Bedlam!

In Fort Pippin, the governor has called an emergency meeting of the men that he trusts. This, therefore, is quite a small meeting: less a meeting, really, and more of a moment of self-reflection. However, since he cannot do everything himself, he has been forced to invite Colonel Entendre and a certain Herr Lippe, the mayor.
'Herr Lippe, report on the current conditons in the town', Schroedinger says at once.
The mayor nods. 'Many of the peasantry have expired, sir. And many others are very ill. On the downside, those with money have been engaging in damaging levels of panic stockpiling'.
Schroedinger frowns. 'What, stockpiling food? But how? We have all stores of remaining condiments under lock and key - the distribution  is carefully rationed'.
'No, my lord', replies Lippe. 'Not purchases of food - rather, the panic purchasing of britches'.
Entendre snorts. 'People are stocking up on trousers?'
'Indeed, colonel', replies the major.

The governor shalkes his head. 'Madness! Sheer bleach-injecting madness! But why? What possible use could a large pile of britches be in the current dire circumstances?'
Lippe shrugs. 'It seems, sir, that many take them to be some kind of defence against the plague!'
'But how?', interjects the colonel. 'How could that possiblly be the case?'
'Well, sir', replies Lippe, 'to be fair - how many victims of the plague have you seen wearing britches?'
'Yes', says Schroedinger,  'but that's because people tend to be in their in beds, ill! Of course they aren’t wearing trousers. That would be like saying that, because people who are ill tend to be in bed, that beds are a major source of plague!'
Lippe nods. 'I refer you, my lord, to item four on the agenda - the shortage of beds; and also item five, the strange outbreak of fires involving furniture germaine to agenda item four'.
'So beds now cause the plague as well'. says the governor in exasperation.
Fearing for his temper and his sanity, he excuses himself for a moment.

Seeking the air, the governor takes a few steps out on to the balcony. With a curfew now in operation to save the lives of the citizens, the square below is, naturally, packed with people. Sadly, his balcony seems to be at a slightly different scale to his body and so it is a lot smaller than he expected. Unable actually to fit on it,  he goes back inside. He returns in the middle of an animated conversation.

'What about chaise longues?' Entendre is asking Lippe. 'Are they beds, and so a health concern, or are they chairs and thus safe? And bunk beds - they must be like four-legged death pits!'
'I couldn't comment', says the mayor, 'not being a health professional and all. But we certainly need to do something about the shortage of britches. We can't have people going out without trousers on. This is Fenwick. Even with underwear still on, such a situation is likely to result in the proliferation of the illegal use of such words as "bulge", "wobbly", and "crease". The hoarding of britches could cause a rebellion worse even than the Thirty Years War'.
'Are you sure?' says the governor. 'Because that was quite a bad war as wars go'.
'Believe me, sir' replies the mayor. This is Fenwick. I was there in Camberwick Green in '47 when Prince Joachim's codpiece fell off. It took days to restore order. And even longer to find someone that could safely pick up the codpiece'.

Later, Entendre and the governor repair upstairs.
'This is nice and roomy' says Entendre. 'But also lacking strangely in furniture'.
'Yes', says Schroedinger. 'There is furniture, but it seems oddly two-dimensional'.
'That must make it difficult to sit down', replies the colonel.
'Yes, but it helps with the cleaning. Now, tell me the latest news on the enemy forces'.
'Well, sir - it might be time to break out the champagne; or, depending upon what we have left, the pickled onions and napkins. For the plague has had a pleasantly terrible effect upon our hated adversaries'.
'The nuns?', asks Schroedinger
'Nay sir', replies Entendre. 'The army of the coalition of the Spasmodic Sanction - the enemy besieging us'.
'Do tell, colonel!' says the governor. 'Do tell! What is going on in the enemy camp?'

Plague!

And so, unbidden, plague came to the lands of Mittelheim. No one knows from whence it came; nor, indeed, where 'Whence' might be; or, in truth, whether 'whence' is the right word and whether 'from' might be better and a bit less pretentious; and also, in parallel, whether the word 'unbidden' isn’t also a bit lah-di-dah. Whatever, plague has arrived: the hard hand of Pestilence, stalking the land like a taller-than-average stork with a dodgy hip, laying low both lord and peasant, though the former at least probably has a better quality of pillow to be low in.

