Chapter One Hundred and Sixteen: Another Bright Idea

 The OTHER upshot of the
Insurance Siege was that Demon decided that if his insurance company
was going to be at risk, he should probably invest some more into his
metalworks as a bit of an insurance policy.

Of course, he did this
in the most underhanded way possible, including multiple attacks on
Charlies metalworks business. These attacks weren't only performed by
the Haunted Maze Troupe, but they were also some legal ones too.

“I hate him! I wish
he'd go shove his head in a toilet! REPEATEDLY!” Charlie threw the
latest contract as far as he could. It flew back and hit him in the
face. “I HATE him!”

“I don't understand
how he could legally do this to your suppliers. This is severe
conflict of interest and any legal fight would throw this out and
burn it.” Belle replied, taking the offending paper away. They were
sitting in Charlies room, after a rather underhanded move by Demon to
go for Charlies suppliers. “Throwing fines at these suppliers for
the most inane things…”

“Yeah, but he's the
fricking Mayor and has nearly every legal eagle in Pleasantville
under his thumb, present company excepted.” Charlie grumbled.

“Yeah, well,
unfortunately there's no chamber of commerce in Pleasantville.”
Belle said, reading the contract over. “Good LORD he's anal.”

Charlie froze. Belle
slowly lifted her head from the contract and looked at her best
friend.

“Charlie…this had
better be good…” She warned him.

“I think…it's
time…for a BUSINESS REVOLUTION!” Charlie cried.

Thomas Begly stuck his
head in the door. “Did I hear the Improbability Clause?”

“Oh boy…” Belle
sighed.

—

“And so,” Charlie
said as the hairdresser looked extremely bored. “This is why I
believe that the business owners of Pleasantville need to get
together to ensure fairness and equality for all of us.”

“Are you done sugar?”
The hairdresser asked, annoyed. “I have customers to get to.”

Charlie opened his
mouth.

“We're done here,
we'll just leave you an information pack and be on our way.” Belle
quickly jumped in. She left a small envelope full of leaflets on the
counter and pushed Charlie out of the salon as quickly as she could.

“WHAT?” Charlie
cried.

“You say I'M bad for
exposition! You just told your life story and then some!” Belle
walked with her best friend down the street.

“We have to get
people on our side!” Charlie pleaded as Belle headed towards the
ice-creamery.

“Yes, and boring them
out of their skulls won't work. You should know that.” Belle walked
into the ice-creamery and immediately felt her stomach rumbling.

“FINE.” Charlie
groaned as they approached the counter. “Hi, I'm Charles Begly,
owner of Begly Metal Services. We've noticed recently there's no real
path for communication between the business owners of Pleasantville
and the Council, and we would like to propose a Chamber of Commerce
to help facilitate this. We at the Business Revolution Organisation
propose that all business owners in Pleasantville should have a place
to go for advice about various laws and regulations, as well as a
place to settle disputes. Especially -,”

“Here's our
information pack, can I get one scoop chocolate, one scoop toffee,
one scoop mint, one scoop hazelnut…” Belle started, mouth
watering.

“You get up ME for
taking forever! How long did that ice-cream order take?!” Charlie
cried in fury as the pair walked out twenty minutes later, Belle with
her rather large ice-cream bowl.

“DON'T YOU JUDGE ME
BEGLY.” Belle growled, making her friend back off.

“They're a cute
couple aren't they?” An old lady mentioned to her partner as they
walked past.

“I don't think
they're dating?” Her partner looked confused.

“Anyway, I think
we're done canvassing this street, how about we tackle the Industrial
Zone?” Belle continued to scarf down her ice-cream.

“Sure. Hey, do you
think we should try and canvass Jones Metalworks?” Charlie giggled
as they got into the busted old Elantra that Belle refused to part
with.

“Are you serious?
He'd find a way to get rid of both of us!” Belle grinned back.

Then her eye began to
twitch.

—

“I am the textbook
definition of an enabler. Every single one of your lame ideas, and I
just follow along like the sheep I am.” Giggles groaned as she and
Chuckles walked up to Jones Metalworks.

“You're still alive and thriving aren't you?” Chuckles said with authority as they approached the
entrance.

“Alive, yes.
Thriving, debatable.” Giggles replied as they walked into the
building.

“IT'S CHUCKLES AND
GIGGLES!”

“ATTACK!”

“THIS IS YOUR FAULT!”
Giggles screamed as they both bolted out of the building with bullets at their backs.
Unfortunately, Haunted Maze Troupers blocked their path – and all
of them were armed to the teeth!

“UP!” Giggles cried
as she grabbed Chuckles and flew them onto the roof of the building.
Both of them gasped for air.

“Oh NO!” Chuckles
cried as they heard a door banging, and they looked up to see more
employees opening the roof door and rushing towards them.

“Time to go!”
Giggles grabbed her best friend and they flew away, dodging thrown
knives and a rain of bullets as they left.

—

“Like I said, you're
still alive!” Charlie tried to cheer Belle up as they walked home
from the tip.

“BARELY, Begly!”
Belle snapped. “My helmet is now more chips than actual helmet!”

“Well, your birthday
is soon, I can buy you a new one?” Charlie suggested as they passed
Bills restaurant.

“Just so you can get
out of buying me a proper present.” Belle smirked.

“At least I
remembered it!”

“Our birthdays are
exactly six months apart, of course you're going to remember!”
Belle chided him as they walked past the lake.

“Anyway, we've got a
lot of work done today, the Business Revolution Organisation is off
to a great start!” Charlie pumped himself up.

“Maybe we should talk
to some of the people from the PRO. They'd be interesting in getting
things off the ground.” Belle thought out aloud.

“Yeah! Then we'll be
a PRO BRO!” Charlie cheered.

“I walked right into
that one.” Belle sighed.