Extremely BAD Fanfiction

Arthur was dead.

This should not have come as a surprise to him, as he had been expecting it from the moment of his birth, and had been well aware that it could come at any moment and from any direction. It had been drilled into him repeatedly that safety had been a primary concern, and that all other factors should be secondary to this one overriding drive. Of course, there were threats that he could do nothing about, and with those the best strategy for long term mental health had been strict obtuse observation of danger.

As such, it was quite a shock to find himself lying in mud on what probably was the worst morning of his life. The quiet chatter of workmen near the large yellow machines was both distracting and indistinct, in a manner that invited passers by to join in the boisterous discussion, which seemed to revolve primarily around the previous night's match between Millwall, and West Ham United. One of the men was quite happily gesturing towards a small bruise on his cheek, and making a rude gesture which the other workers found quite entertaining. They raised their small styrofoam cups in a cheer, and paid no attention to the nearby gentleman in suit and yellow green safety vest, making placating and patient noises into a phone nearby.

This came as another shock to Arthur, as he had fully accepted that none of this currently existed. Of course, the pounding headache behind his eyes drove home quite handily how much he had been drinking the previous evening, and the memory of the solemnly nodding heads of the local aristocrats, who agreed that indeed something should be done about the bloody council. Someone should have done something, and they would certainly look into it. About who should be doing something that is, because they of course had an important society meeting with regards to the renovation of the old church, but if Arthur would come along it couldn't hurt to know some of the local movers.

Which is why Arthur found it quite hard to remember what was and wasn't real. He was quite sure that he was dead.

Another shock ran through him, and he realized that in fact that he was not shocked at all, the motion merely being that of his cell phone, which buzzed in his pocket.

"What have I got in my pocket...?" He murmured for a moment, his mind fogged with the aftereffects of drink. The brief message that flashed notified him of an email, which happily explained to the man lying flat on his back in front of a large yellow bulldozer that his solicitor was currently in a very important online chat and could not get back to him until at least four thirty. Arthur was not pleased by this, and momentarily contemplated calling and waiting patiently to deal with yet another foul machine that sought to invade his life.

He glanced at the bulldozer, then back at his drab little house. It wasn't much of a house, but it was Arthur's, and for a moment he contemplated what he would do if he lost here today. Victory over the bright yellow monstrosity that squatted in front of his house, mechanical appendages ready to lay waste to all he had been and would ever be. His mind flitted to those persons that he in social circles referred to as his friends. No man is an island, but at this point an archipelago wouldn't be an inadequate depiction as to his mingling and going out agendas.

He leaned his head up out of the mud, trying to ignore the slightly wet feeling it left on the back of his head. The local councilman was still chattering madly into a phone, and demanding that Mr. Dent be removed from the premises with an inordinate amount of gusto, and actually reminded Arthur a bit of a small barbarian. The Councilman's little furry hat just added to the effect, and brought a slight chuckle to his lips as he imagined the slightly rotund man sitting astride a mighty horse and complaining to his aides that the Romans hadn't left the field as promised.

"Mr. Dent!" Came the call from the Councilman, who held his phone away from his head and observed the six foot tall man lying in the mud, clad in pajamas and a bathrobe. "Are you aware you're breaking the law?"

"Am I?" Arthur shouted back from the mud, and looked up at a particularly nice cloud.

"Yes. Several laws in fact." The councilman smiled back, with an impish grin. "And the Council has decided to press charges."

"Well, that's very interesting. Put it on display somewhere. I'm sure I'll see it." Arthur cheerfully suggested, before reaching out and picking a particularly nice looking clod of dirt from the tine of the bulldozer's shovel.

"Mr. Dent, you realize that this means that you are a criminal."

"Indeed. I understand that they are terrible people." Arthur nodded.

"Oh yes, absolutely." The Councilman smiled, delighted to get some forward motion on the problem.

"I hear they threaten people, make unreasonable demands and then take everything they have." Arthur nodded pointedly, looking at the Councilman with a beatific smile.

"I see what you are doing here, Mr. Dent." The councilman stated blandly.

"Well Mr... I'm sorry what was your name, I didn't get it?" Arthur asked, realizing that he had in fact, never asked the name of this officious little toady, who seemed taken aback at the question.

"I... you don't need to know my name, Mr. Dent. I am a representative of the people of..."

"Well, that hardly seems fair. With you having my name and everything and expecting me to respond to everybody."

"I'm... I work for the council and..."

"Are you sure?"

"What?"

"Are you sure you work for the council?"

"Yes, I'm sure I work for the council."

"Well, I didn't vote for you, I voted for the council. I think. I'm not quite certain, a lot of the names looked vaguely familiar, but nobody ever sees them."

"They are extremely busy people, Mr. Dent." The councilman fumed, realizing that he was not in fact, getting anywhere with this line of reasoning. "You can't expect them to come down and watch every demolition."

"So, there's a LOT of demolitions going on today."

"I didn't say that, Mr. Dent." The councilman looked slightly nervous.

"Well, you just said that they can't watch EVERY demolition, so clearly that means that there's more than one going on."

"What are you driving at Mr. Dent?"

"I'm sorry, Mr. Tubby Furhead, I..."

The comment brought a guffaw to the workmen, who had brought out small flasks and were enjoying the show.

"That is NOT my name, Mr. Dent."

"Well, I need to call you something, and it was the first thing I thought of. You could have solved that problem by..."

"My name is Prosser."

"Well, that saved us all a lot of time, and if you had just said so in the beginning, we could have...

"Mr. DENT, are you... I... what were we talking about?"

"I haven't the foggiest. I think we have established that your name is Prosser and my name Is Dent. If anything else comes up, let me know."

Mr. Prosser found himself more confused, and stepped back to the side, hurriedly consulting his cell phone and writing another irate email with both thumbs. The receiver agreed heartily that something needed to be done about this situation before it affected the potential roll out of the tourist season and the model village competition. Mr. Prosser was on the committee for the Morris Dance, and while it was no longer the main appeal to the vast majority of tourists, he quite enjoyed it, mostly for the amount of time it required for him to spend at the pub practicing. His wife also appreciated it, and had even insisted that he go as many times as he liked. An email to her was not out of the question at this time, and he busily sent her an apology that the day might run long today.

When he was finished with his numerous activities, Mr. Prosser found to his dismay that the problem had not resolved itself, and now he would be **** to find another tactic towards removing the blockage from the path of the bulldozer.