Stroob Inspects the Goods

Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob’s spurs clattered on the ground and he spilt popcorn around him as he slid inelegantly off the barstool in his excitement. Not for the first time he wondered whether SWOPP had made some minor error in selecting the size of his designer cowboy jeans. The two cowgirls bent down on their hands and knees and started sweeping up the popcorn.

‘Wow… aren’t they great!’ exclaimed Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob, peering at the collection of Humans being paraded before him by a proud Thrumm.

‘Hey, Thrumm, you really done good. I just love the colours. Particularly the girls in blue. And they really have got titties like on the database,’ said Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob, prodding Brenda’s left breast with a popcorn buttery finger and leering.

‘Get your bloody greasy ’ands off me,’ said Brenda, trying to kick Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob violently in the genitals and finding herself frozen in mid-attack.

‘Is that normal Human behaviour?’ queried Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob. ‘Or does this thing really want to self-destruct? I mean, how gutsy can you get trying to kick the Omnipotent Power In The Universe in the nuts?’

Thrumm nodded sagely, wondering how many times he had ached to do just that and the Rabophantt tittered.

‘I am afraid, Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob, that their behaviour is completely beyond even a super intelligent being like me,’ sighed Thrumm. ‘Not to say antisocial in the extreme. SWOPP did, however, warn we drones and inferior beings charged with familiarising and cleansing the Humans that we would probably find their behaviour hideous in the extreme and certainly far removed from the relatively civilised way in which we conduct ourselves.’

Translation: ‘Look what I, Thrumm, Elector, save for a few technicalities such as the approval of Your Ridiculousness, have had to put up with so that you and your fellow clowns can have a little mental and physical stimulation.’

‘Would you like me to brief them further, Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob?’ continued Thrumm, sounding sycophantic.

‘Talk about the blind leading the blind,’ muttered the Rabophantt.

‘It seems as though you still have some way to go,’ grumbled Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob as he cracked his horsewhip. Brenda thawed and landed with a bump near the Rabophantt, but a safe distance from Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob’s lower region.

‘Wot the ’ell ’appened?’ demanded Brenda, looking around dazed but deciding not to make any more fuss in case something even nastier befell her.

The girls continued to sweep up errant pieces of popcorn and Kevin looked in interest at the large amount of thigh being revealed from under their leather tasselled skirts.

James suddenly realised what was bothering him about Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob’s appearance; he had only one ear. James stared fascinated at the side of Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob’s head where the missing ear should have been. It was smoothly contoured and showed no signs of having had an ear in the first place.

‘Mr Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob,’ said James, trying to cope with addressing a mono-eared Roy Rogers, normally one of his favourite cowboy characters, while standing stark naked, painted a delicate shade of pink.

‘Do you think it would be too much of an imposition to ask you to explain a few basic things such as why we are here, where we are, who you are, why Mr Thrumm is a male cow, why you appear to be Roy Rogers even though most people call you Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob and… and…?’

‘My, my, for an advanced form of pond life you really do ask a lot of questions,’ cut in Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob, while looking disparagingly at James. ‘Now instead of pretending you have any form of intelligence worth taking notice of, why don’t you and the other Human specimens just line up like the nice little mono-brains you are and let me get a proper look at the goods.’

Thrumm waved a hoof in a ‘get in line quick’ fashion and the Humans dutifully stood next to each other along Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob’s bar room wall. Kevin took the opportunity to smile at the more attractive of Chancellor Legs Eleven’s two helpers and was delighted to receive a shy grin in return. He tried hard to prevent this brief interest manifesting itself in his all too visible lower region.

‘Okay, Thrumm, tell me what we’ve got here,’ commanded Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob, licking his lips and beginning to munch popcorn again.

‘I can report as follows, Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob,’ said Thrumm, trying to sound like an Elector and succeeding in sounding pompous.

‘He can report as follows,’ mimicked the Rabophantt.

