Headphones disconnected via yank, the stereo's speakers let out a pulsing, blasting, ear-splitting whine akin to a screeching competition between Yoko Ono and a billion boiling kettles. If only to protect himself from this evil noise, Crumpet-Hands Man clamped his crumpets over his ears; yet the unrelenting, unpreventable whine brought our grimacing hero to his knees. As the whine grew ever-more severe, breaching the very core of our hero's brain, he began to feel himself smothered under a stifling drowsiness, as though he were being subjected to the most tedious lecture in all of human history, while at the same time lots and lots and lots of millipedes with unkempt fingernails were skidding down a blackboard.
Meanwhile, on the other crumpet-hand (not literally), Detective Pilchard was seemingly unaffected; if anything, deaf to the whine, he couldn't understand why his partner was writhing around on the floor. Cramps, perhaps? (Or heatstroke, if you're reading this series of adventures back to blah.)
“Please! I beg of thee! Turn off that infernal noise!” Crumpet-Hands Man pleaded of his partner. “Turn it off! Off, detective! Or I fear I may soon lose consciousness!”
“Don't worry,” the detective said helpfully. “ If you do lose consciousness, I'll help you find it.”
“Find the stereo's off switch first!” the hero said sharply.
Unable to locate the off switch or any button labelled 'toa mkanda', the detective instead instigated a more delicate course of action: he took up the stereo, stuck it under his fedora, performed a hand stand, and pounded his head jackhammer-style against the floor again and again until the stereo was silenced into many pieces. Thus, the whine was muted.
“Golly, that was a close one,” Crumpet-Hands Man gollied, the worst of the whine's effects having dissipated. He got to his feet. “It's a good job you have those eyes in your ears, detective. They're like proverbial earplugs. Or eyeplugs!” he giggled.
Having also gotten to his feet, albeit with less stability than his partner, the detective shook off the worst of his concussion; he removed his fedora, setting free a deluge of smashed electrical components. With the stereo's headphones no longer producing the whine, the figure on the stool – as yet unmentioned in this chapter – came around from their slumber; their purpose to the plot concluded, they said, “Thanks for saving me, Crumpet-Hands Man and his sideways eye-eared friend; I feared The Slumberer's slumber sound would've had me slumbering forever, ” they added before whisking themselves away, never to be seen or heard from again.
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“Well now,” Detective Pilchard said proudly with a clapping of his hands, causing both himself and our hero to jump, “that's another mystery done and dusted. The Slumberer's evil plan is foiled! Once we've landed we should pay the mayor a visit, so she may reward us with tea and medals and the like, like.”
“I would not be so certain of our victory just yet, detective,” our hero reasoned, mid air. “I fear that every man, woman, child and moth in Trifle City may soon be subjected to that very whine which afflicted myself and that poor snoozing figure...
“That's right, detective,” Crumpet-Hands Man replied, despite the absence of a question. (For time and plot for wait man no.) “Unless we find him first, I fear The Slumberer is going to put Trifle City entire population into a slumber! Permanently! Now come on, detective,” our hero cried, making haste from the mattress factor. “Outside! To the Crumpet-Mobile!”
Into the Crumpet-Mobile our heroes leapt, Crumpet-Hands Man via the driver's side, Detective Pilchard via/through the passenger window. With a screech of crumpet-tyres, they were away; yet despite racing into the centre of Trifle City as fast as the Crumpet-Mobile would carry them, our heroes arrived too late to prevent The Slumberer from unleashing his sleep-inducing whine upon an unsuspecting and previously awake population. (Our heroes were safe from the whine, as the Crumpet-Mobile was double-glazed; as in terms of glass, not icing.) Indeed, as he thrashed his two-seater crumpet on wheels up and across the city's pavements at an unceasing velocity, Crumpet-Hands Man was aghast at having to swerve around so many ambling people, the whine overwhelming them, the poor souls literally sleepwalking in a feckless, direction-less mass.
“Where could they all be fecking?” Detective Pilchard wondered from the passenger seat, ear pressed squarely to the window.
“The edge of town,” Crumpet-Hands Man replied in a downcast, bitter tone. “The Slumberer is no fool. As you well know, my dear detective, the first settlers of Trifle City built the pillars of their megalopolis on the verge of a cliff; now, due to centuries of erosion and rapid expansion, all that separates the city's lemming-like citizens from sleepwalking into the sea is a hundred-foot plummet off the sidewalk!”
“That,” Detective Pilchard said, encouragingly, “and us.”
Our hero spun to his partner in rejuvenated agreement – taking his eyes off the pavement, running down several zombified bystanders in the process. (No harm was caused. The Crumpet-Mobile was super spongy. And insured.)
“You're quite right!” our hero declared, speeding away from the scene. “We shall previal! If The Slumberer wants to put this city to sleep, then he'll have to get up mighty early to prevent us chickens from watching his worm! Right, Jimmy?”
The detective blinked, bewildered. Our hero *panged* before setting his frying pan aside.
“Never mind,” he blahed, “I'm getting ahead of myself.”
