Mr Cuckoo's laboratory lay at the end of a very long, very white, very tunnel-like hall. The laboratory itself was wide open, white, and the size of an aircraft hangar, with the ceiling rising at least 40 metres above the floor. There were no windows, the entire room was lit with a uniform white glow by massive fluorescent tubes hanging on white painted chains from the ceiling.
If it hadn't been for all the junk laying around inside it, one look would have convinced you that you'd gone blind.
And what a marvellous array of junk there was too. There were lab benches covered in mysterious glassware, with bubbling beakers and flames that flared different colours. There were stacks of cog wheels of all sizes and descriptions, piled of hydraulic thingummy-bobs, and vast heaps of nuts, screws and bolts. There were three vast robotic arms, like the sort you'd see in a car factory, lined up against one side wall. Another wall was lined with more arcane and strangely clean and shiny looking machinery.
The centre of the room was a large open space. Mr Cuckoo stood there, next to a pair of tables that could have been taken from any psychiatric hospital in the first world. Both had heavy, thick padded restraints attached to thick iron bars. Arrayed neatly around his steel and brass body were the gold dragons from the dining room. They sat in ten columns, ten deep, awaiting their master's command. One, slightly larger than all the others, stood in front of the columns, in the position normally taken by the commanding officer.
Sam sat next to the commander dragon, his tongue hanging out.
The scene at the centre of the room didn't dominate the whole view though. What did that was a glass case high up on the wall opposite the door. Inside, like a parody of Snow White, was the body of a young man, motionless.
Something moved in the corner of his eye. Chas turned to look, and caught a very quick glimpse of a man in a bright yellow shiny zoot suit scurrying behind a piece of machinery. He had been carrying a muted trumpet.
"Excellent," said Mr Cuckoo, as his two prisoners were firmly encouraged onto the two hospital beds, and more firmly strapped in. The ends of the beds were raised, so that Chas and Nics ended up in a sitting position. Chas pulled at the restraints, testing them. They didn't even give a tiny bit.
A single note came from somewhere behind the scenes, played with the nasal quality of an oboe.
"Jeremy, the collar," ordered Mr Cuckoo.
Jeremy swallowed and shuffled off to a workbench, returning with a large velvet covered jewellery box, of the sort that a very large, very precious necklace would be kept in. The box was covered in dust.
"I spent a very long time working on this," said Mr Cuckoo, taking the box from the nervous young man. "Back when my thoughts were dominated by revenge."
He took a deep breath, and blew the dust from the top lid.
Chas and Nics both sneezed, one after the other. The gold tarantula that sat on Chas's shoulder slipped and fell, straight down to the hard concrete floor. From behind the pair a spring in some machine went "b-doinggg" as it broke.
Quicker than a normal human could move, Barbra grabbed the tarantula, and transferred it back onto her shoulder. Nics looked at her strangely - was there a hint of worry in her expression there?
The same note sounded again, echoing through the room, but this time played on many instruments. It lasted a few seconds, enough time for Mr Cuckoo to flip open the lid of the jewellery box.
Inside was a heavy ornate gold collar, suitable for a lady to wear out to a very posh ball. Instead of being a chain it was a line of linked cogwheels of various sizes, all fitting together in a circle. The wheels were ornate with diamonds, and the whole thing was dominated by a large cut ruby, right in the centre of the collar.
Mr Cuckoo looked at it fondly as the hidden orchestra began its overture.
"Such beautiful workmanship, even if I do say so myself. And to think, I finally will get to test it."
He nodded to Barbra, and she came around to stand behind Chas, her very hot hands holding his face and head firm. Chas flinched at her touch, but he couldn't move a millimetre.
Taking the collar from the box, Mr Cuckoo carefully placed it around Chas' neck, moving with surprising gentleness. Chas skin crawled. There was a quiet 'snick' as the collar snapped shut.
A trumpet fanfare blared out, making Nics twitch in her restraints. No one else did, Chas because he couldn't, and everyone else not seeming to care.
Jeremy watched the installation of the necklace with avid eyes, licking his lips laviciously.
"Now," said Mr Cuckoo, standing back from Chas. "You will give me the locket."
"Go to hell," said Chas in a low, furious voice.
"Good..." said Mr Cuckoo, pleased.
Jeremy's face fell. "Wh-wh-wh-what do you me-mean, g-good?" he stuttered, outraged. "It doesn't work!"
Mr Cuckoo rounded on him furiously. "Of course it doesn't work, you bloody fool! It's not supposed to work on real humans!!"
Jeremy took a step back, terrified, hands up to shield himself. Chas seized the opportunity:
"So that's your plan, is it? Make a load of synthetic humans, control them perfectly and take over the world? It's never going to work!"
Mr Cuckoo turned back to him and laughed, loud, long and hysterically.
All the lights went off, leaving the scene in the centre of the room the only area still lit.
