There's a Red House Over Yonder

It's the wee small hours, a partial moon hangs sullenly over a warm spring night. Only a couple of things are moving anywhere near the warren - most good bunnies are fast asleep in bed. Deep, dreamless sleeps courtesy of the jury-rigged golden carrot.

Two conies are sweating.

<Scrape>

Puff, pant. Puff, pant.

<Scrape>

These are two bucks, similar enough to be litter-brothers, dragging a supermarket bag full of something large and block-shaped. On their hands we can just ascertain the glint of gold.

<Scrape>

Puff, pant. Puff, pant.

"Biggs," Says one of the rabbits.

Puff. "Wedge," Says the other, who is probably, by the first law of narrative, called Biggs.

Pant. "Biggs," Says the first one again. If we apply the second law of narrative we will be able to determine that this coney is Wedge.

<Scrape>

Puff.

Pant. "I've always wondered."

<Scrape>

Puff. "Wondered what?"

Pant. "Well, when Mum named us..."

Biggs stops and let's Wedge try to scrape the bag forward on his own. He fails.

"When Mum named us?"

"Well," Says Wedge, "Were we named after the characters in Star Wars or after the characters in the Final Fantasy games?"

Biggs shoulders his edge-of-bag again and motions Wedge to do the same. "One, two, three!"

<Scrape>

"Well," Biggs says, "Seeing as how I thought that the Final Fantasy characters were named after the Star Wars ones then I don't think it matters that much."

"Humm." Wedge agreed.

<Scrape>

"Biggs," Wedge starts again, "What are we doing?"

Biggs looks at Wedge. "We're carting this thing to the North Warren entrance. As requested."

<Scrape>

"But why?"

"Why what?"

"Why do we serve him?"

"You saw what he did to the Elders?"

"Humm."

"That's why."

<Scrape>

"But why are we wearing the rings?"

"Because it's best to be on the inside."

"Oh."

<Scrape>

"Biggs?" Wedge asks, "Have you seen how he's treating Lotte?"

"What you mean the Right Hand of the Old Oppressive Regime?"

"Yeah, the young doe, the cute one."

"Masterfully."

"He hits her." Wedge says quietly. "Have you seen that?"

Biggs is quiet.

"Have you noticed how he hits her with his ring-hand?"

Biggs has a little gulp.

"With his ring-hand. For a split second as he hits her she's normal - so she feels the pain."

Biggs looks at his toes then manages to speak. "I hear he's pairing off the single bucks and does - you know - the workers. For breeding."

"Let me get this straight," Wedge says, "we're working for the nastiest piece of work just because he's the nastiest piece of work around."

"Umm."

"Because we were in on the ground-floor we're privileged and keep our free-will."

"Umm."

"Our free-will means that we get to cart around great heavy objects on his say-so at three am in the morning."

"Umm."

"Our free-will means that we get left out when the totty is handed out because we're soldiers, not workers."

"Umm."

"You know when mum said that we'd never amount to much because we're thick?"

"I remember that..."

"You know what don't you?"

"Yep."

"Yep, she was right."

"So what do we do?"

"You remember how she told us we were weak-willed?"

"She was right there too."

They shrug, then look at each other then shrug again.

<Scrape>

Puff, pant. Puff, pant.

<Scrape>

Puff, pant. Puff, pant.

<Scrape>

We'll fly up into the air and watch their travel. We can do this because we're not actually doing the work, and reading "Puff, pant" for an hour and a half could be a little boring and I don't want to lose any readers I've managed to keep up to this point.

So, imagine their trail as a winding path of dots and dashes leading from the northern woods to the north-most entrance of the warren. Let's rejoin them as they un-pack the bag there. Day is almost at the stage of thinking of breaking.

"Biggs?"

"Yes Wedge?"

"Is this safe in the open?"

"Well, he was going to send a couple of workers to box in it tomorrow."

"Good."

They stand back and look at the block they've brought here. It's of white plastic, with two metal lugs on the top - one with a surround painted red one with a surround painted black. A large emblem on the side proclaims "12 V" and "Suitable for all makes of car". Some smaller lettering quantifies that statement in legalese.

Biggs pulls a couple of spindles out of his pockets and hands one to Wedge.

Each coney attaches a large metal clip to one of the terminals and starts walking away from the battery, letting wire out of the spindle as they go.

They walk backwards, into the warren.

We'll skip ahead to the Head Buck's offices. Inside we find Gilchrist pottering over his Heath-Robinson coney mind-control device.

In a dark corner we can just about make out a cowering doe - quite probably Lotte.

There is a knock on the door.

"Enter." Gilchrist says without turning his back.

