Esteban di Cultiva – Part 5 – 31st August 2014 (23:59)

Sirens blared across the sleepy town. The mobsters turned to one another, blind panic creeping into their faces. Sirens hadn’t been heard in the village for close to sixty years, nothing happened there apart from their meetings. It could mean only one thing.

They rolled the body of Esteban do Cultivated over and ripped his shirt open. As the buttons patted on the wooden floor boards, one of the older mobsters uttered a single curse word. Esteban had worn a wire, in his death, they would be arrested. Some tried to run but even they knew they would not escape.

Sometime later, after the forensic team had done their sweep abs the drug squad had impounded the evidence and the uniformed officers had made the arrests, fourteen affiliates all in all, they had taken less than half an hour to round up the three that had run, Jayne stepped over the body of di Cultiva, he had been placed in a body bag but at her request he remained lying on the floor. Her superior officer stepped up beside her.

As they looked down at the body, Jaynes superior spoke, “well done on this one Dawson, this is the best outcome we could have hoped for.”

Jayne held back tears but her boss knew so,etching was awry. “Detective Dawson, is there anything you want to share?” She asked, sounding strict even when she was trying to be empathetic.

“It’s just… He was going to be…” She trailed off and cradled her stomach.

“Oh Jayne,” she said, the disappointment in her voice hidden none to well.

Boring Super Heroes – Part 3 – 30th August 2014 (22:13)

What’s more useless than a radiator in the high heat of August? What’s more useless than air conditioning in the snow covered alps in December?

Me. A heater when it’s hot, a freezer when it’s cold. No one wants to be near me, and criminals laugh in my face. What’s the point.

Boring Super Heroes – Part 2 – 29th August 2014 (23:59))

Norman said, “Ding,” when his ready meal had finished cooking. He liked the sound. It reminded him of a real microwave, rather than just his hands.

The power microwave food wasn’t what Norman wanted when he wished for radioactive super powers.

Boring Super Heroes – Part One – 28th August 2014 (23:50)

“I don’t really know what else to tell you,” it said.

“All you’ve told me is that you ate some ground food and slept,” Many Tongues said, checking his notes.

“Like I say, I didn’t see nothing else. Sorry.”

“Anything else,” he said with a sigh. Talking to animals really wasn’t as useful as Will had thought. He felt that he had squandered his chances due to a poor snap decision.

“

Still – 27th August 2014 (23:51)

Nothing in the world is still. Stillness cannot and will not exist in our universe. Even when you do not move, your heart pumps, your blood rushes your lungs breath. Even in a rock, there are atoms moving and circulating and existing.

The universe is expanding outward and outward every word uttered sends it further and further into the black void which itself is running from the hot air that we are blowing out into the universe whenever we talk about the size of the universe.

The winds blow the branches, the moon moves the sea. Growth pushes trees, fuel moves cars.

Flowers bloom, baby’s smile and the world spins. Around and around in a universe that is expanding further and further.

The world is a ball of chaos that itself is covered in chaos and folly and pettiness, but so much more.

So just stop. Embarrass the chaos and take a moment to be calm, even if you cannot be still. Sit, lie down, stand up, walk with your head held high and your mind open to everything.

You will never be still, but you will be part of something extra ordinary, just from being alive.

Esteban di Cultiva – Part 4 – 26th August 2014 (23:59) – I was flying home from Italy on a delayed flight hence the delay in this upload!

“Well Jayne,” she met him with a face of stone. Her cold eyes made her pretty face fearsome. “I am not a man to down a good offer. I am a man to question an offer when it is this good however. Tell me, what do I get out of this deal.” Esteban spoke with his hands as much as his mouth, when his mouth fell silent, they fell to rest on his belly.

“You get your life back Me Di Cultiva. You get all this, you get your pool and your maids and your mistress and your wife and we leave you alone,” he gave her a wry smile that told her he wasn’t buying it. “All we ask is that you help us stop these sons of bitches, and then stop yourself. You’ll be free to live out the rest of your days on the millions of undeclared dollars you have stacked away and my team and any other that follow mine, will leave you alone.”

“And if I refuse?” He liked playing games with her, her stubbornness only egged him on.

