Finkumpoops

By Patrick Whittaker

After having his spaceship wrecked by the dreaded finkumpoops, space pirate Captain Codswallop takes refuge on Earth and unwittingly brings three finkumpoops with him. The finkumpoops are small furry creatures called Fink, Um and Poop who as well as being technological geniuses are complete idiots. They have a habit of taking things apart and p

• Language: English
• Publisher: Hear Our Voice LLC
• Release date: Jul 8, 2022
• ISBN: 9781957913063

Book preview

Finkumpoops

Patrick Whittaker

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Hear Our Voice LLC

Copyright © 2022 by Patrick Whittaker

All rights reserved.

No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher or author, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law.

Published by Hear Our Voice LLC

www.hearourvoicellc.com

Contents

Finkumpoops

Dedication

1. The Space Pirates

2. Every Man for Himself!

3. Hobb’s End

4. A Strange Light in the Sky

5. Something Weird in the Woods

6. Zing!

7. Finkumpoops to the Rescue!

8. The Rise and Fall of Captain Codswallop

9. In the Shadow of Boggleland

10. Nightmare on Bilge Street

11. Toby’s New Boots

12. Up a Jelly Tree without a Belt Buckle to Ride Home On

13. Black Van Man

14. Toby in Time

15. The Day of the Finkumpoops

16. Alicia

17. The Ghost Train from Hell

18. The Return of Bodger

Finkumpoops

A novel

by

Patrick Whittaker

To Johnny

1

The Space Pirates

Although most of this story takes place on Earth, it begins on board an alien spaceship orbiting Mars.

The spaceship is called The Wild Mouse II. It is as big as an oil tanker and shaped like a bullet that’s been stepped on by an elephant. It is a lean, mean killing machine painted in black with a white skull and crossbones on its underbelly.

As you probably know, ships bearing the skull and crossbones are nearly always pirate ships, and that’s The Wild Mouse II in a nutshell. It belongs to a space pirate by the name of Captain Codswallop who reckons himself the toughest, meanest, most fearsome pirate in the galaxy.

We join him just as his day is about to get utterly ruined.

# # # # #

As you’d expect from a pirate, Captain Codswallop had a lot of darkness about him. Not only was his heart black, but his clothes were too. He had black boots, black trousers, a black shirt with matching jacket and a cravat that was mostly black apart from three red spots. Even his hair and beard were black.

And he shouted - a lot.

Some days, he shouted from the moment he got up to the moment he went to bed. He was even known to shout in his sleep and some of his men imagined he would be shouting long after he was dead and buried.

Captain Codswallop loved being a pirate. He loved killing and looting and being thoroughly rotten to people who’d done him no harm. Money, gold, jewels – these were all things close to the captain’s heart but there was one thing he loved above all else.

Funfairs.

In the lowest deck of the Wild Mouse II were two very big rooms where Captain Codswallop kept all the stuff he nicked. One was called the Treasure Room for reasons too obvious to mention. The other was the Funfair Room, and it was the captain’s favorite place anywhere.

He liked the room so much; he had never been known to shout in it.

Never.

Every day, he would put aside an hour to visit the room and walk between rows of crates piled twenty deep. The crates were filled with dismantled rides waiting to be put back together again to create the biggest fairground the galaxy had ever known.

There’d be thousands of rides and a dozen circuses, not to mention free popcorn for everyone! The captain planned to have a brass band playing all day and night and people dressed as cartoon characters and a miniature railway a hundred miles long. The roller coasters would be arranged so that as soon as somebody came off one ride, they could go straight onto the next one. And there’d be areas for children only and areas just for adults.

And it was all going to happen very soon, for Captain Codswallop was planning to retire once the Fairground Room was completely full. Ten more fairgrounds, he reckoned, would do the trick.

Today, he planned to add one more to his total, which was why his ship was in orbit around Mars, the nearest planet to Earth.

