Darn that’s fine as Mississippi mud on a Louisiana day.”

“What are you yammering about?”

“Horcruxii, or have you forgotten?”

* Note: See a previous post for the difference between blatant and flagrant.

Episode 8

Here it is by popular demand of my reader, the continuing saga of Harry Splutter and the Never Ending Story….

“When a wizard does something bad, like jaywalking, a piece of the sole is torn away and can be placed in a container. Making the wizard, as it were, immortal…if he or she can remember his or her shoe size.”

“And, that’s a bad thing?”

“Oh yes. Who’d want to live forever? That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.”

Harry knew that Bumblebore had now lost the screw that had been loose. Living forever sounded pretty groovy to him. If he did so, he might even be able to make some money in the stock market. Analyzing trends and such.

“Anyway,” Bumblebore continued, “I’m sure that you’re going to want to know how to destroy a Horcrux.”

“Huh? Oh, yeah. sure.”

“Could I trouble you to get me an iced tea from over there?” Bumblebore pointed vaguely to a rather seedy place next to the Three Broomsticks Express. It was called The Rusty Cauldron Nail. “They make the best ones around Long Island, or so I hear.”

Harry walked toward it or towards it, he wasn’t certain. Anyway, he walked over and went inside the dark interior. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the gloom. There was a very long bar and a man behind it, wiping the wooden surface with a magical rag that left everything damp after it passed.

The man was tall and wore a spotted white apron. His black hair was combed straight back and unguentined into place. He had a sharp beaky nose and squinting eyes as
though he was always trying to focus on something. He had a toothpick that danced magically in his mouth when he spoke.

“What can I get you runt?” the man grumbled with a voice as if a well could speak. The toothpick did the rhumba.

“Do you have the iced tea like they make in Long Island?” Harry asked timidly.

“Sure. Anything else, bub?”

Harry shook his head.

The man turned and began pulling strangely shaped bottles from in front of a magical mirror that reflected the man’s opposite side than the one Harry could see and the bottles on the wall. “One Long Island Iced Tea coming up.” The man mixed different colored liquids together and the magically changed colors and became a blend of the colors they had been.

And so it goes…