The adventure: Did a pot of orange paint really save the monochrome Nelsons’ bacon? Well, sort of…
The time: December 1971
The place(s): Carlisle, England; St Paul’s Cathedral, London, England
Prompt: bang #vss365 (view original tweet)
“Five, four, three, two, one…” But where Epsilon expected a ‘#BANG!’ there came only the deep silence of Carlisle on a snowy Christmas morning many pages ago.
“Some lookout you are are!” Snapped Beta. “Eyes closed. Fingers in your ears.”
“Has it begun?” He blinked.
tree #vss365
“Begun?” tapped a cane. “Back to work number 5. Make like a #tree. Keep watch!”
“We’re in,” declared Gamma, crouched by the door.
“That it?” Epsilon muttered. “A click of a lock, not a bang?”
“It’s called style,” Alpha picked up his cane. “Leave this to us. You keep…”
still #vss365
“I know, keep watch.”
And, with that, the grouchy lookout became very #still and settled back into the shadows while Alpha, Beta and Gamma entered Dalton’s Paint Store.
Across the road, Delta was snoring at the wheel of the getaway van. Epsilon began to drift away, too.
uncertain #vss365
Inside, Alpha began popping lids of blues, reds, yellows, and greens. “Get the hoses, Beta. The sooner we switch these and get out of here, the better!”
“Everything will be black and white.” Gamma muttered #uncertainly to herself. “No maybes. Z.E.B.R.A. keeps us safe.”
thunderbolt #vss365
She crouched before a pot of crimson and dipped a finger into it, spooled a splodge into her palm. The colour of blood, she’d heard the locals say. She clenched her fist around it, opening to watch it shoot away like a red #thunderbolt onto the floor.
“You okay?” Alpha asked.
walk #vss365
He tapped his cane beside her. “Maybe you should go for a #walk? Help settle your mind.”
“I’m fine,” Gamma stood as number 2 burst in, unrolling a mass of hose pipes. “Let’s do this.”
“I had to wake that idiot, Delta!” Beta began plopping the reels into the paint pots.
persuasion #vss365
There was no #persuasion needed, just a wave of a hankie at the sleepy number four in the van. He flicked a switch and all of the colours were sucked out of the pots. A second hankie was flagged, and the pots were refilled with either a black or a white of paint.
cave #vss365
Gamma gazed at the black, dark #cave of pigment. She was about to close the lid when the jagged scarlet in her palm stayed her hand.
“Hurry!” Snapped Beta. “We need to get these tins back on the shelf.”
Alpha moved swiftly. “We’ll be legends in Z.E.B.R.A. folklore!”
between #vss365
“Not if we get caught.” Delta was at the door breathing heavy. “I think I saw Agents of T.I.G.E.R.!”
“Where?” Alpha rushed to a window, peering out into the street.
“#Between cars, buildings. Everywhere!”
“Where’s Epsilon?” Beta snapped.
“Gone. I think they took him!”
child #vss365
Alpha tapped his cane rapidly. “So close to a masterpiece that would have made Z.E.B.R.A. proud, and now it’s about to all come crashing down on the Nelson gang!”
“We should never have trusted Epsilon as lookout,” Beta spat. “He has the attention span of a #child!”
wren #vss365
Gamma, seemingly untroubled by all the commotion, placed the last pot on the shelf: a tin simply labelled #wren, with a creamy-brown colour scheme. But, inside, it was now pure white. She smiled and began combing the black of her hair. “We can still pull this off…”
harp #vss365
“Pull it off?” Beta peered through a window and caught a scramble of black stripes upon orange. “The only thing we’ll be pulling will be their #harp strings, as we beg for mercy!”
“What about this?” Gamma flipped a lid on a spare pot.
“Disgusting!” Number two scowled.
sit #vss365
“Come here. #Sit.” Gamma dipped a finger into the bright orange paint and, for a moment, was transfixed by the colour.
“You okay?” Grunted Beta, taking a seat.
“Hold steady.” Number three painted several stripes on her fellow Nelson. “There, our very own T.I.G.E.R.!”
bonny #vss365
“And that’s how you escaped?” Wellington popped an eye back in his socket.
Alpha, uncharacteristically nervous before the Duke, tried to smile but winced. “When the smoke canisters were fired in, we snuck out…”
“In your orange-striped disguise. What a #bonny sight!”
whoever #vss365
The inquest into Carlisle was held in the crypt beneath St Paul’s.
“But where is Epsilon?” Wondered Gamma.
“We had to negotiate his release.” A silence fell on the group as Admiral Nelson shuffled over, more bone than skin. “#Whoever he was, he no longer is.”
“Dead?”
hope #vss365
“Epsilon is now standing high over Trafalgar Square in my place, in my uniform. Keeping watch for any sign of T.I.G.E.R. in Forget. Or of #Hope, for that matter. And as for you four,” the Admiral handed them each a slip of paper, “consider your Z.E.B.R.A. licence revoked!”