Tuesday, May 1, 2012

Morris Dance

Venexia

The Morris Dance group was being watched very closely by the authorities, the authorities being the secret service and a handful of police task forces plus a local makeshift amateur detective, Mr. Still, who was determined to find out exactly what was going on.
Some believed it was a case of infidelity, others a case of stolen identity, but the cunning detective was sure it was something far more complicated than that.
Every time the group scheduled a trip out of town to perform in a neighboring village, a convoy of countless cars, vans and a bike would try to look inconspicuous and follow the Morris Dance crew. It was quite an extraordinary sight. Electric companies, garages, gardening enterprises, all took an unusual interest in what the dance party was up to.  It would seem like they had money invested in the group, the way they kept following them everywhere in their vans with tinted windows.
The only one who looked like someone following someone else was the amateur detective. On his bike, he struggled to keep up (he was a bit of a clunk in what motorized vehicles were concerned and no way he was getting behind a wheel, he had decided many moons ago).
As the Morris gang arrived to the nearby village (thank God, it had had been a short trip, thought Mr. Still), the blatantly wannabe-anonymous entourage scattered in all directions trying to find a spot to park their mobile units.
There was a sense of celebration in the village. It was decorated with little flags and bright colors. Somehow, this celebratory mood visibly contrasted with all the men and women hiding behind columns and talking into their sleeves.
Now, Mr. Still did nothing of the sort. He paraded himself in front of the pub where the group was to perform and even approached one of them, TomTom, to salute their enormous talent but the dancer waved and walked away as quickly as possible, thinking that that chubby middle-aged man looked like a groupie in the making and he absolutely dreaded those people.
So, Mr. Still decided to surreptitiously check the group’s van. There was nothing of interest inside. Odd, he thought. There had to be something. As the other services, police and secret alike, progressively closed in on the group, Mr. Still heard someone yell at him in a thunderous voice “Still! Stan Still!” The Morris Dance crew all raised their arms in unison thinking they had been caught for stealing jewelry worth millions from millionaires who moved to the country aiming to find peace in the later years of their lives; these millions were in turn shipped overseas and used as the financial basis for a very lucrative armament business. But it was only Justin Case who had spotted his best friend and was calling out for him.
The authorities praised Case’s amazing contribution to the capture of this group of dangerous criminals, TV networks lined up to interview him and, within an hour, there was talk of a book. Stan Still was as furious as he could possibly be. No one, not even Justin Case, should ever steal his minute of fame. So, not abiding by his last name, he jumped from behind the thick line of people and grabbed his friend by the neck. It was a shock to everyone to witness such a short lived case of heroism as Case fell to the ground and hit his head on the pavement.
What happened to Still, you may ask? He ended up in the same jail as the Morris Dance group, where he has become quite the groupie type annoying the hell out of TomTom.

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