Unseen Academicals

Billy; it was a long way from his ears to his brain. ‘There’s not a girl in Dolly Sisters who’d look at you poxy lot!’
    ‘Ah, so that’s where we got it from!’ said Carter the Farter. This struck Nutt as inflammatory in the circumstances. Perhaps, he thought, the ritual is that childish insults shall be exchanged until both sides feel fully justified in attacking, just as Dr Vonmausberger noted in Ritual Aggression in Pubescent Rats .
    But Andy had fished his short cutlass out of his shirt. It was a nasty little weapon, alien to the true spirit of foot-the-ball, which generally smiled indulgently on things that bruised, scared, fractured and, okay, worst case, heat of the moment and so on, blinded. * But then came Andy, who had issues. And once you had someone like Andy around you, you got other Andys around too, and every kid who might otherwise have gone to a match with a pair of brass knuckles for bravado noticeably clanked when he walked, and needed to be helped up if he fell over.
    Now, weapons were being loosened here, too.
    ‘Careful now, everyone,’ Trev cautioned, stepping back and waving his empty hands in a conciliatory way. ‘This is a busy street, okay? If the Old Sam catch you fightin’, they’ll be down on you with big, big truncheons and they’ll beat you until you ’onk your breakfast, ’cos for why? ’cos they hate you, ’cos you’re making paperwork for ’em and keepin’ ’em out of the doughnut shop.’
    He stepped back a little further. ‘And then on account of you damagin’ their weapons with your ’eads they’ll run you down to the Tanty for a nice night in the Tank. Been there? Was it so much fun you want to go back again?’
    He noted with satisfaction the looks of dismayed recollection on the faces of all except Nutt, who couldn’t have any idea, and Andy, who was brother to the Tank. But even Andy was not inclined to go up against the Sam. Kill just one of them, and Vetinari would give you one chance to see if you could stand on air.
    They relaxed a little, but not too much. All it took in these sphincter-taut circumstances was one idiot…
    As it happened, one very clever person was able to do the job, when Nutt turned to Algernon, the youngest Stollop, and said cheerfully, ‘Do you know, sir, that your situation here is very similar to that described by Vonmausberger in his treatise on his experiment with rats?’
    At this point, Algernon, after one second of what passed for Algernon as thought, whacked him hard with his club. Algernon was a big boy.
    Trev managed to grab his friend before he hit the cobbles. The club had hit Nutt square in the chest and torn the ancient sweater open. Blood was soaking through the stitches.
    ‘What did you ’ave to go and ’it him for, you bloody fool?’ Trev said to Algernon, agreed even by his brothers to be as thick as elephant soup. ‘He wasn’t doin’ a thing. What was that all about, eh?’ He sprang to his feet and before Algernon could move Trev had ripped his own shirt off and was ministering to Nutt, trying to staunch the wound. He came back up again after half a minute and flung the sodden shirt at Algernon. ‘There’s no heartbeat, you moron! What did he ever do to you?’
    Even Andy was frozen. No one had ever seen Trev like it, not old Trev. Even the Dollies knew Trev was smart. Trev was slick. Trev wasn’t the sort to commit suicide by yelling at a bunch of men who were already tensed for a fight.
    The luckless Algernon, with Trev’s rage baking his face, managed, ‘But, like…he’s a Dimmer…’
    ‘Who are yer? You’re a bloody fool, that’s what you are!’ screamed Trev.
    He rounded on the others, finger shaking. ‘Who are yer? Who are yer? Nuffin! You’re rubbish! You’re all shite!’
    He jabbed the finger at Nutt. ‘And him? He made stuff. He knew things. And he’d never seen a game before today! He was only wearing the strip to fit in!’
    ‘Don’t you worry, Trev, mate,’ Andy hissed and raised his cutlass menacingly. ‘There’s going to be a bloody war about this!’ But Trev was suddenly in his face like a wasp.
    ‘You what? You are mental! You just don’t get it, do you?’
    ‘I can see helmets, Andy,’ said Jumbo urgently.
    ‘Me? What did I do?’
    ‘As much as the stupid Stollops. Dimmers and Dollies? I hope the gods shit thin shit on both of you!’
    ‘They’re getting really close, Andy.’
    The Stollop boys, who were not altogether dumb, were already