‘As instructed,’ continued Thrumm, ‘SWOPP made a thorough analysis of its memory banks, scanning the profile of every living being on Earth that complied with the given parameters of intelligence, fitness and sexual appetite. However, since SWOPP was more interested in the three other projects it was simultaneously handling, plus it was approaching its R & R period, it adopted some highly developed statistical techniques to reduce the living population of the world to a number that could be analysed in the most efficient manner in the forty-five seconds allocated to the task.’

‘Get to the point, Thrumm, waddit do?’ demanded Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob, who was becoming decidedly bored with Thrumm’s ramblings.

‘Never done that before in his life, don’t see why he should start now,’ grumbled the Rabophantt.

‘Quite simple really,’ continued Thrumm. ‘SWOPP developed the DMI and ranked the males of every nation in the world on it.’

‘Thrumm, you are beginning to bore me in a serious fashion. What the hell’s a DMI when it’s at home?’ demanded Stroob.

‘Oh, sorry, Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob, DMI stands for “Dirty Mind Index”. The idea of the index is that it correlates sexual thought with action.’

‘Oho,’ said the Rabophantt, beginning to sound interested.

‘At one extreme,’ continued Thrumm, ‘you have the nation comprised of males with the least revolting thoughts in relation to actual sexual activity. And at the other end the reverse. There is a scale of one to one hundred with one equating to maximum thought and minimum activity, while one hundred defines the sort of person who would jump on anything female, with or without a tail. Measured according to this scale, the British scored five, the Australians fifty and the French one hundred and fifteen. On this basis, SWOPP ignored all nations except the British on the grounds that they were the most sexually repressed people on Earth, yet at the same time being the ones most likely to perform even under laboratory conditions if given half a chance. Especially if they were allowed to queue up and didn’t have to pay for it.’

‘I’ll buy it so far,’ crunched Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob. ‘Continue.’

‘The next part of the analysis was a bit tougher, given the time remaining. As quick proxies for intelligence, SWOPP took knowledge firstly of the scores of the football league for the previous one hundred and fifty years and secondly, one of the best known but least read classical books in Britain: the Bible.’

The Rabophantt yawned loudly, nearly starting an epidemic.

Thrumm looked nervously around the room, noted the dwindling interest being shown by his audience and decided to push ahead quickly before they all dropped off entirely, speed sleep or no speed sleep.

‘The two males selected came out top during a two-second analysis of all British male subjects rated on this basis,’ he continued. ‘The younger one with the pot belly blew SWOPP’s socks off in terms of football knowledge. The elder of the two scored pretty low on individual knowledge of both topics but was the name stuck in the processor when SWOPP decided to call it a day and switch off. From then on it was plain sailing. If they had two arms and two legs they passed the physical fitness hurdle. SWOPP then identified the female most lusted after by each subject and atomised all four of the specimens here.’

Thrumm finished in a rush and looked around nervously to make sure everyone was still awake.

‘Okay, so far so good,’ drawled Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob. ‘But what about the funny coloured one?’

‘Ah yes,’ groaned Thrumm. ‘It seems to possess characteristics that don’t fit at all with the basic mandate. As far as I can ascertain, it would appear that it got in the way of the atomising process when the fat female was being collected and we wound up with both of them. Do you want me to dispose of it now?’ said Thrumm, with a small note of reservation in his voice.

Julian started to make a quiet whimpering noise before being interrupted by Chancellor Legs Eleven Stroob.

‘No, I find its colour rather appealing. Leave it around for the moment. Frankly I am more concerned with the others. Thrumm, do you think they will actually perform? I really don’t want any cock-ups in front of the Electors. This would be bad for me and I hardly need point out fatal for you.’

‘I can assure your Excellency that their performance is guaranteed, or I am not worthy of Electorship,’ said Thrumm, on the one hand relieved that the mauve one had survived but on the other amazed that he had opened his big mouth regarding the ability of the Humans to perform when needed. Would he ever learn?