As the numbers of afflicted begin to mount*, the citizens of the wide lands of Mittelheim turn to the most important and pressing issue: finding someone to blame. Foreigners are an obvious choice: as any self-respecting Mittelheimer knows, silly accents have been for centuries a sure cause of epidemics. Sellers of soap have also quickly found themselves in metaphorical hot water. Many blame excessive bathing as a self-evident source of the virulent malaise. For others, mainly in Fenwick, the origin is widely believed to be bad humours caused by contact with rudely shaped fruit and vegetables.

One of the few in Mittelheim that might view the plague in a more positive light is Death himself. For him, the sudden bout of mass illness has come as a bit of a relief. With the slow pace of military operations in the region, there has been much less to do of late. This new and sudden increase in earthly expiration has had for Death at least two benefits. First, since many of those that have expired have been in their beds, there has been much less bending down to do, which has helped Death with his lumbago.

Mittelheim Plague Doctors with a Local Quack

Second, it has stopped Death's apprentice, Cheese, from continuing to suffer terminal boredom. Boredom generally is rarely a good thing: but it becomes a partcular problem if the individual it afflicts literally has the power of life and death. Statisticians studying the manner of recent fatalities in Mittelheim might well raise an eyebrow at some of the new categories of mortality that have emerged in these recent times; times which Death suspects probably correlate heavily with those periods when he was on a break and Cheese was in charge of the reaping of souls. Thus, in addition to the more expected categories of final departure (such as the pox, flux, dropsy, biliousness, canker, and effluvia), there has been an increase in incidences of death through such causes as: the inhalation of potatoes; being crushed by a commode; being Welsh; having a terminally curly moustache; and being morbidly afraid of underwear. Indeed, there have been more than the usual number of souls that have found that their journey towards the white light has been accompanied by the sounds of someone sniggering.

This new turn of events has had some profound implications for the conduct of military operations during the current war in Mittelheim. In Fort Pippin, the governor ruminates on its implications ...







* Except in Fenwick, where, for obvious double entendre related reasons, the list of casualties can only 'grow' rather than 'mount'.

Roll Out the Barrow! Or Not!

Across the battlefield, Nabstrian musketeers survey the damage to their trenches (below).
'Is that a crossword puzzle?' asks one, pointing.
His comrade reaches down. 'Yes, it is: but it's covered in something sticky. Syrup, probably'. He considers the mess. 'Hopefully'.
'How on earth would they think that such a thing would stop the progress of our siege?' asks the other fellow.
'No idea, the fools', replies the other. 'Now, eight down: "Large proboscis on an elephant. Five letters. Begins with "T"'.
'What?'
'Eight down. Elephant. Large proboscis. Begins with "T". And someone has also helpfully filled in an "L" and a "Z". That's nice of them'.
'Oooh, yes', says the other eagerly. 'We'll have this finished in no time'.

(Below) At his headquarters, General Rheinfunkt takes the report on the enemy raid. 'So', he says to his assembled staff. 'So - in summary, almost no losses. A couple of musketeers dead that I probably didn't like anyway. Minor damage to the approach trench; and also a wheelbarrow stolen. And that for an entire enemy company wiped out!' He begins to chuckle merrily. 'Ha ha ha ha! How could they think that a bit of damage and a stolen wheelbarrow would in any way impede the progression of my siege. Ha ha ha ha! As if we would have only one wheel barrow in our army! Ha ha ha ha! Only one wheelbarrow! Ha ha ha ha! Ha, ha ... ha ... ha ...'

His laughter comes to a stop as he looks at the faces of his subordinates. Just then, behind them, the general notices a pioneer who seems to be walking from the direction of the trenches. He is carrying carefully two handfuls of earth.
Colour begins to rise in Rheinfunkt's cheeks. The veins on his temples begin to inflate like boa constrictors that have foolishly decided to snack on some compressed gas. 'No. No. You have to be joking ... You can't tell me ... just ... one ... just one ...barrow'. His eyes protrude dangerously and his fingers clasp and unclasp as if they are kneading some particularly sticky dough; or as if, perhaps, they were wrapped around the necks of some of his headquarters staff.
'So tell me, gentlemen - what now?' the general asks in a dangerously hoarse whisper.
Suddenly, there is a gurgling sigh: one of the staff officers falls to the ground with a thump.
'Why yes!' says Rheinfunkt with sarcasm. 'We could all have a little nap! A lovely little snooze! What a marvellous, marvellous ...'
'No, sir!' says another officer, attending his supine comrade. 'I think, sir, that he might be ill!'
'Actually, I feel a bit peaky', says another, before tumbling to the floor.
'Permission to collapse suddenly and perhaps be bit sick, sir' says yet another, saluting, as he then keels over.
'What the ... ?' says the general, suddenly alarmed ...

