Footnotes

*Unfortunately I have had no luck in discerning what the initials LCC stood for. Several academics have suggested various possibilities, including one outlandish idea involving Elephants** although none have been universally accepted. [Back]

**Elephant: a large herbivorous mammal, Elephas maximus of south-central Asia or Loxodonta africana of Africa, having thick, almost hairless skin, a long, flexible, prehensile trunk, upper incisors forming long curved tusks of ivory, and, in the African species, large fan-shaped ears. Now extinct. [Back]

***Sign-off: Synonymous with the colloquial ancient phrases such as ‘I own you bitch’ [Back]

**** For that I recommend a rather voluminous body of work by Lord Night. Curiously, Lord Night is a direct descendant of The Castrators arch enemy, the person who dealt the final blow to her reign and toppled her political tyranny, the respected St. Darkus Knightus. [Back]

*****Ridley: One can only hypothesize a reason for The Castrator choosing this as the secret code. A closer reading of her life shows a somewhat obsessive and neurotic insistence that she once worked as a ‘Ridley Scott’, what exactly a ‘Ridley Scott’ is has unfortunately been lost in the wayside of history. [Back]

******Gents: Acronym- Genetically Engineered Transportation Stratagem. [Back]

Epilogue

Alas, my dear and faithful readers, the time has come for me to lay down my scribe. But, fear not, the true adventures of the Red Owls have yet to begin. For now however, I must leave the fate of our heroes up to your own imaginations.

The task at hand is too great for me to continue with at present but perhaps one day you will have the chance to read 'The Society of Shells Volume Two' to your sleepy grandchildren.

In it, they will find friends, our Bachelors of Art, on a quest to rid The Castle of The Castrator and other incredible adventures along the way. Such as how Tiger led Toni, Loukie, Captain Cook, Thor, Poom and Benji on a horrifying mission to defeat the RED Dragon, helped on by the advise of the wise sage Bambino and his faithful helper Chiaki, who watched over all of their actions with the use of a magical looking glass.

Then there is the dangerous encounter with the gang of Philipino nymphs that attempt to hypnotize Toni with their rhythmic synchronized dance, the feared 'Macarena'.

They will read too of the solo mission that Tom bore on his shoulders, to save a young girl from the clutch of a terrible paedophile who held her prisoner on a long and crumbling pier that stretched far, far over the Sea.

Fare well, brothers and sisters, we will all do well if we are to heed the advise given to Jimboy by Amphitrite. 'Follow our hearts and be good, that way we are sure to always obey the rules'.

Yours humbly,

James Mann

Chapter IX: The Workshop

He knew what he must do. All of the Bachelors must be initiated into the Society of Shells. He immediately got to work with the passion and furore of a man whose very life depended on it. He sat at the desk for almost two days, getting up only four times, once to get a glass of water, once to use the toilet and twice to stretch his legs. The other Bachelors found his behaviour very curious but Jimboy told them he was okay and that he would explain everything shortly. Meanwhile, he employed into his services and entrusted with his plan, two of the Red Owls.

The first was Barlow, a young man who bore the resemblance of an Edwardian fireman. He had the job of collecting additional Shells, for he had quite an acute eye for the shinier, more decorative ones. At times Jimboy grew concerned that Barlow was paying too much attention to the material look of the Shell and was forsaking its inner magical qualities. He had trouble in getting him to realize that each Shell was equal and it worried Jimboy to hear him mutter under his breath nonsensical and fragmented sentences about Silver Shells and how he was going to find them soon. Barlow’s main skill however was his buffing of the Shell. This became widely recognized as the Barlow buff.

The second helper was R-Bizzle, although she was very busy, it pleased Jimboy that she found the time to visit his workshop on a regular basis, commenting on his progress and suggesting various techniques that he might try. R-Bizzle is credited with the emergence of the second model of Shell necklaces, the difference being in how the Shell is attached to the string.

Soon all the Bachelors were wearing a Shell necklace. They were shown the secret hand gesture and had repeated the oath to one another. Although some of them, such as Loukie, laughed off Jimboy's insistence that the Shells were magic, they still showed good heart and agreed to be initiated. Once the necklace was on though and the oath had been said, there was no question from any of them that the Shells were indeed imbued with magical qualities.

Now they were ready to go to battle.

