Hi! Thanks so much for the reviews. Especially Chalcedony Rivers - I nearly fell off my chair when I saw you had reviewed after all this time! This chapter, nay, this whole story is dedicated to you!

HatStandsandPinstripes and sinner. vs. saint thank you as well. HSaP (hope you don't mind the abbreviation) you make a very good point. It was clear in my head what had happened but I forgot I hadn't actually mentioned it. It will be addressed in the next chapter after this one

Sorry if any followers got update notifications this week - I went back and tidied up a few sloppy bits and spelling mistakes that were bugging me.

I hope you enjoy this. In case you couldn't guess, I do not own the Mighty Boosh or the Mint Royale Blue Song

"Howard?" Vince whispered in the darkness. Howard decided to pretend to be asleep and hope he would leave him alone. For a few seconds he thought it might have worked.

"Howard? Howard? Hooowward?...Howard?" Vince flicked the bedside lamp on, "Howard,"

"What?" he whisper-shouted back. They were crammed into the single bed, fronts pressed against each other. It was the night before the robbery and Howard really wanted to get some sleep so he was fresh for the morning.

"Do you think I'll be ok? At being a getaway driver, I mean," the uncertainty on the younger man's face was enough to melt his anger.

"You'll do a better job than Baxter would with his bad hand, but that's about all I know. You know if I had any other choice I wouldn't be doing this to you don't you?" his first time on a job and he hadn't even had a dry run or anything. If it all went without a hitch it would be a miracle. He didn't say that to Vince though.

"It's ok, I'm looking forward to it. It's just…do you reckon it'll all go ok Howard?"

"If you'd asked me a few weeks ago, before the other time, I'd have said yes. But now, who knows? Everything seems to be above board. The plans seem ok, it's just one of those places that has a real reputation for being difficult. Like no one's ever broken it before. Anderson reckons that's all talk, it's made their security sloppy but we'll see tomorrow. There's only one guard on duty so it's better than the job the three of us pulled in Calais. Place was teeming with security. Me and Cartwright both got shot,"

"You never did!" Vince's eyes were like saucers.

"I most certainly did, only a scratch though. The bullet just grazed my leg," Howard lifted his leg out from under the quilt to show the small scar, "Cartwright's is worse, it went right through his side. I'm surprised he hasn't got it out this week, he used to love showing it off,"

"What are they like?" Vince jerked his head in the direction of the landing.

"Anderson's alright – sensible head on his shoulders, keeps his temper in a crisis. Very good at what he does,"

"What's that?"

"More often than not he's the inside man, he'll get a job at a bank or a security company somewhere or find a way in and get all the info for the robbery: key codes, floor plans, that sort of thing." Seeing Vince's quizzical look, "he's very charming. He can get any job he wants, get any of the girls on the desk to go out with him, doors get opened for him. He doesn't always come on the job itself. Once, he stayed on working at the bank we turned over, waited til all the fuss died down, got all the new security codes then we turned over the place again. Crazy times," Howard sighed, shaking his head fondly.

"Could I do that? I'm charming, everyone loves me,"

"No." Howard said shortly, the thought of Vince being in that much danger making his mouth dry up, "It's not that I don't find you charming, the fact that you've still got a pulse is proof enough of that, it's just that your face is an open book. Watch Cartwright some time, when he's really scheming, really thinking how much he wants to do you over, his face goes all polite and when he talks he sounds almost like he's telling you a bed time story,"

"Ha ha, yeah I noticed that when he found out I'd eaten the last of his sugar puffs," Vince agreed.

"That man sure does love sugar puffs," Howard chuckled along with him, "goodness knows why, nasty things,"

"They're alright, I just hate that monster that advertises them. Speaking of monsters, what about Cartwright?"

"He's not so bad. He's just carrying a hell of a grudge with me,"

"You didn't steal a girl off him an' all did you?" Vince meant it light heartedly, Howard knew, but they were starting to skate towards a topic he didn't want to go into, and was unable to raise a smile.

