"Give me your inflatable duck," demanded Options, the green-toed pig. Actions, the bleeding cat responded in her usual manner by asking Tools the pig/cat translator to translate. Once everyone was up to speed, Actions told Options that the deal on the table wasn't agreeable to her, but if Options was able to procure a shiny new bell for Actions' winklepickers, then she would trade. Options nodded as if his neck muscles worked intermittently and set off a-questing, Tools dashed around the village making the most of the inter-species translating work that was available to him, and Actions did nothing all day.
"Give me your shiny new bell," demanded Options of Format, the bell-endowed fish. Tools explained to Format what Options was saying, and then Format said a lot of very naughty words. Caught between the rock of not being able to get what he wanted, and the hard plaice of a swearing fish whose actions might rub off on him and cause him to be a rapscallion too, he made his excuses and sought guidance from Help, the wizened wizard atop the big hill on the outskirts of time.
"Go away and stop bothering me with your petty little problems before I turn you into a poet," screamed Help. As he tripped and fell down the hill, catching his head on all sorts of jagged rocks and scratchy plants, a tear welled up in Options' delicate little pig eyes. By the time it fell to the ground he was already twenty metres further down, and he could pretend he hadn't been crying at all.
"Give me your shiny new bell," demanded Options on returning to Format's palatial bowl. With Tools' help, Format explained to Options that he was rather fond of his bell, and had no inclination to give it to no smelly-bottomed pig with green toes and a face that looked like it had just fallen down a big hill, but he could be persuaded to trade if Options found him a replacement toothbrush for the one that he'd lost during his New Year's Eve partay. They shook hand-like bits on it, and Options and Tools left Format to swear at a passing water.
"Give me your nose," demanded Options, trying a different tack in the vain hope that a positive result might occur. File, the lizard fluent in pig, told him that his nose was what people liked about him most and to give it away was tantamount to denying his own individuality. Not caring one iota for the nose anyway, Options dropped this bargaining point and went straight to the nub. File slapped him, and rightly so. Options quickly changed the subject and demanded that File gave him his toothbrush. In a shocking bout of unoriginality, File said he would trade his toothbrush for a diamond-encrusted gold necklace.
"Give me your diamond-encrusted gold necklace," demanded Options. Send, the uninterested Pelican, with a heart to match, opened her eyes, looked Options up and down, then closed her eyes and mumbled a request for translation to Tools. Tools complied. Send dozed. Options saw no course of action other than waiting outside until Send had finished, and Tools followed blindly, happy for the work. Edit, the repressed Morcheeba CD and Insert, the equally repressed, but unequally lop-sided puppy with attitude were outside. A brief, but bloody, conversation ensued, in which it was agreed that if Options was unable to achieve a suitable trade with Send, then Edit and Insert would be cut into the chain of trading at some point. The sound of Send snoring stopped, and once the echoes had also died, Options and Tools re-entered her antechamber and repeated the demand.
"Have it; I was just going to throw it away anyway." Quicker than you can say Bob, Options had wrenched the diamond-encrusted gold necklace from the fishy depths of Send's beak and was running at full-pelt to File's hovel. The obese Tools followed as quickly as his tubby little vein-clogged legs would carry him, bursting through the door just as Options burst out, carrying the toothbrush. Options headed off to Format's bowl, whilst Tools skipped a step so that he might saunter slowly, appreciate the view, and not get tired. On the way, Tools bumped into Send and Insert, who were informed that their services wouldn't be required; Tools recommended they seek solace in the teachings of Help, and Send and Insert were never heard of again. When Options turned up at Actions' home with Format's bell, Tools was already there, tucking in to a hearty cup of tea.
"Here's your shiny new bell," said Options. "Now give me your inflatable duck."
"What's he saying?" Actions said to Tools. "And what's he doing with that shiny new bell?"
"What's she saying?" Options said to Tools. "And why isn't she giving me her inflatable duck in exchange for this shiny new bell."
"I think I'd better come clean," explained Tools, first in cat, then in pig, then reversing the order so Options wouldn't develop a cat inferiority complex. "I lied, I mistranslated intentionally: Actions never wanted a shiny new bell in exchange for her inflatable duck, she wanted three black pawns to complete her chess set."
"But there aren't any more black pawns in the village: Subject ate them all to win the black-pawn-eating bet last Friday," whined Options. "How am I supposed to go around everyone and trade so that I might get Actions' inflatable duck? Everyone else has what they want, except Actions and myself."
"There are some black pawns in the village," explained Tools, with a wicked glint in his eye. "I ordered them off the internet last week, and they arrived a few minutes ago. Now, if Actions would care to trade her inflatable duck for these three black pawns, then I can leave you to feel betrayed and confused."
"Done," said Actions, handing over the inflatable duck.
"Oh," said Options, desperately grasping, "you're just going to give me the inflatable duck for a present?"
"No," said Tools, and repeated a couple of words he'd learnt from Format. "Learn a lesson from this or something."