The Manager In The Window
WHEN YOU LAST TUNED IN, OUR DASHING HEROES WERE DELVING DEEP INTO THE SORDID UNDERBELLY OF STAMFORD BRIDGE ON THE HUNT FOR THE NEFARIOUS MISCREANT WHO HAS BEEN SPINNING A WEB OF TRANSFER SPURIOUS-NESS!!
THE TWO WONDER-DETECTIVES HAD BEEN COWARDLY KNOCKED OUT COLD BY AN UNKNOWN ASSAILANT!
CAN OUR AMAZING DUO ESCAPE WITH THEIR LIVES? CAN THEY FOIL THE DASTARDLY PLAN OF THE TRANSFER SHIT-SPREADER? WILL I EVER STOP TYPING IN CAPITAL LETTERS?!
IT'S TIME TO FIND OUT FOLKS! IT'S THE THRILLING CONCLUSION TO......
'THE ITK ALWAYS RINGS TWICE!!!!'.......
When finding yourself in a squeeze tighter than a pair of Bee-Gee's slacks, in my experience of hunting justice for the common man, I've realised one thing; avoid them. Nothing good can come of a lack of choice and being caught between a rock and a hard place. It's god-damn uncomfortable and you can never reach your lighter for a smoke....
So here we are. The last thing I remember before awakening to a feeling of being bound was the lift doors opening and what seemed like metallic computer mice launched toward my noggin. Not just me though, Gunnersaurus as well.
Upon opening my groggy eyes, I see that I haven't been moved that much. Tied up, bound to a surprisingly comfortable desk chair, complete with wheels on the bottom, and put in the centre of a semi-circle couch, which currently housed about five heavy-set guys who seemed intent on at some point finding out whether my ribs can contort. It doesn't seem as if they're here to play Backgammon.
The room is rather large, exposed brickwork giving it a feel of intentional decay, much like a modern club. Never liked those places, give me a smoky gin-joint any day of the week. The whole area had an aura of crimson, probably from the red neon bulbs overhead. Leather couches lined the edges of the room, sat in these couches were skinny girls wearing a variety of gaudy leather-wear and other things that would make their parents blush and say Hail Mary. Their attentions however, were all on the centre of the room.
In the centre of the room, on a floor of polished steel it would seem, were four desks, all aluminium. They had been pushed together to form a square. Atop these cold items of furniture were what resembled computers with huge flat-screen monitors. The screens must have been 40inch or you can call me PeeWee. The PC's looked like futuristic beings from another planet. I've always been a luddite, favouring the HB pencil and notepad, GS was always the computer whizz, but even his computer wouldn't recognise these monsters if they bumped into each other at a PC Party. They glowed green, with circuit boards and wires coming out of the yazoo. It was like a scene from a sci-fi movie. Not a particularly good one because I had the headache from hell and the lighting was exacerbating it. What was this ear-bleeding cacophony being filtered through the speakers in the wall? No....It can't be. Say it ain't so. Not Bieber.....
A chorus of 'Baby Baby' laid assault upon not only my eardrums, but my mind as well. I struggled against the binds, but they were fine straps that resisted my best attempts. I hear a high-pitched mewling to my left, I see my good buddy GS in the same boat as me. Strapped in and in music hell. His struggle and fight were far greater than mine but to no avail, the straps held tough. The music was growing louder now, I don't think I can ta...
Do you recall when I told you that our chances were slim and none? Well, Dollface, it seems 'slim' just left town.....
At that moment, the music cut off. Thank Dennis Bergkamp. All the stragglers and idiots with the nifty haircuts were silent. Lights focused on the four desks. At each desk now sat a figure. One stood up.....
"I see you've awoken from your impromptu slumber, fellas! How nice! Let me introduce myself. How can we expect to have a conversation when you can't address me properly!"
The figure, now in full view, began walking toward me. He was wearing a stained t-shirt that was two sizes too small for his burgeoning gut. He had hair of no discernible style and wore Umbro tracksuit bottoms with an elasticated waistband that was already screaming in submission. In one hand, he brandished a box of MicroChips. Not the technical variety, the cardboard potato variety. In the other was a jar of Hellmann's Mayonnaise that in pauses between his sentences he dipped his digits into and slurped off. If this guy ever saw daylight, let alone speak to the fairer-sex, then I'll be Bendtners Uncle.
He stopped just short of me. His stench was reminiscent of unwashed geriatrics and forgotten cheese.
"I believe you know me as IndyKalia, but we are known by many other tags. We have been named many but what we truly are...."
All of the supposed followers of this cadre stood up as one. All straight as an arrow, backs unyielding...
"WE ARE LEGION". All in unison, like a Hammer Horror version of a Choir.
"Thank you, my pets. Now. I believe you've been digging, haven't you naughty boys? You have been looking for the source to all those awful transfer links that seem to be doing the rounds like some terrible smell? Well. I can tell you this, DETECTIVES. You have found the hands which typed them, but I can't reveal my sources...."
That meant this ran deeper than Chuck Norris's beard. I looked at my old pal GS. He wasn't writhing with customary anger now. He seemed tranquil, if anything. No, not tranquil. Focused. He was up to something. Think back to our original encounter when we had our feet up in our office. Damn, right now, I miss our office. Anyway, when that porcelain-faced Damsel bust not only my door but my heart, GS had been ready to file his deadly claws. Maintenance, he liked to call it. Well, he never quite managed to carry out that safety procedure, did he? Thank Bergkamp he didn't. He was busy using those sharp utensils to rip through the fabric that currently had his hands behind him. You beautiful Green Bastard. Still, even with a raging dinosaur on my team, we were ridiculously outnumbered.
Indy snapped me out of my hopeful reverie.
"WHERE, ARE, MY, MANNERS!! Would you like to meet the rest of the Doomsday Team? Do you like our name? Too apocalyptic? Ah, who cares what a goody two-shoes detective thinks! It's Fabulous!"
The figures who were at the central desks waddled forward, aside from one, who dragged what should have been a limb, behind him.
"Detective, I give you.......
BEN FAIRTHORNE!
WAYNE GOONEY!
AND OUR SPECIAL GUEST, DRIPPING WITH EVIL....IS SALOMON KALOU!!!"
The guy with the floppy leg was Kalou. The other two were as greasy and as corpulent as Indy. They revelled in my apparent hopelessness and it would seem that Kalou was there to act as their abhorrent muse. Dressed in a patchwork quilt of football jerseys, ranging from my beloved Arsenal to Evian, from Malmo to Morton. He danced suggestively in front of the filthy rumour-mongers. It was evident that the dancing 'inspired' them, as their fingers twitched as if typing an invisible keyboard and their Umbro trackpants developed a small dark pattern at the crotch.