To be continued…

Chapter VIII: The Dream

“Jimboy! Jimboy! Wake up, you must, please!” Jimboy slowly opened his heavy eyelids to see R-Bizzle and the other Bachelors gathered around him in true concern for his well-being. As he sat up he felt rejuvenated, like he’d been sleeping on a floating cloud for the last one thousand years. He was helped to his feet by all of his friends and as they saw he was okay they began to laugh and make merry at this odd scenario. Jimboy felt a bulk in all of his pockets, he put his hand in one of them and when he drew it out the Bachelors saw that he was clutching a hand full of the brightest, glimmering Shells. They all looked at each other, confused. Tom was the first to speak up. “Hey Jimboy, what’s that you’ve got there?” “Wow, they’re beautiful!” cried Naomi. Tiger was amazed, he’d never seen such wonders.

They quizzed Jimboy all the way home but he couldn’t make any sense of it himself. It was only late that night as the Bachelors were eating their supper that he got a vague recollection of the earlier incident. He recalled to them a dream he had in which the most beautiful women he had ever laid eyes on was putting a necklace on him. As he started to explain the dream it suddenly all came back to him, it was like a curtain had been opened in his head and beyond that curtain he could see everything of the mysterious event that had happened to him. He was just about to burst forth with everything he could see before he checked himself and thought better of it. He decided it was best to digest things first and only once he had made sense of it should he attempt to describe the events to his fellow Bachelors.

That night, lying in bed, whilst Captain Cook and Benji, whom he was sharing quarters with, slept like two old drunken sailors, Jimboy recalled the magical dream with the beautiful Women in its entirety.

Her name, she told him, was Amphitrite, Goddess of the Sea. They were in a deep underground cavern, the walls of which were decorated with thousands upon thousands of bright, shining Shells. They were standing waist deep in a turquoise pool of warm water and she was initiating Jimboy into what she called 'The Society of Shells'. She asked Jimboy to make a hand gesture and repeat the words she said, then she fitted him with a Shell necklace. He was initiated. Amphitrite then explained that he would carry the power of the Sea with him wherever he went, provided he had the Shell around his neck and obeyed the rules. What the rules were she did not say, but she did say that the only way you know that you have not obeyed the rules is when you break them, so, the best thing to do is to follow your heart and be good, that way you will be sure to always obey the rules. Jimboy closed his eyes and relived his initiation into the Society of Shells. He saw the sacred hand gesture and heard the magical words “I shell, I shell, I shell obey the rules.”

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Chapter VII: Common Enemy

Emblazoned on the door, in a strange and mystical fashion, was a sign that read ‘Gents’******. He tentatively pushed open the door and stepped inside. As soon as he did so the melody ceased and was replaced by a loud, almost mechanical, humming sound. It startled Jimboy and he was momentarily disorientated. When he regained his composure he found himself face to face with the oldest Man he had ever laid eyes on. Dressed decently in attire suggestive of an adventurous life spent in exotic, far-away lands, the Old Man addressed Jimboy. “Jimboy, my name is Bernie. Welcome to my abode.” Jimboy, too confused to respond, shook the outstretched hand of Bernie, it was an unnaturally warm hand. “Ah, dear boy, you look at me like I’m an alien. I blame you not, but you’d be surprised, we have more in common than you would think. Yes, I read in your heart a hatred, not just in your own but also in all of your friends on the beach, a hatred for a common enemy. I know it as Abaddon but I believe it has once again taken the form of a female, known to you as The Castrator. Years ago it appeared to me as a female also, I fell in love, it enchanted me with its boasts and brags but it soon showed it’s true colours. It is a power hungry beast, a black hole that sucks in everything it can. I have spent my life roaming the globe in fear of it finding me but now, as I approach the end of my life, I no longer fear it. I am consumed with a burning desire to destroy it. It is no coincidence that you and your friends find yourself on this beach. This shoreline has been blessed by the Gods, the water that washes against this land is made up of the tears of Amphitrite. She has left her magic upon these shores. It’s in the Shells Jimboy, collect the Shells. If each of you confronts The Castrator with a Shell attached to your neck then you will see her power fade and she will crumble to dust.” Bernie slowly began to fade away and a heaviness descended on Jimboy. The words “the Shells Jimboy, you must collect the Shells” echoed around him and before he knew it he had fallen into the very deepest of sleep.

