A mysterious parcel delivered to Nabootique turns everyone's lives upside down and brings out unexpected paternal instincts in our boys.

This is unashamedly girly, I know, but I couldn't resist writing Three Men, A Gorilla and A Baby.

Disclaimer: Do I really need to say I don't own the Boosh? Would be nice if I did, then I could keep it in a cupboard and bring it out whenever I get bored, but I don't.

Boosh Baby!

Chapter 1: An Unexpected Delivery

It was another quiet day in the Nabootique.

Without any customers to distract him, Howard was rearranging his display of jazz records, putting them into alphabetical order, then in chronological order, then order of preference, rarity, price, and any other category he could think of before putting them all back in alphabetical again. Vince was creating an elaborate cardboard play-town on the counter, including a car park for the toy cars, three nightclubs, eight bars and fifteen hairdressers. With Naboo occupied upstairs, brewing new potions, Bollo was busying himself dusting Gary Numan in the cupboard.

Eventually, the giggling got too much for Howard.

"Do you mind? I'm trying to organise my jazz here!"

"Sorry," Bollo apologised. "Gary say, feathers tickle."

"Well, maybe we should think about letting him out of the cupboard, yeah? Then you wouldn't need to dust him."

"He not want to come out," Bollo told him, closing the door on the laughing electro star.

"It was you who put him in there in the first place," Vince pointed out, glancing up from creating a music venue for Vincetown.

"For you!" Howard replied. "Suppose I should've known better – you know how long it took us to get Toyah Wilcox to leave."

"Yeah," Vince recalled. "She used to take ages in the bathroom, too. And she was always using my straighteners."

"And eating all the toast," Howard agreed. "Maybe we should make a rule; no more 80's pop stars unless absolutely necessary."

Bollo shrugged, taking off his flowery pinny and heading into the kitchen.

The bell above the door jingled, announcing the presence of a motorcycle courier, helmet tucked under her arm, a brown paper package dangling from her other hand.

"Delivery for Nabootique?" she asked the two men, sounding bored.

She dumped the package down onto the counter, ignoring Vince high-pitched shriek as she destroyed his miniature metropolis with the two foot long parcel. The delivery girl then thrust a pad of paper under his nose

"Sign here?"

But Vince didn't register her demand, staring open mouthed in horror at his squashed settlement. Howard leaned over and took the pad, scrawling a hasty "Howard TJ Moon" and shoving it back at the girl so he could lift the package up.

Neither of them noticed the girl leave, too wrapped up in the devastation she had caused to the countertop community.

"Look, it's probably not all that bad…" Howard began awkwardly, but he could see it was useless; Vince's town had been completely flattened.

"She crushed my multiplex!" Vince protested, pointing at the now one-dimension cardboard building.

"Yeah… let's have a look at what's inside this parcel, shall we?" Howard suggested, hoping to distract Vince's butterfly-like mind from the destruction of his creation with something new.

He picked up a pair of scissors from their tree on the green of Stationery Village and sliced through the string, ripping away the thick brown paper.

He lifted the lid of the box, then froze in shock at the sight that greeted him within.

"Eurgh, what's making that smell?" Vince lifted a hand to his nose in disgust as he leaned over Howard's shoulder.

"Um, I think she is," Howard replied, staring at the baby girl lying inside the box.

Sucking her thumb contentedly, she stared back up at the two men with huge blue eyes, kicking tiny pink-booteed feet.

"Why've we been sent a baby in a box?" Vince asked.

"I - don't know."

Gingerly, Howard reached down and picked up the little girl, holding her at arms length as if she might explode.

"Who's the parcel addressed to?"

"No-one," Vince replied, reading the label. "It just says 'Nabootique'. Do you think she's Naboo's?"

"Well she's not gonna be Bollo's, is she? Not nearly hairy enough. Go get Naboo, will you?"

Vince raced away up the stairs as Bollo came back out of the kitchen, carrying a tray of tea mugs. The ape stopped as he caught sight of the infant dangling from Howard's hands.

"Why you holding baby?"

"Came special delivery," Howard replied, wishing he knew what you were supposed to do with babies.

"Look, you don't know how to change a nappy, do you? I think this one's a bit… ripe."