Wheel Meet Again!

(Below) From their position on the battlements, Governor Schroedinger-Skatt and Colonel Entendre can hear in the gloom to their front the sounds of mortal combat. Or, combat that, if it isn't actually mortal, probably still stings quite a lot. The colonel peers into the darkness, keen to discern from the sound and the occasional sight of the orangey-red discharge of muskets, some clue as to the developing outcome of the sally.

'What do you think is going on, my lord' he asks the governor.

Schroedinger-Skatt blows his cheeks and shrugs. 'Well, Entendre; terrible defeat; embarrassing episodes of military incompetence; poorly conceived plans, executed in an even more mediocre fashion; all punctuated by an unmanly soiling of undergarments'.

'So you can see the action, sir?' replies the colonel, craning his neck enthusiastically to try and observe the enemy positions.

'Oh no, colonel', replies Schroedinger. 'I'm just using experience to fill in all the blanks'.

The fighting begins to die down, signalling that some kind of resolution might have been reached to the events of the sally. As the sound of combat dwindles, however, another sound begins and then commences to get louder. It consists of a combination of a terrible squeaking and creaking: as if a surprisingly large octogenarian mouse was trying to to sprint towards some cheese; or as if a bagpipe player, lustily winding his instrument, had just had a heavily laden cart run over his testicles. Luckily for both, it is neither. Instead (below), it is Captain Dreihumpe bringing in the remains of his command. His has with him a barrow, the wheels of which seem to have been last oiled some time before the cretaceous period. As spoils of war, the barrow isn't especially impressive; but the captain hopes that with the right narrative, the continued darkness, and perhaps some tinsel, if it can be easily obtained, it might be sufficient to have his attack judged a success.

The governor and the captain peer down into the defences. There is movement, indicating the return of the Fenwickian troops. Colonel Entendre listens to the rising din. 'Is this victory, my lord - or do you think this signals an embarrassing defeat?'
The governor snorts. 'I think, colonel, that your options are overly optimistic. I would say that the likely choices are between an extremely embarrassing defeat, and an embarrassing defeat that was made even worse by, say, the random detonation of orphans, or the arrival of some nuns. I suspect there are no good outcomes to choose from'.

(Below) As the remaining company of grenadiers nears the safety of the covered way, Dreihumpe begins to worry a little at the depressed aura surrounding his force. If he is to sell the loss of half of his mean as a military success, then it is important that his returning troops should carry with them the whiff of victory, or at least, that amongst all the other whiffs the permeate his men, victory might be a discernable sub-note.
'Men, you have done sterling work. Walk like heroes!' cries the captain.
'How do heroes walk, sir' enquires one of the men.
Dreihumpe considers this. 'Well, I suppose that one's posture would involve heaving the shoulders back, and pushing one's manly parts to the front'. This, of course, is an unwise thing to say.

Whilst the captain might have meant by the phrase 'manly parts' such things as one's chest and chin, his troops are Fenwickian and sadly have in full measure the wearisome sensitivity to double entendre for which the imperials are famous. As his command dissolves into a hooting heap of 'fnars', Dreihumpe finds a sudden practical use for his barrow - transporting the gibbering remains of his force back to the safety of his lines.

xXx

'So, we meet again', says the governor, greeting the captain unenthusiastically as the latter, having dismissed his troops, arrives to report.
Dreihumpe salutes smartly. 'I can report a great success!' he says. 'Behold!' says Dreihumpe triumphantly, gesturing towards his barrow.
'You can report a great success', says the governor, 'in the same way that I can report having given birth to an ostrich. Which is to say, that the saying of something does not in itself make that something real'. He examines the wheelbarrow. 'Why did the enemy put tinsel on it?'
'I cannot say, sir', replies the captain. 'But I guarantee, my lord, that right now the enemy are panicking, having lost their key means of wheeled mud-related transportation.'
'I wouldn't bet on it', sighs the governor. 'Soldier, are you feeling alright?' he gestures towards one of the nearby gunners. 'You look a little ... sweaty'.