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Anne looked down at Bradley as he enthusiastically his arm around the contestant. He seemed a bit more...bouncy than normal today: it seemed as if he was high on something. Shirley, 37, a sneezle factory quality inspector from Wembworthy in Devon was looking nervous. The question ‘Who is Walford FC’s star striker Daniel Sproghouse married to?’ had just been asked and Shirley had just selected ‘Catalina Sunderland’ from the range of possibilities. This was correct and Bradley knew it, as did Anne. It’s just that Bradley was far more way-hay-exuberant than such a middling question deserved. “C’mon Shirley!” he loudly declared, “You’ve got it I reckon. You're proper bang on the money for sure. Yessss. Go for it Missus, get that fortune!.” Suddenly he started convulsing oddly before bouncing around in a circle and making odd cries of ‘Yip! Yip!’ and other similarly mad sounds. Shirley shrieked loudly before wisely seizing the chance to run away to safety as a clearly worried producer flanked by a couple of floor crew tried to deal with the crazed host. Clearly he had suffered a serious incident and they had to subdue him and fast before he caused damage to himself, the set or anyone nearby.
Bernie the producer carefully sidled behind the out of control Brad while the crew tried to distract him: there was an answer to this and Bernie knew exactly what to do. Bernie, judging his timing carefully, measured up his approach and suddenly lunged, pressing a small button on the back of Brad’s neck. Brad came to a sudden halt, frozen in position. The crew cautiously approached, checking it was safe but now there seemed to be no life from the deactivated comic. The taller crew member remarked, “I think we should invest in the Sony MK 4 hosts y’know. The new ones with the remote kill switch seem pretty groovy”.
They then realised that muffled cursing could be heard coming from within Brad’s head and upon closer inspection they could see that the cranial hatch was juddering: it appeared to be stuck. Bernie looked up at Anne and she was in park position, with her cranial hatch open and Bill, the imp that controlled her sat on top of her head, swigging from a tiny bottle, “Jiggle it with a spoon, the latch is probably caught.” observed the imp, “Its these cheap American TechsMechs imports that Bert from accounts insisted on. They’re a proper example of corporate cost-cutting: they're really badly put together, all shoddy plastic fittings, horrible veneer and crappy wiring. Bloody cheap and nasty connector’s loose probably. If you guys think the exterior's bad you should spend a day inside Shawn's head!"
"You do realise that the canteen only has cheap plastic spoons that'll probably snap. I could always use violence I suppose." mused Bernie.
Bill thought for a second before replying, "Well…its the first rule of engineering isn't it? If something goes wrong, hit it. Just don’t damage Brad and don't hurt Tracy. We imps are irreplaceable, and while these lousy mechs are cheap rubbish practically speaking, they still cost a packet."
Bernie nodded, ”You’re right there Bill, we really should up our budget for these things.” He directed his attention back to Brad’s head, poking around the cranial hatch, working out the best approach. Raising his voice a tad, he addressed the demon within, “Stand back Tracy, I’m gonna try hitting it.”
With a muffled “OK” coming from inside the head, he aimed the side of his fist and with some care, belted the hatch, causing it to spring open with a ‘Thwoing’ sound. Tracy the imp peeked out. “Cheers Bernie, I don’t know what the hell happened. Everything was fine one minute, then bam! all the settings went straight to max and he went bloody haywire!”
Bernie let Tracy climb onto his hand, “We’ll get the tech guys to look at it. Until then we’d best see if we have a spare Bradley on hand.”
"I think I'd best run the diagnostic thingy. It's a bit rubbish on these models but better safe than sorry I suppose. Back with you in a mo." Bill ducked back into Anne's head, shut the hatch and activated her self-diagnostic program. Under automatic control, Anne stood up, revolved one circle, raised her arms up and then put them straight out. Her head turned full left then full right then back to centre, her jaw opened and she let out a "Baaa" sound before putting her arms down. She blinked twice, flared her nose twice, made a happy face and then a scowl. Finally she stepped backward, said "Vowels, consonants, foxes and vaguely zany badgers. The quick brown fox outsmarts a chicken on hazy Tuesdays." Then she stepped forward again, pulled her chair up, sat down and went back into the park position. The hatch re-opened and Bill leaned out, "Well it seems fine, but I'll be careful."
Bernie smiled up at Bill. "Nice one mate. I'm going to lobby for a new set of chasers as well as a replacement Brad.”
Tracy stuck her oar in at this point, “I reckon we need to go a bit more upmarket instead of going with the cheap ass cowboys that made this pile of quiz show junk again." This was a sentiment that Bernie wholeheartedly agreed with, mentally noting to bring it up at that day’s after-show production meeting.
Thankfully they had a spare TechsMechs-made Brad, and as a precaution gave it a test run and a full diagnostic first to be sure all its systems were up to scratch. The faulty unit was sent off to a service centre in Chiswick and stripped down and inspected, the fault being traced to an unexpected infestation of Vernon's Quiz Weevils in his central control unit.
The studio consequently relented and spent some actual money on a much higher quality Bradley Walsh, some better outfits, a couple of brand new Dark Destroyers and a shinier, brighter-suited Sinnerman.