"Bloody hell, Howard," came a voice from the stairs. "What've you got there?"

"What's it look like?" Howard snapped back at the astonished shaman.

"Don't just stand there, help me!"

Bollo put down the tray and took the baby from Howard. She didn't seem to mind her peculiar surroundings, cuddling into the gorilla's arms as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

"Do you know anything about babies?" Howard asked, relieved not to be holding her anymore but wary of letting her be looked after by an ape.

"Who d'you think looked after you and Vince when you drank the water from the Fountain of Youth?" Naboo asked, grinning.

"It took me ages to make a reversal spell; someone had to take care of you 'til then."

Howard's eye fell on a photo pinned to the board next to the shop counter, one he'd always wondered about. In it, Bollo held two baby boys in his arms, children he didn't know, but had always seemed familiar. That would explain why one of them had a moustache, at least.

"Bollo, we got any nappies left over from then?" The shaman asked his familiar.

"In kitchen. I sort it."

The gorilla took the gurgling little girl through, leaving the others to try and figure out what was going on.

"Where did she come from?" Naboo asked. "Have you been ordering stuff off e-bay again?"

"Why are you looking at me?" Howard protested. "Surely if anyone's got a baby they didn't know about, it's gonna be Vince!"

"Oh, come on!" his friend replied indignantly. "Just 'cos I get all the attention from girls doesn't mean I'm – you know. And anyway, if she was mine, why'd she come through the post?"

"The post?" Naboo repeated, wrinkling his nose.

"Yeah, she was in that parcel that just got delivered. Nothing to do with you, is it? It was addressed to the shop."

"Why would I be buying babies by post? I'm a shaman; surely if I wanted a kid delivered, I'd use the carpet? Who delivered it?"

"Some courier. She squashed my cardboard city!"

"That's not exactly the issue now, is it Vince?" Howard intervened.

"I think we should call the delivery company, try and find out what's going on."

"Alright," Naboo agreed. "But get it sorted, yeah? I can't have a kid hanging round here too long; it messes with the spiritual vibes. My moss collection's going mental."

The three of them looked over at the garden pot standing just inside the kitchen door, behind the table where Bollo was changing the baby. Inside the pot a tiny green fist was raised in anger and a small high voice could be heard.

"Aaaaahhhh! The pinkness! Make it stop, make it go 'way!"

"I'll get onto it," Howard agreed, picking up the pineapple shaped phone that had replaced the crocodile after the Morris dancers broke it.

There followed a swift, angry conversation, peppered with lots of 'sirs' but with no result other than the person on the other end of the line questioning Howard's parentage.

"They claim they don't know anything about a baby, they don't have any record of the delivery, and they don't know where the woman who made the delivery is," Howard announced, slamming down the phone, pink in the face from the exertion of the argument.

"Apparently she's gone on holiday or something."

"So what do we do know?" Vince asked. "I can't look after a baby! I'm a rock 'n' roll star! I've got my image to think about! What if she's sick all over my jumpsuit?"

"Bollo take care of baby," the gorilla spoke up. "But will have to get babysitter Thursday night. I got DJ set at Cream."

"We can't keep her!" Howard almost shouted, panic rising in his voice once more. "She's not ours! We don't know who her parents are; there could be police looking for her. Do you really think anyone'll believe she arrived in the post? We might as well say the stork brought her!"

"Don't be ridiculous," Naboo admonished. "The stork doesn't bring babies."

"I didn't say it did!"

"It's flamingos. Everyone knows that."

Vince was peering closely at the baby, now content in Bollo's arms.

"She's a bit, you know, squashy."

"Squashy?" Howard tried to understand his friend's choice of words; of all the things to call a baby?

"Yeah. Her face is all scrunched up. And as for that outfit… I know of a brilliant website that makes glam rock babygros. Leroy got this fantastic one for his nephew."

"Oh no," Howard cut in. "You are not dressing up the baby like you used to dress the animals in the zoo."

"Why not?

"She's a human being, Vince! Not an accessory!"

"Oh come on Howard, please! She needs something to bring her out a bit. It's not like she does anything interesting. All babies do is cry and get sick everywhere."