It’s a little known fact that Earth has more funfairs than any other planet in the galaxy. If he’d had the time, Captain Codswallop would have been pleased to steal ten of them, but the cops were after him and he couldn’t afford to hang around. He had just enough time to steal one – and only one – funfair from Earth. The question was: which one?

Disneyland quite took his fancy as did Thorpe Park and Knott’s Berry Farm. Then again, Dollywood certainly had a lot going for it, not to mention LEGOLAND, Alton Towers and Blackpool Pleasure Beach.

After much deliberation, he had decided on a little-known funfair called Boggleland, which was somewhere in England. One reason Boggleland was little-known was that it had been closed for years. Another was that almost nobody in the galaxy had even heard of Earth let alone knew where it was.

# # # # #

Captain Codswallop was on the bridge of the Wild Mouse II putting the finishing touches to his plans to steal Boggleland when things began to go wrong.

The bridge – in case you didn’t know – is what you might call the ship’s control room. On the Wild Mouse II, it was a glass dome full of control panels, screens, and machines that occasionally went bleep or ping. In the middle of the dome, the captain sat in a big chair which could swivel all the way round at the touch of a button.

Mr. Shiver and Mr. McTimbers manned the flight console. It was their job to see to it that the ship went where the captain wanted it to.

The thought of soon having another funfair to add to his collection had put the captain in a good mood, though you’d be hard put to know it.

Where be my coffee! he shouted at his long-suffering servant. Fetch me a coffee, Mr. Scruloose, afore I have ye keelhauled!

Mr. Scruloose was not human, as was obvious from his blue skin and the short, thick tail he sometimes used for swimming or playing tennis. I suppose the thing he most resembled was a lizard although not one you’d see in a zoo. Rolling two of his three eyes, he pointed at the table next to the captain’s chair. There, Cap'n! There be yer coffee!

It be cold!

B’ ain’t cold, Cap'n. Ain’t cold at all.

It be cold, I tell ‘e! The captain snatched up the cup of coffee and promptly dropped it. Ow! It be hot, Mr. Scruloose! Darned hot!

I know, Cap'n.

Then why didn’t ye tell me? Fetch me another, ye simpering space maggot!

Aye, aye, Cap'n. Mr. Scruloose was glad to have an excuse to leave the bridge and spend a bit of time in the galley. As much as he loved the captain, there was only so much of his shouting he could take.

Mr. Shiver and Mr. McTimbers wished they could have joined Mr. Scruloose. As the Captain’s joint second-in-command, they spent a lot of time with him and were slowly going deaf.

Lay in a course for Earth! Captain Codswallop commanded – very loudly. Prepare to set sail!

Aye, aye, Cap'n, said Mr. Shiver and Mr. McTimbers. Their fingers were a blur as they danced across their keyboards, tapping in the instructions the ship’s computer needed to get them to Earth.

Noticing something unusual on one of his screens, Mr. McTimbers suddenly stopped his tapping and said, Cap'n! There be a ship off the starboard bow!

There be a what? shouted the captain. Say again, Mr. Shiver.

Actually, I be Mr. McTimbers.

It was an easy mistake to make. Although Mr. Shiver and Mr. McTimbers were in no way related and had been born on planets billions of miles apart, not only did they look alike, but they also spoke alike too. People naturally thought they were twins and would sometimes call them liars when they said they weren’t - which was never a good idea as Mr. Shiver and Mr. McTimbers had a habit of killing people who called them names.

My apologies, Mr. McTimbers. Please repeat your message!

I was saying there be a ship off the starboard bow.

A big ship?

Aye, Cap'n.

Be it full of money, gold and jewels and so forth?

I doubt it, Cap'n.

Why so, Mr. McTimbers?

Because it be a Gorbanian battle cruiser.

A Gorbanian battle cruiser! The blood drained from the captain’s face. No space pirate – no matter how tough, mean, or fearsome – had ever tangled with a Gorbanian battle cruiser and lived to tell the tale. Great blistering blue giants! What be ye waiting fer? Turn and run, man! Turn and run!