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Chapter VI: Melodies from the Sea

One fine morning, as the group busied themselves with their activities, Jimboy was taking a stroll along the beach, close to the shore, occasionally letting the gentle waves lap over his feet. One can only hazard a guess as to what was passing through his mind that morning but I’ll suggest that the new found freedom caused his mind to wonder to subjects he’d barely touched upon before. Imagine, if you will, that he was silently lamenting the relationship between the Sun and the Moon, and how, although both are so familiar to us, they are strangers to each other, the one constantly missing the other. Tragic, no? Perhaps Jimboy was prone to a sporadic melancholic emotion that would suddenly surge up in his chest as quickly as it would then disappear, only to be replaced with such mundane thoughts as ‘what’s for tea?’ or ‘do I have enough change in my pocket for a can of fizzy pop?’ Whatever was passing through this young mans mind was very quickly laid to rest, for what happened next is sure to test even the most credulous of you. It was a beautiful and mesmerizing sound, a hypnotic melody that swelled around Jimboy’s body. He knew not where is came from, certainly not from this world. Like nothing he had heard before the sound washed over him in waves of euphoria. The voices from another dimension were calling to him. He looked back to see if his friends could also hear the sounds but he had drifted further than he thought and they were little more than specks in the distance. Where was it coming from? The Sea, it must be the Sea. As he listened intently he felt the sound nudging him in a certain direction, he let himself be moved, submitting his body to the will of the melody, like a leaf in the wind. He found himself moving off of the beach and a few yards yonder he found a small out-house. This is where the melody had led him.

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Chapter V: New Friends

At the beginning of the trip Jimboy thought of nothing but exacting revenge upon The Castrator, he was indifferent towards the group whose company he was in and kept himself to himself. He was formulating a plan. But eventually he began to warm to a few members of the group and before he knew it he was on good terms with all of them. The terrible thoughts of revenge were slowly supplanted by those of admiration and respect for his new friends. He began to forget about The Castle and The Castrator. They all did.

For every passing minute that the Red Owls were away from The Castle they grew in stature, their spines got straighter, their step was lighter, their lungs inhaled deeper, their hearts beat stronger and their eyes glowed with an indefinable quality. They were happy.

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Chapter IV: The Insider

Within days she announced that one of her more subservient Bloodhounds, a particularly nasty and malevolent character, named Jimboy, was to accompany the Bachelors on their voyage. At least that was the perception people had of Jimboy, but the Bachelors themselves, especially some of the more intuitive ones, had good reason to believe that Jimboy wasn’t all that bad at all.

Jimboy was put through a tiring afternoon of vigorous mental and physical tests, supervised by The Castrator herself. Flow charts were analysed and bodily fluids examined, eventually Jimboy was deemed capable of fulfilling her wishes. Then, he was briefed with the following instructions…

1) To infiltrate the upper echelons of the Bachelors group, namely the Heads of the Departments (H.O.D’s) and gain their confidence.

2) To report back daily via phone or email with updates and intelligence reports on the groups activities.

3) To secretly sabotage the film, throwing its completion into jeopardy so that The Castrator herself needs to be contacted by the group for advise.

Before Jimboy left the briefing session he was given a small microphone and instructed to conceal it in his flat cap. Then he was told the code word for rescue in case anything were to go drastically wrong. The word was ‘Ridley’*****, all he had to do was to say it and The Castrator would unleash the other Bloodhounds to come to his rescue. Jimboy secretly doubted this, he suspected she would happily listen to the Bachelors beat his body to a bloody pulp and chuckle as she heard him whimper for mercy. But Jimboy would do no whimpering for her, in fact, he resented The Castrator more than anyone else. He was bitter, she had wronged him in the past and now she had made the mistake of trusting him, “more fool you”, he muttered under his breath as he bade his farewell.

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Chapter III: Caution in the Wind

That was the plan, but like all efficient tyrants, The Castrator had her underlings in every crevice of society and she soon got wind that there was talk of revolution in the air.

Our Bachelors knew to be cautious, something didn’t feel right, the tower block seemed to cast a darker and more penetrating shadow than usual and even in the most deadly of silences one felt there lurked a hidden foe. So plans were momentarily halted and all discussion of the trip outside The Castle’s walls were abandoned.

That is, however, until the Bachelors leader, a ferocious little character named R-Bizzle, had the bright idea of telling The Castrator all about the trip, but she cunningly pitched it in such a way that suggested they were making a film about how far reaching The Castrator’s reputation and fame was beyond her central domain of The Castle. This, R-Bizzle knew, would be too irresistibly nourishing for The Castrator’s ego to turn down. That is how it came to pass that the Bachelors were allowed to take temporary leave of LCC.

We'd be a foolish lot to even entertain the idea that The Castrator wasn't already one step ahead of the Bachelors. After all, she didn’t become The Castle’s Leader by being so gullible. No, she pretended to trust the group but all she was really doing was luring them into a false sense of security.

