Bin To Earth - Matt Woods (android e book reader txt) 📗

own penalty area, Freal the Ghost ponders thoughtfully then turns to face Stich. “Nice work there from Sue. Who needs a 4-4-2 formation when you’ve got a Banshee whose happy to screech at the opposition then expose her knickers to them. It certainly does the job!”

The hobgoblin nods his head.

At the restart Skeleton Bob tries to keep momentum going by doing another one of his darting runs up the pitch. All goes well until he spots Shabba, a Troll, cheering from the pitch-side. His darting run soon changes to a static standstill as he greets his friend;

“Shabba. It’s been too long. How are you and the good lady troll?”

“Very well Bob, very well indeed” replies Shabba affably. The two continue small-talk whilst the game continues around them.

This unfortunate lapse of concentration re-ignites the yeti’s back into action, and during the next twenty minutes they knock in a further three goals, increasing their lead to a now unbeatable 7-1. The best of these goals comes from the yeti’s right midfielder, who pulls off a stunner of an overhead kick. Without doubt it was the goal of the tournament so far, so good in fact that the small Yeti fan base behind the goal mustered up not only their usual chorus of grunts, but also managed several high fives between them as-well.

With just ten minutes of the game remaining, The Misfits were now playing for nothing more than pride. Never one to give up, Grunt, the headless man, tries to salvage a little dignity for his team. He intercepts the ball just past the halfway line then sprints towards goal. Rather than opting for the standard kick the ball towards goal method though Grunt plumps for the lesser known tactic of ‘throwing your head straight at the goalkeepers chest’ approach!

With the goalkeeper in noticeable pain, Grunt takes full advantage by hoofing the ball into the back of the net. Although a relatively straightforward goal, Grunt was still pleased with his effort, bearing in mind his head was now forty yards away by the corner flag!

His team-mates rush up to congratulate him. Oblivious to this, Grunts body rushes in the opposite direction then, two minutes later, ends up tangled in the net of his own goal!

The remaining minutes pass with little incident, and Jamba the anxious finally blows his whistle to signal the end of the game. One or two boos from the crowd are overhead, several fans seemingly miffed by the Misfits below par performance. One particularly irate wizard yells out that they were ‘all a bunch of blockheads’ whilst a normally mild mannered elf yells out ‘pillocks’ to anyone who cared to listen!

Although downhearted, the Misfits knew they’d tried their best. The fact that their best was downright abysmal wasn’t the point! Pre-match predictions had the majority forecasting a 20-0 whitewash to the yeti‘s, with most reckoning that half of those goals would come from The Misfits inadvertently scoring in the wrong net. So in actual fact they’d exceeded expectations, and that was something for them to be proud of.

As ever the gentleman, or maybe more accurately gentle-skeleton, Skeleton Bob strides over to the referee and crouches down to shake the dwarfs hand;

“Thanks Jamba. Not one of your better games but ad-least you tried.”

“Thh…thh…thanks Bob.” replies Jamba nervously, pulling his sweaty palm away from Bob’s skeletal hand. “You never know, one day I might be cc…confident and take no ner…ner…nonsense on the pitch.”

“I doubt that very much.” replies Bob cheerfully. “Anyway, keep your pecker up. Do you fancy joining us for a few drinks?”

“I better not” replies Jamba, clearly pleased Bob had thought to invite him. “I promised B…B…B…B…B-”

“Not to worry then” says Bob, who, for all his friendliness, had little patience when Jambas stutter exacerbated! He walks off to catch up with his pals.

Elsewhere the yeti’s celebrate their resounding victory with a mixture of back slapping, high fives and a copious amount of grunts. Their prize, a bronze statue of a hamburger, would be presented to them at next week’s annual dinner dance at Mystic Malcolms.

By now the crowd was starting to disperse. Some head homewards, to return to their dearly beloveds, whilst others head off back to their day jobs. A small group, however, think of a far better plan, and that is to depart to the local watering hole, Compton’s Tavern, to drown their sorrows.


DRINKS


Having a tipple was a popular past-time in Elzac, there being dozens of taverns, alehouses and beer huts located throughout. The wizards and the dwarves were generally regarded as the most hardened drinkers out of the variety of creatures who inhabited the land. It was not uncommon to see a group of inebriated dwarves singing very drunkenly outside Glossops Tavern, or a party of wizards casting all manner of contentious spells inside Hamlads Inn. On one particular occasion Greybold the Wizard had got so legless he’d ended up casting a spell which, unintentionally, caused a young pair of elves, out on their first date, to spend the evening performing an Irish jig. They obviously hadn’t wanted to, but couldn’t stop themselves. It wasn’t until six hours later, when Greybold was beginning to sober up, that he remembered how to reverse the spell. Needless to say the courting couple then had one or two choice words to say to the wizard, his response being to collapse forwards into them and knock them flying!