Well, I could do that…

Do it, do it, do it!

But there ain’t no need.

"And why not, Mr. McTimbers?

Because aside from space rats, there be not a single soul on board that thar ship.

Be ye sure, Mr. McTimbers?

Aye, Cap'n. I’ve done a full scan. That ship be ours fer the taking.

Captain Codswallop rubbed his chin. Now this be a rum thing.

Aye, Cap'n. A rum thing indeed!

An abandoned Gorbanian battle cruiser!

Aye, Cap'n.

Equipped with some of the deadliest weapons in the galaxy.

Aye, Cap'n!

With just the forward cannon alone, we’d be able to destroy an entire battle fleet!

Aye, Cap'n. That we would.

Then what be ye waiting fer? Battle stations, Mr. McTimbers! All hands on deck and prepare fer boarding!

Aye aye, Cap'n!

Throughout the Wild Mouse II, alarm bells rang, sirens wailed, and klaxons sounded. Loudspeakers on every deck said very loudly: Now hear this! Now hear this! All hands on deck and prepare fer boarding!

Amidst the din, 127 space pirates grabbed their cutlasses and laser pistols and ran whooping down the ship’s corridors. All of them were excited at the prospect of killing people and nicking their money.

Such a gathering of rogues and villains was the stuff of nightmares. Only half the crew were human. The rest were unmistakably alien. For instance, the Rigelans were lizard people with eyes on the side of their heads and forked tongues that kept flickering in and out of their mouths. They stood together at a safe distance from the Thetan rhinomen, who considered lizard people brains something of a delicacy.

Also present was a group of frog people from the planet Casturia and a handful of giant creepy-crawlies that could be mistaken for insects but actually were plants, not to mention the two dozen creatures who really were insects. Eight of the insect creatures resembled praying mantises and the rest could have been mistaken for house flies but for the fact that they were eight feet tall and stood on their hind legs.

Perhaps the strangest pirate of all was Mr. Slingshot. He had four legs, six arms and two necks, each of which had five heads. Sadly, his heads did not get along and would often argue with one another for days on end until they all got tired and fell asleep.

2

Every Man for Himself!

While his men waited impatiently to be let off the leash to do what pirates do best, Captain Codswallop remained in his chair. The glass dome gave him a grandstand view of the Gorbanian battle cruiser as the Wild Mouse II crept ever closer. He loved the blackness of the other ship and was impressed with how sleek it looked – like a giant sports car with guns instead of wheels.

Part of him couldn’t believe his luck. No pirate had ever captured a Gorbanian spaceship and the few daft enough to try had paid with their lives.

There had to be a catch! There just had to be.

Scan again! he shouted at Mr. Shiver and Mr. McTimbers.

Mr. Shiver groaned. But Cap'n, we’ve already scanned it twice. There ain’t no Gorbanian warriors within a billion miles.

Scan again! I wants to be sure I ain’t walking into no trap.

Aye, aye, Cap'n. Mr. Shiver did as he was told and looked at the results on the screen in front of him. Empty, Cap'n.

You said there be space rats.

Aye, Cap'n. There be dozens of the critters but they ain’t no danger to us.

Very well, Mr. Shiver. Bring her in ready fer boarding.

Aye, aye, Cap'n.

Between them, Mr. Shiver and Mr. McTimbers steered the Wild Mouse II forward until its nose was almost touching the Gorbanian battle cruiser. Then they turned the ship sideways and switched on a giant magnet.

Clang! The magnet grabbed the battle cruiser and pulled it against the Wild Mouse II, making the two spaceships effectively one. Now there was no chance of the Gorbanian battle cruiser drifting away.

Right, shouted Captain Codswallop, rising from his chair. Let’s go get us some booty!

He withdrew his cutlass from a sheath in his chair and waved it in the air. As fine a sword as any pirate could wish for, it could cut a man in two like