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Chapter II: Revolution

Like every great story, this one too, has at its core a hero. In this case though, it is not a Grecian lionheart that is so deserving of our attention but instead a small band of Bachelors, who went under the banner of Red Owls, the combined weight of whom would barely equal Achilles heel. It would of course be a folly to let physical appearances sway our opinion of them, for in mind and spirit we shall soon see that they had the strength of Apollo.

Every so often The Castrator commissioned all of the Bachelors to create, for her amusement, a series of films. These were, more often than not, sheer tripe, propagandist material that flattered her ego. But this time our heroes, the Bachelors afore mentioned, would not toe the party line. They had seen enough suffering, enough comrades banished to the Basement and they were sick to the very pit of their stomachs with what was happening to their beloved LCC. They had a plan. A plan to make a film that would bring down the empire, and if they failed they were prepared to join their comrades in a life confined to the Basement, or worse, as office juniors in The Castrator's own quarters. A place that few Bachelors had ever ventured and none had returned.

The Red Owls were to flee The Castle, escaping in the dead of night by an ingenious use of bed sheets tied together. They would then travel to distant lands, far from the dark cloud of The Castrator, where they could gather their thoughts and speak freely, without the fear of eavesdroppers. Then they would make a film that would inflict as much damage as possible on The Castrator's reputation. The next stage of the plan would be to then break back into The Castle, no mean feat I assure you, and by holding underground screenings they were confident that they could inspire enough people to unite and bring about change. When the time came that enough influential fellow Bachelors had seen the film they planned to hold a screening for The Castrator herself. As she would watch the film the vexation would steadily rise within her and as the final credits revealed the names of our heroic mutineers she would bay for their blood. Meanwhile, the masses of youths gathered around the tower block would be prepared to revolt and riot dark into the night.

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Chapter I: The Castle & The Castrator

The Sun was beginning to rise later and set sooner, heralding a new chapter in the lives of the habitants of The Castle, a sprawling metropolis that had at its centre the great tower block of LCC*. With the arrival of the new season, a dark cloud descended over the land. It coincided with the appointment of a new Leader. Known only as The Castrator, she took her throne at LCC and immediately began to implement her regime change. Under the dark and claustrophobic cloud the people of The Castle began to think that God had forsaken them. The braver of folk soon referred to The Castrator as ‘Lucifer’s mistress’ as she held the habitants of The Castle and especially those under her direct control at LCC (known as the Bachelors of Art) in her tight and oppressive grip. Her first law to pass was to ban everything that had not had her prior ‘sign-off’***. This came to include even the rudiments of bodily functions such as eating, excreting, talking and at one point, in a particularly strict era of Castratean law, even breathing. However, the latter was found to be difficult to police and she was persuaded by her close aids to abandon this particular policy. Alas, we have neither the time nor patience to wade through the quagmire that is Castratean law****.

Now, where was I? Yes, the Bachelors of Art, those fine young men and women, well, they found The Castrator to be constantly meddling in their affairs. Some of them were convinced that she was out simply to sabotage and undo all of their good work. There were few Bachelors that dared stand up to The Castrator. What became of those that did, you ask? They never did so again, for they were cut down to size by her sharp and spiteful tongue with a vehemence that would bring a tear to even the most hardy of characters. Humiliated and de-motivated these poor souls would often find themselves spurned by the other Bachelors, who were unwilling to socialise with them for fear of incurring the wrath of The Castrator. The LCC Basement would be the eventual resting place for such individuals, where they would spend the remainder of their days making hot refreshments for the LCC technicians and also for some of the Bachelors that found themselves in favour with The Castrator and who, from time to time, would treat themselves to taking the odd liberty over the less fortunate.

It was, all in all, a dark period in the history of The Castle.

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Preface

This ere story is one of such inconceivable wonder that some of my more sceptical readers may find reason to doubt its validity. I’ll be frank in stating that this is no place for the rational minded, for rationality is only a human construct that bears little significance to the true mystery of life. What you are about to read is a factual account relayed to me in confidence by an old acquaintance, their name shall not be disclosed for fear of reprisals. The exact time and place of the events contained herein are uncertain, but through logical deduction I have ascertained that it took place in the late 20^th to early 21^st century.

Now, if you please, embark with me on a journey into the realm of the unknown and take your place among the ranks of brave youths of whom this story is about and so gratefully dedicated.

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