I reckon I've got a story here! So do please enjoy, dearest reader. I mean, anything that kicks off with the Shaman Council can't be that bad, right?

"Dennis?"

Dennis mumbled into his folded arms, still half-lost in his dream world. It was pleasant, warm, full of muted colours that didn't aggravate his wicked hangover.

"Dennis?"

His eyes fluttered open but he screwed them shut again. Pain needled at the back of his head.

"Dennis!"

Now he identified the voice. Tony Harrison. He had spiked the vodka last night, Dennis was sure of it. Why else would he have been dancing on that table-

"Dennis, you peacock berk! Wake up!"

-in the nude?

Wait, nude?

As in, naked?

With no clothes on?

Nude?

The thought jolted him upright, patting his body frantically. The feathery feel of his robe calmed him and he gazed around, momentarily dazzled by the brightness of the moon, illuminating the clearing. Confused, he gazed at his fellow shamans.

All at once, he remembered. He had woken that morning, nothing but a blanket draped over him, on Saboo's sofa. Six glasses of water and a Berocca later, he had taken the carpet home, swerving dangerously and almost colliding with countless south-bound birds. He had still been slightly drunk.

And yet, shamanic duties beckoned. In spite of his rapidly-worsening hangover, he had retrieved some new robes and headed to the Board's meeting place. Being the only one there, he had sent out several increasingly angry summons. Finally, they had turned up, ready to put weeks of planning into fruition.

Well...

Looking around, he saw his team were no better off than him. Some stared into the distance, rubbing their heads. Some drooled on the table, dozing, much as he had been doing. Tony sat beside a large glass of water, an incredibly long crazy straw looping toward his mouth. A pair of sunglasses concealed the majority of his face. In fact, the only one of them who seemed unaffected was Kirk, who was doing a kind of rave in his seat, arms working and head nodding to a beat only he could hear.

Again, the image of himself on that table flashed to the front of his mind. He winced.

"Dennis, snap out of it! Saboo's got the human," Tony called from beside him.

"Ah," said Dennis, coming back to himself as he remembered why they were there. "Bring him to me."

There came a rustling from the trees. Out of them stepped Saboo, looking, remarkably, no worse for wear. For a moment, all Dennis could see was the man downing six shots of Sambuca in quick succession. Then, blinking, he laid eyes on the person Saboo was leading by their bound hands, a sack over their head.

They stopped in the middle of the clearing. Saboo bowed deeply.

"The human, sire," he said needlessly. He was such a suck-up.

"Very good. Remove the sack."

Saboo did so.

There was silence.

More silence.

Tony Harrison began to laugh.

"Saboo!" Dennis bellowed, making the sleeping councilpersons jerk back to reality. Tony moaned a protest in chorus with his own aching head, but he ignored both of them. "What is the meaning of this?!"

The human attempted to speak, but the duct tape over his mouth reduced it to angry mumbling. Saboo interrupted him.

"Head Shaman, I did as you asked. You wanted me to bring you the human, I did."

"Saboo, you twonk," Tony cried excitably. "That's the wrong human!"

"Vince?" Howard called, poking his head around the door to the supply closet. There was no sign of him so he turned back to the shop. "Vince? I give up now!"

He had been systematically searching the flat for the last half hour, convinced this was another of Vince's 'surprise hide-and-seek' games. The main principle of the game was that Howard would never know if he was playing or not. Usually, these occurred in the mornings, right before the shop was about to open. Or at lunch, right before the shop was about to re-open. Or in the evening, right before the shop was about to re-re-open for the midnight clientèle. Usually, he was easy to find (apart from that one time he used Naboo's potions to shrink himself and hid in a vase on the fireplace) but this time there was no sign of him.

"Come on now, Vince, this isn't funny any more! Vince!"

"What's all the shouting about?"

The voice of the tiny shaman startled Howard, who dropped the lamp he had been peering under. It smashed on the floor.

"Oi! Watch it! That's coming out of your wages."

"You don't pay me any wages. Actually, I've been meaning to talk to you about that. I think-"

"We'll talk about it later, yeah? Have you seen Vince?"

"No, I was just looking for him."

Naboo frowned. "When did you last see him?"

"This morning. He was in bed. I went to make a cup of tea and when I got back, he was gone."

"You left him alone?!" Naboo cried, throwing his arms up exasperatedly. It was the most emotion Howard had ever seen him show.

"Of course I left him alone!" he defended. "I don't spend every waking minute with him, you know!"

"Well, you should!" Making a visible effort to calm down, the shaman drew a piece of paper from his robes. "Look at this."

Howard took it and read silently:

hueman,

we r goin 2 kidnap u. b prupaired. we r cumin munday 9 in da mornin.

p.s i fink so aniway, dere is a tiyme difrence beetween were u r and were i am.

p.s agen. i no its an outrage soz

"But it's Tuesday," Howard said once he had struggled through the frankly atrocious spelling and grammar. A terrible urge had seized him and his hand itched toward the red pen on the counter. It was the pen he used to correct anything and everything Vince wrote down. On one occasion, he had used it on his iPhone, highlighting the errors in a text message he had sent to Leroy. Vince hadn't been pleased at the scratches left on his screen after the colour had wiped off, but as Howard had argued, nobody with auto-correct could possibly spell that badly.

"Howard?" Naboo prompted.

The man in question blinked. He had been staring at the pen, one hand stretched out to take it.

"Hmm?" he muttered, dazed.

"You're drooling."

"Oh, right." With the outstretched hand, he wiped his chin, then focused on the shaman once more. "So you think whoever wrote this note has got him?"

Naboo's expression clouded. "I know they have," he said darkly. "And what's more, I know who wrote it."

So, yeah... Story. I have a vague idea where this is going, but at this point, not much more than you, dear reader. Still, I have the second chapter so that shall be uploaded now! Well, why not kick off with a double update, eh?

I'm relatively new to this, so any feedback is welcome, thanks :).