Black Bicycles

Black Bicycles by Chris Green

I am old enough to remember a time when all bicycles were black. Perhaps it was the growing awareness of the Tour de France as a spectacle and its spin-off the Tour of Britain that brought about the trend for brightly coloured bicycles, this backed up by an organised marketing campaign around cycling as a healthy pursuit. This coincided with the advent of colour television which phased out the idea of monochrome in all walks of life. Everything now had to be colourful. Bicycle design went into overdrive. There was big money to be made. People were coerced into acknowledging the benefits of two wheels as a way to beat the traffic and help combat the threat of global warming. As new models emerged in ever-changing shapes and sizes for ever-changing leisure pursuits, black bicycles became a rarity,

You may have noticed that black bicycles have once again begun to appear. I must admit, I hadn’t, but Debbie’s friend Echo, who hosts gong baths on Thursday evenings at the community centre and knows a thing or two about far out things, insists that they are everywhere and are part of a plot to destabilise society ready for the takeover by advanced second-generation human clones. Until it is brought to your attention, she says, you may not have noticed that all black bicycle riders have what appears to be a tattoo on their necks. This is a communication device which links their consciousnesses so that they function as one. Exactly how the riders are going to destabilise society remains a little sketchy. Echo didn’t share this information. Perhaps they are already doing it, but us mere mortals have simply not made the connection.

The idea of an army of people on black bicycles preparing the way for a takeover by advanced human clones is so crazy that I am reluctant to raise it to anyone. But it would be useful to know if others whose wives perhaps don’t go to gong baths have encountered the idea. Or how much they have heard. Might I have missed an important news item about it? One night in The Stitch in Time after work and a pint or two of Stingo, I mention it to Eddie Straight. A former police officer, Eddie generally has a grasp of what’s going on in the world. He has his ear to the ground, and in my experience you can rely on Eddie for a balanced view.

‘If you ask me, Chet, your friend Echo is off her rocker,’ Eddie says. ‘Second-generation human clones taking over? I mean, come on, mate! I’ve never heard such rubbish. What is she on?’

‘Echo does have some odd ideas, certainly. But she is sometimes right.’

‘But now you mention it, Chet, there do seem to be lot of black bikes around these days. More than you might expect. When I was in the job, they weren’t at all common. Bikes all had brightly-coloured paint jobs then with fancy graphics. But maybe that’s changing. I often see a group of blokes on black bikes with big bags on their backs hurtling along Ken Barrington Way. Perhaps there is something we don’t know about. I’ll do some investigation.’

When I mention black bicycles to Hoagy Platt in my harmonica class he says it reminds him of the Birds Aren’t Real conspiracy theory in America. Birds Aren’t Real claims that between 1959 and 1971, all birds in the United States were exterminated by the government and replaced by lookalike drones. The fake birds are used to spy on citizens. The movement claims that birds sit on power lines to recharge themselves and defecate on cars as a tracking method. Although Birds Aren’t Real was created as a joke, the movement now has hundreds of thousands of followers in the US. It even takes aboard other conspiracy theories. John F Kennedy was killed by a hummingbird drone because he opposed the initial policy to replace birds, and the US invaded Vietnam to secure bauxite and other raw materials for building the bird drones.

‘Bird watching takes on a whole new meaning, doesn’t it?’ I say.

‘Basically, Black Bicycles has been created as satire,’ Hoagy says. ‘But the theory conveniently taps into David Icke’s world view, and like him or not, David sells millions of books. A kooky idea like Black Bicycles is always going to land favourably in the minds of the most impressionable, and given the added boost of an unregulated electronic media and a wealth of new apps to exploit it, those people are going to go for it. The masses are so easily taken in these days.’

It doesn’t of course end there. For some reason, I feel compelled to find out who or what is behind Black Bicycles. Who could stand to benefit from it, and how? The obvious place to start my search is at a bicycle store. Having not ridden a bicycle for years, I imagine that Halford’s might be a good first port of call. When I have been there for car parts, they always seem to have a large selection of bikes. On visiting my local branch now, I can see at a glance from the ones on display, they seem to be sticking with the old coloured models. The odd silver track bike, but nothing in black, I ask the fourteen-year-old assistant if they actually have any black bicycles in stock, or perhaps are they are expecting a new delivery? With an expression that is hard to interpret, he tells me that I require a specialist outlet. Darx maybe.

‘Darx. Not a name I’m familiar with,’ I say.

‘Darx don’t advertise widely,’ he says. ‘I read about Darx in a copy of Troof I picked up in that place that sells the poppers behind Budgen’s supermarket.’

‘What did it say?’

‘That’s the thing, it didn’t seem to say very much. but used a lot of big words to say it. Worth checking out Darx though, don’t you think?’

‘I think I may come across Troof,’ I say. ‘There was a guy in a Wax Head t-shirt handing out free papers at the market last week.’

Although Google doesn’t seem to have links to it, if you are determined you can find the Darx website hidden away in the depths of the Dark Web. The usual function of a web presence is to be visible and promote what you are offering, But secrecy seems to be key to the Darx operation. Frustratingly, there is not a single mention of black bicycles, but there is a link to a get together of some sort in the village of Wavering, thirty miles away. I might be putting two and two together to make nine, but it is worth a shot.

I arrive at the location in Wavering at the assigned time. There are no black bicycles in evidence and no one to explain why there are no black bicycles or whether there will be any black bicycles later. I wait and wait but nothing doing. Have I reached the end of the road on this one? I make a note to pick Debbie up from the gong bath next Thursday and put Echo on the spot. But it does look like I’ve been taken in. I could see if good old Eddie has come up with anything. But he won’t have. I should have listened to Hoagy Platt and seen Black Bicycles as another scam. The whippersnapper in Halford’s needs taking down a peg or two though for sending me on a wild goose-chase. I wonder if Troof even exists.

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