The orchestra swelled to a crescendo, then stopped. A single trumpet played one note, pa-pa-pa-pa.
"You don't understand," sang Mr Cuckoo into the quiet.
"That's not my plan,
It may have been, years ago.
But the day I was shot,
made me rethink the whole lot.
My plans have changed
And wouldn't you like to know..."
The orchestra picked up again, a cheerful ragtime rhythm.
"If I was an evil overlord
like the ones in James Bond
I'd have my an army, nay a horde
ready at my command
"I'd have a strange Doomsday device
with a big red button on it
to tell the world to treat me nice
and make me ruler of it
"If I was a genius, evil,
like in those crap pulp novels
I'd tell you all my plans in detail
so you could stop them, no problem"
A pause, the tempo slowed.
"But I'm not, so I won't
and you can't taunt me into it
Your time is marked, you don't have long
So enjoy it, while you can!"
He stopped, arms out flung, holding the final note.
The snare drum tapped a funky little dance rhythm. A snap of Mr Cuckoo's metallic fingers rang out like a gunshot, and he started tap dancing, the same rhythm coming from his metal feet on the floor.
The snare drum tapped another rhythm, and he replied. This carried on for several bars, each time the call and response rhythm getting more and more complicated, building up into a big crescendo.
The hundred and one golden dragons wheeled into a chorus line, tapping away with their claws in rhythm with Mr Cuckoo, high kicking and waving their front legs above their heads. They turned, and went into an incredibly elaborate set move, looking like giant cogs turning from above, before returning to their neat little line.
Mr Cuckoo watched them in indulgent fascination, waving at them like a conductor.
"Barbra," he called, "Fetch the machine!"
She dropped her hands from around Chas's head, and skipped off, as light on her feet as a ballerina into the shadows. Chas and Nics exchanged terrified looks.
The tap dance routine ended, the music slowing once more to a dreamy ballad. Jeremy stepped forward, and some trick of the light made him look like he was standing under a spotlight.
"This is my revenge," he sang softly
"Against the Agency, who cheated me,
of the only father I knew
the only father who was true to me,
and loved me.
"You can't know what it's like
when your parents go off to war
without even saying what they're fighting for
without even saying good-bye
"My grandfather raised me as his own
taught me everything that I know
And made me believe I could be
Anything I wanted to be
anything I thought I could be
anything I dreamed I could be
And the Agency, took that dream from me..."
Mr Cuckoo took a step forward into the light, laying his hand paternalistically on Jeremy's shoulder.
"So that's when you came to me," he sang.
"That's why you came to me
Your grandfather's partner, his dearest friend
I took you home and I helped you mend
your broken heart and we are dear friends
my boy..."
"More!" sang Jeremy, staring into Mr Cuckoo's dead metal eyes
"So much more than that,
You are the father I never knew
the friend who was always true to me
the person who showed me that I could be
anything I wanted to be..."
"Anything you thought you could be," sang Mr Cuckoo.
"Anything I dreamed I could be," sang Jeremy, turning to look across the room, into space.
"So I dreamed of revenge...
On the Agency...
Who stole my grandfather...
Away... from... me..."
The orchestra swung into a march beat, and Barbra Allen returned to centre stage, her lion and tarantula marching ahead of her. She pulled a very large red ribbon, at the end of which was attached a big metal box with a big red button and a red LED countdown display.
Mr Cuckoo patted Jeremy fondly on the shoulder, and stepped over towards the machine.
"This is it," he sang.
"My great machine
The use of which
I will explain
This button I'll press
to make again
the world that is broken
and the source of pain.
"Of course, I'll have to destroy the world before I can
remake it
But what does it matter when it'll be more perfect when I'm done
remaking it."
Reaching out fondly he was about to press the big red button, when:
"Nooo!" cried Nics. "You can't! You won't!"
"Oh, believe me," said Mr Cuckoo, "I will."
He walked over to her, ran one finger down her cheek, down her neck in a way that was both caressing and horribly repulsive. He sang:
"You're perfect, so you can't understand
What it is to die by inches
I die by only inches
every second of every day."
He dropped his hand before it reached the curve of her shoulder and turned to face his audience.
"Jeremy understands, and so does Sam,
what it's like to die by inches
time lost in little pinches,
every second of every day
"I will spit in the Grim Reaper's eye
I'll make a world where nothing can die
I choose to do this, and it's no lie
I'm sick of death by inches."
Mr Cuckoo turned back to Nics. He stroked her hair gently, and she flinched.
"You my dear, are perfect," he sang
"But I can't have your free will
If I'm to make the world anew
You must submit, or be killed."
The sounds of the orchestra faded away on a harsh and eerie note. The lights came back up, and the far corners of the lab could be seen again.
"Now," said Mr Cuckoo, "Let's see if this control collar works as it's intended..."
And he snapped the collar from Chas' neck, and laid it against Nics throat.
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