"No, nothing like that. I just took off one day, without saying anything to anybody, left them in the lurch a bit. I think I hurt his feelings," Howard scratched the back of his head as guilt settled in the pit of his stomach like a dodgy chicken korma.

"What did you do that for?" at the sight of Howard's pained expression, "Oh right, yeah you said. Some things happened. Don't suppose you'll tell me what?"

"Nope," he hoped the shortness of his answer would cut off the conversation.

"Seems like you're just as stubborn as he is," Vince sighed resignedly.

"Who Cartwright? Maybe not quite as bad as that,"

"What about Baxter?"

"I don't know him as well as the others. I only met him a few times before. He's a real irritating prick. I'm not surprised Cartwright stabbed him actually – I'm just surprised no one's done it to him before,"

Vince grimaced in agreement. His face was free of all marks now apart from the cut hidden up above his hair line and there were only a few fading bruises left on his body to show for the beating he had taken.

"But no, I don't know much about him, other than his name's Baxter, he drives like a maniac, and the stuff you've already seen yourself. He keeps everything else private"

"But the others were pretty easy to find, considering you lot all seem to have all your secret stuff,"

"Not really, I was just lucky. They've got other houses too, I don't know where they are. They don't always live together any more. But this was where they lived when we were younger. I just took a chance – you might've noticed Cartwright's not that good with change,"

"And did you live with them here too?" Vince, curious as always.

"Not at first, no" Howard's eyes slithered past Vince.

"What's that mean? You lived with someone else? Ooh, a girl? A man?" Vince half sat up in bed, his expression scandalised. Howard tutted at the dislodgement of the duvet this caused.

"A friend," Howard qualified, pulling the quilt back over him. "His name was Ian. We lived in London for a bit, that must have been about ten years ago,"

"Really Ian?" Vince asked skeptically

"Yes,"

"Was he a bank robber too?"

"Yes,"

"Jeez Howard, don't you have any friends with normal jobs?"

"What's a normal job?" Howard meant it as a joke, but he really didn't know. When he was younger he had thought about being a writer but always got stuck after the first sentence.

"Like, shop assistant, zoo keeper, musician, I don't know!" Vince threw his arms up in the air, causing yet another chilly draught up Howard's back.

"I've got you – you're not a bank robber,"

"Yet! It's was only a matter of time though weren't it, til you started rubbing off on me," Vince snorted at his unintentional double entendre and slipped his hand down to rub Howard's groin.

"Charming," Howard removed Vince's hand and folded his arms over his chest but he couldn't help smiling as his cock registered a lazy interest.

"Eh Howard, does that mean you think we're friends?" he was pulling that soppy expression that always surprised Howard.

"Something like that….I suppose"

"So what happened to Ian? Is he a millionaire or something now?" The question Howard had been dreading, kicking himself that he had mentioned Ian.

"No, he wasn't a very good bank robber…" he tailed off, unsure of how to continue

"Prison?" Vince was quieter now.

"Dead. But prison first. Then after that I came back up North and moved in here. It all seems so long ago now, like another life time," Howard stared up at the ceiling, grimly.

"When was that, in the fifties?"

"How old do you think I am? When you look at me, what do you see? Gandalf the hoary old wizard? It was only eight years ago"

"So you lived with Ian for two years, then you moved up here, then when did you go back -" but Howard cut him off with a finger over his lips.

"Listen here now Sir, it's about time we got some sleep. I don't maintain these youthful good looks with any less than eight hours peaceful slumber,"

Vince mumbled something under his breath,

"What's that you say?" Howard demanded

"I said it looks like you've been getting a few late nights then,"

"Right, that's it,"

"That's what?"

"You've done it now, I'm going to unleash the full force of Howard Moon's wrath onto you. I'm going to come at you, like a buzzard,"

"Well come on then,"

"I will Sir,"

"Go on,"

"Just you wait,"

Vince was tempted to see how long he could drag this out but he didn't have the will power. Instead he leant over and kiss Howard. After that there was no more talking.