So with the football match over, several of The Misfits make their way towards Comptons Tavern. It was a popular haunt for post-match drinks, as not only did it contain the requisite bar and seating area, it also had several showers and changing rooms to allow the players to freshen up.

Although it was only a short walk to the tavern, this still gave Fizz plenty of time to try her hand at chatting up Freal. Frustrated there’d been minimal opportunity to flirt with the ghost throughout the match, she was now keen to grasp the opportunity to make up for lost time!

"Oi. Handsome!" shouts the witch as she and Sue the banshee head up Sinbads alley, the main walkthrough to the tavern. Freal is up ahead with Stich and is not amused.

"I wish she'd find some other mug to letch after" says the ghost to his pal. "She's really starting to freak me out."

Freal turns and looks at the witch. As he does so she flutters her eyelids at him in a most exaggerated manner, then rounds off her display of affection by blowing him a kiss. Shaking his head, Freal turns back around and continues to walk.

"She asked me round to hers the other night." says Freal, as both himself and Stich walk around a protruding branch.

"Oh yeah. What for?" asks Stich, letting out a small chuckle.

"Cribbage." replies Freal impassively. "She says she loves a good old card game."

"Yeah right" says Stich, still sniggering. "So did you go then?"

"Nah. I told her me and a few of the lads were gonna head over to Ole Ma Flannigans to do a haunting."

"Bet she wasn't happy about that" replies Stich. "What'd she say?"

"She called me a transparent fool and told me my wellies were daft!" replies Freal.

Stich glances down at Freals bright pink wellingtons then looks back at his pal.

"She has got a point chum. They don't really suit the image."

Freal looks a shade dejected. "It's all they had left. Well apart from a bright yellow pair with pictures of Scotch Eggs on."

Stich just shakes his head as they both continue towards the Tavern.

Lagging behind the others were Skeleton Bob, Ross the zombie and Grunt, the headless man. Grunt was lugging his head underneath his arm as usual whilst Ross was trying his best not to stumble into his two pals. To be fair to the zombie his movement on the whole was relatively stable, although he was prone to the odd tumble every now again. He was a tall, lanky figure, with a quite shabby taste in fashion, preferring to opt for the ripped shirt and torn trouser look. He felt this sort of apparel was in keeping as to how a modern day zombie should present themselves.

Skeleton Bob on the other hand had a much more straightforward appearance. He was around six foot six, possibly six foot eight tops, bony, as one would expect, and rarely adorned any clothes. Occasionally he might be spotted wearing a rain coat and holding an umbrella if the weather turned suspect, but on the whole he opted for the exposed bones approach.

The trio pass over a small stone bridge. Their humiliation at the hands of the yetis was still fresh in their minds and Skeleton Bob was beginning to question whether there was any point in entering next years’ competition.

"We just made fools of ourselves really." says Bob as they head over the bridge and back onto the path.

"Ot wasn't fair." adds Ross, struggling with his speech as always. "They were far bugger than us."

"And why on earth did we have Jamba the neurotic as ref?" says Grunt, his eyes peering at Bob from underneath his masters arm. "Surely booting a head across the pitch warrants ad-least a booking."

"I couldn't agree mire." concurs Ross, loosing his balance slightly as they turn a corner. "The referee was shot."

Bob looks at the zombie. "It isn't half a good job your speech lets you down sometimes Ross.” he says with a wry smirk. “How is the course going by the way?"

"Not bad Bib think you. List week I learnt how to pronince the words ' drunk, sick, hangover and never again. I did striggle with the words bittle of boer though because I kept pronincing it bittle of boer."

Whilst Bob smiles to himself, ahead of them Fizz starts jumping up and down and twisting her ankle length skirt around. Life to the witch was one big joke, and she loved nothing more than making the male population squirm with her teasing behaviour. Because of her flippant nature, Fizz had very few friends, though for some reason she had formed a very close bond with Sue the banshee.

Their friendship went back many years, Fizz first meeting Sue when she was called out to the final wail of her next door neighbour, Nishka. Sue had knocked on Fizz’s door that day to inform her that Nishka was in the final throes of life. Whereas Sue had hoped Fizz would show pity and offer support to her severely ill neighbour, she instead told Sue ‘that the daft old biddy deserves it cos she’s never mown my half of the lawn in the twenty years she’s lived there!’

Not quite the response Sue had been looking for, but nevertheless it got them both talking and a friendship was struck up which has remained ever since.

As they continue along the path towards Comptons Tavern, Fizz shows a rare moment of concern to a fellow being;

“You don’t seem yourself today Sue. Is everything okay?”

Sue turns and looks at Fizz. “Oh, I’m alright. I got a bit of a grilling at work yesterday which is playing on my mind but apart from that I’m fine.”

“What happened?” enquires Fizz.

“Well hardly anything really. I just forgot to update the spread-sheet with all the wails I’d done that day. It put all their figures off kilter apparently.” says Sue, ducking as a