"And when did you become such an expert on babies, eh?

"I know stuff! I've… seen kids before. On the bus."

"As if you get the bus. I know you, Vince. If it involves sitting next to anyone with bad dress sense, you run home screaming and lock yourself in your wardrobe."

"I do not!" objected the self-proclaimed Fashion King of Shoreditch, unconvincingly.

"Oh yeah? Remember that time there was a woman in a lime green shell suit stood outside Starbucks? You ran straight into Topshop and wouldn't come out for an hour and a half. And then you insisted on carrying that Kate Moss chiffon blouse around with you for the rest of the day like a security blanket."

Howard folded his arms, enjoying his friend's discomfort.

"Shut up!" The younger man retorted, clearly not wanting to relive that particular memory.

"Like you can talk! What about when that man came in who had exactly the same record collection as you? Except he had one more than you did, one you really wanted and got outbid on? I had to throw a bucket of water over you to stop you strangling him with his tie!"

"That's – beside the point," Howard replied, flushing a shade of crimson. "What are we going to do about her?"

He pointed at the baby, currently transfixed by the shiny pendant Naboo had taken from round his neck and was dangling in front of her. Every now and then, bubbles would appear from the centre of the pendant and burst in front of the girl's startled eyes.

"Well she needs a name for a start," the shaman pointed out, tugging the pendant chain from the infant's surprisingly strong grip.

"Kirabo," suggested Bollo. "Is good name. Means 'gift'."

"I don't think she's a gift," was Howard's response. "Or at least, I don't know anyone who'd wanna send us a baby as a present, do you?"

Bollo shrugged.

"I think we should call her…"

Vince was frowning in concentration as he tried to think up the perfect name.

"Oh this should be good," Howard muttered.

"Tallulah Freema Lucybelle!" Was the triumphant response.

Howard rolled his eyes.

"I might have known you'd come up with something she won't be able to pronounce until she's eighteen."

"Raven Persia Echo?"

"No. Who names their kid that?"

"Norman, then."

"You can't call her Norman! She's a girl!"

"So?" Vince pouted.

"Look, how about Daisy?" Howard suggested, putting a stop to the flow of nonsense from Vince's head.

"Daisy?"

"Yeah. It's a nice name," Howard replied, defensively

"Alright. What made you pick that one?"

"No reason. Just… thought if I ever had kids, I'd name a girl Daisy."

"You know on my planet," Naboo added. "Daisy means "girl who lives in a tree wearing clogs, eating marshmallows all day"."

"Does it?"

"Not really."

Howard gave an exasperated sigh.

"Does anyone have any objections to calling her Daisy? At least until we find out what her real name is?"

The others shrugged.

"Okay then." He reached out to tickle the little girl under the chin.

"Daisy it is then. Hello Daisy."

The baby was promptly sick all over Howard's sleeve.

"See?" Vince was giggling triumphantly.

"Alright, alright!"

Howard wiped the baby sick off his shirt, the baby cooing angelically.

"You two better go buy some stuff for the baby," Naboo pointed out.

"If we're keeping her, that is."

"Us? Why us? I don't know anything about what kids need!" Vince seemed almost panicky at the prospect of taking on responsibility for the infant.

"She'll need some more clothes," his shaman friend pointed out, and Vince brightened visibly.

"But try and keep it practical, yeah? No ski suits or punk boots."

"How about accessories?"

"Like what? Howard interjected. "She's only a few months old! What accessories could she possibly need?"

"Everyone needs accessories! I bet you I can find some well good stuff for babies! I've never even looked at stuff for little people before!"

"Apart from that time we met all those dwarves," Howard pointed out. "You remember, they wanted you to find them all matching hats."

"Oh yeah. Apart from that."

"Don't go too crazy, will you?" Naboo told them. "She's not gonna be here forever."

"Cheers Naboo." Vince replied, grinning, as Howard carefully took Daisy out of Bollo's arms and the two headed out.

………………………………………………………………………………………

Apologies to Gary Numan, who really did name his daughters Raven, Persia and Echo, which I think are actually pretty cool names. Although I didn't think that Howard would agree.

Apparently, Kirabo is a Lugandan name and actually does mean gift.