Budgie Noir

[Donna Moore]

"Oh my lord," tweeted Miss Sassy, turning round from the mirror in which she had been preening herself, "Whatever has happened to Peeve?"
"What do you mean?" asked Dimwit, taking a break from pulling out his feathers with his beak.

Miss Sassy pointed a perfectly manicured claw towards the bottom of the cage. A small green budgie lay stiff as a piece of cuttlefish on his back at the bottom of the cage, his little legs turned skywards, his beady eyes made beadier by death.

"Is he sleeping?" asked Dimwit.

"With his EYES open? Don't be silly Dimwit - he's dead." Miss Sassy flapped her immaculate wings, her feathers wafting beautifully like a little boa. As she caught sight of herself in the mirror, Miss Sassy admired her beautifully turned up beak and shiny plumage.

"Shall I go down and see?" asked Dimwit, setting one foot on the little yellow ladder that led down to the bottom of the cage.

Miss Sassy gasped. "Down to the cage floor? Without a torch? Are you mad? The killer could still be down there."

"Killer? What do you mean 'Killer'? Don't you think he just fell off his perch? Died of natural causes? A tiny little heart attack? Drank himself to death out of the water bottle?"

Miss Sassy shook her head (which is rather difficult when you don't have a neck). "No Dimwit, it's a clear cut case of murder. Look - can't you see...he's been strangled with the tiny little chain from his swing, a hole has been carved in his chest and his bell has been inserted in the chest cavity, and the word's of Ogden Nash's poem The Canary have been left by his cold lifeless body in millet:
'The song of canaries
Never varies,
And when they're molting
They're pretty revolting.'

It's obviously the work of a cereal killer."

"Oh I say" gasped Dimwit, almost falling off his perch. "This really is a locekd cage mystery. "Well, if it wasn't me (since I am far too stupid to write poems in millet) and it's not you Miss Sassy, because you are just far too pretty and sweet to do it, then who could it be? It's a mystery alright. Do you think we ought to call in the boys in blue feathers?"

Miss Sassy rolled her eyes (again, not an easy task for a budgie). "For god's SAKE Dimwit, are you congenitally stupid? If it's not me, and it's not you, then that only leaves...Hannibal."

They both turned towards the cockatiel in the corner, who was bobbing his head and trilling to himself maniacally, blood dripping from his claws, his feathers ruffled, a tiny green feather protuding from his beak. As Miss Sassy and Dimwit approached the cockatiel they began to make out words in the aimless trilling..."He asked for it...he did, he did....perky little bugger.... I had to put up with birds like him in 'Nam....waking up early in the morning full of the joys of spring...when all around...oh god, the endless tweeting....make it go away..."

[LC Fraser]

Sorry to take so long getting to reading - well done again. You should post these at Moldy too - most of us are on here but not all.

[Karyn J. Powers]

Two guys stand on a cliff. One has a parrot on his head and a small pistol. The other has a budgie on his head. The guy with the budgie says, "All right, then, see you at the bottom." and leaps off the edge. The budgie flies away. The jumper falls straight down to smash mortally injured on the rocks below. The man with the parrot leaps off, shoots the parrot and they drop like stones next to the first jumper. The first jumper gasps, "I say, I don't know what all the fuss is about budgie jumping." The second jumper gasps back, "While parrot shooting isn't all the much either." (fade to black,)