In the morning, Howard had been surprised when Vince had pulled a heavy leather jacket with a sheepskin collar from his bag and shrugged it on. The same jacket he'd been wearing in the other bank.

"What, no mirrorball suit, no Joan Jet jumpsuit?" Howard had taken to teasing Vince, coming up with more and more fantastical outfits that he might own, based on the small sample he had with him. After Vince had been so protective over the bag, Howard had been expecting it to have something a bit more exciting in, but all it contained was a few items of clothing, some hair products, packets of sweets, some other sparkly shit, and all his music. It was like Vince's personality distilled into these few items. Vince had explained, as he had proudly displayed his selection of cds "all stored in length order", that he always kept everything important to him in it, in case there was trouble and he had to get out of his flat quickly. It had paid off, Howard thought with a little jealousy – Vince had fresh clothes every day whereas his had all got burnt up in the fire and he had been forced to borrow some jeans and a jumper from Anderson and rotate between these and the clothes he had been wearing.

"Nah, s'my lucky jacket, this is. It's vintage – Jean Claude Jaquetti. Belonged to me dad,"

"Oh?" Howard was instantly burning with curiosity but tried to keep cool on the outside. After all, the kid had ended up living on his own in the Carrestone estate, had ended up here with him, for gods sake, his family life clearly hadn't had a happy ending. That was until he remembered what Vince had said before,

"I thought you said your dad used to beat you up,"

"That was me step dad. This was me real dad. He left when I was little. Then my mum married 'Dixon'" he spat the name snidely, "who made my life a right misery, I can tell you….." he trailed off for a moment, "Yeah, this is all I've got of his, my real dad. I used to think if I wore it as a kid, and wished hard enough, he'd come back from wherever he'd run off to, and love me and my mum again and protect us from that prick. Never did though, bastard." Vince's eyes were downcast,

"What happened to him? I mean, could you track him down"

"Dunno, I can't even really remember him. Only thing I know was that he was called Charlie and he used to wear this jacket and look like James Dean when he used to smoke those roll up cigarettes. Not much to go on really," Vince laughed bitterly. Howard's arm twitched upwards as if to touch the younger man's shoulder but his nerve gave out and he just left it hanging there in mid air.

"What about your mum?" he asked, in as gentle a tone as he could manage. Seeing the kid like this unnerved him. If he didn't want to know about this so badly, he'd make a joke, or tickle him in the ribs to bring back the sunshine.

"Dead," Vince's mouth pressed into a thin white line and Howard knew that this was all Vince was going to be able to say about it. There was a beat of silence before Vince pasted on a bright smile – Howard could almost see the shutters coming back down. "Anyways, this is me lucky jacket. I always wear it when I want something good to happen,"

"Does it work?"

"Not at first – my step dad used to give me a right good hiding whenever he caught me wearing it, said that he was my real dad now and I should forget about that waster. But lately, I don't know. I was wearing it the day I went into Colbotts bank weren't I?" he inclined his bony hip towards Howard,

"Only you Vince, would think that being held hostage at gun point was a good thing," Howard laughed in spite of himself.

"Well it was!" his eyes got very big and Howard wasn't sure he could ever tear himself away from them, "I mean, I didn't wake up thinking 'ooh I 'ope some big Northern fella comes along today and sticks 'is great big gun into me little ear'ole'" Vince parodied himself camply, "but I wanted something, just didn't know whether it was a new job, a new life, just something to get me away. And you did that," his voice softened, and he reached out to brush the back of Howard's hand, smiling gently. "I'm grateful, I really am. I know I might be a pain sometimes but I'm glad you put up with me. An' I'm going to repay you today by being the best getaway driver there is!" With that, he ran from the room, making vrooming noises and holding his hands out in an approximation of a steering wheel.