There is a short scuffle as the brothers attempt to go through the doorway at the same time. Finally Wedge enters first and, rolling wire as he goes, steps towards Gilchrist in the most deferential way he can.

He hands the remnants of the spool to the dark coney.

"Positive or negative?" Gilchrist intones.

"Umm. The black one. I think." Wedge replies.

"Mine was not black, I'm sure of that." Biggs chips in. Gilchrist rolls his eyes in a "why me" manner then attaches Wedge's end of wire to his contraption.

Wedge backs away and lets his brother come forward.

Gilchrist takes the second wire. "Hold yourselves steady." He tells the bucks, then he attaches the second wire.

There is a small spark, and Wedge and Biggs shake. From our vantage point we can see a force rippling out from the pear in the centre of the table. Gilchrist isn't touched. The figure in the corner retches.

We'll take a quick jump out of the warren and, from a vantage-point high above, we can see the shock-wave passing out of the warren and into the surrounding fields and woods. It takes over a mile before it dissipates. Well that was interesting; let's pop back inside to see Gilchrist congratulating the brothers.

"And so, as we have expanded out sphere of influence enormously we should be on the look out for conies that were missing, because they will be coming back!" He smiles from ear to ear (which is rather impressive on a rabbit).

"Thank you sir!" The brothers say in unison.

"Get yourself a couple of hours sleep, boys. You could have a lot of work ahead of you the next few days."

"Thank you sir!" They reply as they shuffle out, with a predictable crush trying to get through the door backwards.

---*---

'Mad' Malc opened his eyes in the early morning sun. He breathed a deep sigh of contentment as the warmth suffused his body. He looked up at the tree above him and started to count the leaves.

Hitting the count of two thousand he suddenly realised the problem. He sat up straight and looked at the space beside him. The empty space beside him that Phump had occupied the night before.

He swore.

In five languages.

He felt the need to invent a new language just to be able to swear properly. Then remembered a smattering of Afrikaans he'd picked up after returning and realised there was no need.

He felt the ground where Phump has been sleeping. It was still warm.

"Gone for nearly an hour." He estimated, then stood up scanning the clearing for clues.

His eyes alighted on a broken blade of grass, he went to it and felt it's temperature. He nodded to himself and started off into the woods at a jog. Northwards, back towards the warren.

He made good time, he knew pretty much where Phump was headed - the same place that all other unprotected conies would head. To the Carrot. Or rather the jury-rigged pear. So he could leave the trail and take shortcuts rather than following it slavishly, however it was important to catch up with Phump before he was found by the guards.

Malc came to the edge of the woods to see Phump being escorted towards the warren by a couple of guard bucks.

He hesitated for a fraction of a second (the exact fraction is available upon request) and raced down the hillside.

He stopped just past the bucks.

"It's okay lads," He said to the guards, "I'll take him from here." He held his hand out towards Phump.

"Sorry sir," Wedge said, "We're under strict orders from the Lord himself."

"So am I son, so am I." Malc had his fingers of his left paw crossed tight. "Hey," he exclaimed, "You're still wearing the rings!" Wedge looked at Biggs and Biggs looked at Wedge.

"Yeees." Wedge said.

"Didn't they tell you?" Malc said, his crossed fingers starting to hurt, "You only need to wear them for a day and you're immune!" he quickly uncrossed his fingers and waved both paws at them.

"They didn't tell us." Biggs said in a small voice. "They never tell us anything."

"Look," Malc said, "if you give me the rings I won't make an issue of it. You know what they're like - they might decide you kept them on purpose!"

The brothers gulped and Biggs quickly yanked his ring off and handed it to Malc.

Of course he immediately went blank-faced and started to walk off in a daze towards the warren.

Wedge saw this. He also saw Malc's fist just before it knocked him out.

"Thank god for dumb guards." Malc said as he robbed Wedge of his ring too. "Looks like these rings don't work the way Gold rings used to. Guess he didn't want any intellectual equals this time round.

Phump had started to wander off after Biggs and Malc had to quickly catch him. He forced a ring onto his finger. As soon as he regained his free will, Phump fell over and quickly started the 'Where am I?' phase.

"Come on," Malc said holding a hand out to Phump. "We've got to get you out of the range of his control. Which grew surprisingly rapidly overnight." Phump got to his feet. "I'd say he's got a new power-supply."

"Are you okay?" Phump asked Malc, "You seem a little, well, un-strange?"

"Yeah," Malc replied, tugging at Phump to follow him, "These things affect me differently. Long Story."

They padded off away from the warren into the woods.

"We've got a long time..." Phump said.

"Not really." Malc said sadly, "Once we get out of range of the carrot I'll be back to normal. You'll have to look after me then."