“We arrest you tomorrow morning for drug trafficking, possession with the intent to supply, money laundering, fraud, tax evasion and I can pin at least three murders on you, more by the time you get to court. Your choice.”

Esteban di Cultiva – Part 3 – 25th August 2014 (23:34)

Esteban Di Cultiva, prided himself on being a man who women found irresistible. He had never failed to melt an icy heart, to break a glare, or to coax a woman willingly to his bed.

There was a certain finesse about his manner in seducing women but no matter how much he tried to break down the walls that Detective Jayne Dawson had built, he could do nothing that would please her.

He offered to take her coat, he offered her a seat, he paid her a compliment, he brought her a drink, he welcomed her to his home, he started some small talk with her, he tried to lighten the mood and all the while he was met with nothing but a stare that would be too cold for the Arctic, too hateful for prisoners and unlike anything that Esteban had ever seen.

After much persistence, he was forced to concede defeat and get down to business.

“As you will know Mr Di Cultiva, yours is not the only drug syndicate in the valley any longer.”

“Please,” Esteban said holding a hand up and giving her one of his famous bright white smiles. It had been said on more than one occasion that he could melt any heart with one of his smiles and bend any person to his needs. It had no notable effect on Detective Dawson. “Call me Esteban,” he finished meekly.

“Mr Di Cultiva,” she continued, “can you agree to the conditions set down by our department and help take down these other syndicates.”

“I had always been of the persuasion that the police didn’t make deals with the likes of me.”

“Things change.”

Esteban di Cultiva – Part 2 – 24th August 2014 (23:55) (in Italy at the moment and haven’t had Internet access to publish this)

Hooves clip clopped on broken pebbles as the rider slowed her horse to a trot.

Esteban rose as the rider dismounted and made use of his hitching posts. He made his way down the steps, curved and smoothed by years of use and heavy set, wealthy men and women.

“Hola,” he called to the rider, though he knew she could speak even less Spanish than him. Esteban always found it an embarrassment that he had failed to learn his mother tongue, and whenever presumed that he could speak it, he feigned disgust and walked away. It was this apparent lack of interest in anyone beneath him that won his lordship, and eventually the reason for this meeting.

“Hola, Mr di Cultiva.”

“What a pleasure it is to see you again Jayne,” Esteban made a point of keeping strictly to English. “I hope your journey wasn’t too wearisome.”

“It was alright Esteban thank you. I would sooner have met in town though,” she was clearly irritated, though Esteban suspected that was more because he knew and had used her first name. She largely preferred Detective Dawson.

“Well Jayne as much as I would have loved to come down to your office, I don’t think myself being seen leaving a police station would end very well… For either of us,” he gave her a stern look before continuing. “Besides, as I’m sure you know I have been unable to leave my grounds for some time, which is in truth one of the only reasons I have agreed to assist you. With those people out there, my life is at risk.”

“I know,” she replied with a sly smile. “I just really don’t like having to ride all the way up here so the likes of you don’t get killed.”

“Well I’m sorry that I am such a burden Detective Dawson. Shall we go inside?”

Esteban di Cultiva – Part 1 – 23rd August 2014 (23:55) (in Italy at the moment and haven’t had Internet access to publish this)

A lone horse had been spotted coming up the mountain side. A plume of dust heralded it’s arrival as it twisted in and out of tree lines and around and around the mountain, winding its way up.

Mr di Cultiva watch it from his terrace, sipping on his coffee and taking in the pleasant fragrances from the colourful array of flowers that bordered the door to his home. His late partner had spent many hours working on the arrangement of the flowers and no, even in her death, Esteban could still enjoy them.

The horse continued its long and dusty journey up the road. It would still be another five minutes before it arrived, but what was another five minutes when Esteban had already waited five years for its arrival. There would be no going back when it came through the high iron gates. Once the rider jumped off, he was in, his only challenge henceforth was not not get in over his head.

Keith Moon and the Search for the Glass Crocodile: Part 9 – Not with a Bang but with a Whimper – 22nd August 2014 (23:39)

“Well bugger me!” Said the warden. “That’s not something you see everyday!”

The Moon family were speechless, all expect Keith who smiled and said, “come on, let’s go home.”