Howard just stared after him, listening to him screeching as he put his foot to a pretend brake pedal. He didn't know how to say back to him that he had been wanting too, and that he didn't know it but Vince was that want. And even though he wanted to throttle him most of the time, having him there was what made him carry on, was what had stopped him from just lying down in the road in front of his burning house and waiting for the Hitcher to come and get him. He was only just realising all of this. It had been creeping up on him since he first saw the boy, but he had managed to trick himself into thinking he was doing the boy a favour, that he was a pain in the. 'Oh shit,' Howard muttered under his breath at this realisation, 'I really am stuck with the little tit box now. He is still a pain in the though'. He shook his head, smiling to himself and followed him down the stairs.

Vince had driven carefully, slowly, but all too soon they were pulling into the imposing grey concrete structure that housed the staff entrance to the Mint Royale. Anderson had his access pass and that was going to get them inside. Howard could feel the butterflies mounting in the pit of his stomach. Normally he enjoyed this part of the job, he thought of it almost like fore play. But not today. Not with Vince behind the wheel of the ancient silver Ford Mondeo they had for the job. Stolen plates, obviously. But Howard couldn't help noticing that Vince had customised the dashboard with a little glitter ball and portable cd player. He stroked his clean shaven face, missing his moustache. But he had had his moustache at the last job and there were too many photos of him from then to go out looking exactly the same.

"S' this the place?" Vince asked Anderson, making sure he was parked in the blank spot of the camera's vision that he had discovered.

"Yep this is the place," Anderson didn't even turn his head and concentrated on pulling on his black gloves. They were all dressed in black coats and glasses. Of course, Vince had to be different and had his leather coat on and sunglasses. He said it was for the glare off the roads but Howard suspected it was because he wanted to look cool. Vain idiot.

"How long?" he asked, using the cocky voice that normally made Howard want to back hand him across the room.

"Two, three minutes max," Howard couldn't help letting a slight tinge of irritation colour his tone. After all, he'd been going over this all week, explaining the variables, laying out the amount of time different tasks might take depending on tiny variances that they hadn't been able to account for. He knew Vince hadn't been involved the whole time but had he not listened to a single word? He'd even said to Vince last night that if they weren't out after 4 minutes, he should drive away and leave them.

"Can you be a bit more specific?" Vince raised his sunglasses. As always, the startling blue of his eyes made Howard lose his train of thought.

'Focus Moon' he told himself sternly, knowing that if he fucked this up because he was distracted by the kid, it would be bad for all of them, including Vince.

"Two and a half to three minutes" Cartwright reiterated. He had been more subdued today, sorry about how had jeopardised the plan, with that stunt with Baxter. Howard could tell he was making an effort to be more polite to Vince. The strained politeness in his voice almost made Howard smile.

"Call it 2.45" he furthered. He could tell how nervous Vince was, tried to imagine what he'd feel like if the roles were reversed. Not that it was the same obviously, half the time, Vince still seemed to think this was a big game. He had been practically vibrating with excitement all the way here.

"2.45" Vince had got out his little cd case and was flipping through determinedly. Howard rolled his eyes at the sight and he swore he could actually hear Cartwright gritting his teeth.

"No, more. 2.54" Anderson sounded almost indulgent, which worried Howard, but he had confidence that Anderson's mind was too much on the job to think to much about Vince right now.

"Ok 2.54" he flipped past a couple more discs before selecting one

"Ain't you got a watch?" Cartwright demanded, his polite façade slipping at last, and Howard wanted to punch him for his sneering arrogance, punch the both of them really, but Vince just grinned,

"I don't read too good," Howard and Cartwright just looked at each other. Howard could see the frustration on his face, the bemusement at how Howard could put up with the little tit who seemed to best him at every single turn. He couldn't stop his lips curling into a smile. God that kid sometimes took his breath away. He was, there was no other word for it, magnificent. He was barely able to stop himself climbing between the seats to kiss him. Vince barely batted an eyelid though.

He slid the cd into the player and all four of them took a deep breath "Ok you got 2 minutes 54 seconds from now". He pressed the button and as the beat of the song kicked in, they opened the doors and stepped out.

There you go, we're onto the Mint Royale video at last! I hope I didn't murder the first part of it. Please review xxx