Archive of Our Own ^beta

Dara looked into the camera, grinned and announced, "Now we come to If This is the Answer, What is the Question? There are six categories to choose from: Milton, what would you like?”
Milton started to say "sport" but his speech suddenly slowed down as if his batteries had gone flat. Much to everyone's surprise he slumped forward with a creak and even more surprisingly, a panel on the side of his head opened, allowing a small imp in loud yet tasteful Hawaiian shirt to peek out. "Sorry, guys: power's completely gone. Dunno what's wrong, we only had him serviced last week." It moaned.
"Oh not again." whinged Russell Howard, "It's bloody Frankie all over again. It took them months to get him restarted and even then he needed a beard battery."
Hugh Dennis poked the inactive comedian, "Are we paying too much for our comedian insurance?" He quipped, generating a series of groans from the entire studio.
Carol the director had walked on by now, her first concern being the welfare of Milton's demonic pilot, “You ok Larry?”
“Yeah, I’m good. This guy ain't though.” He patted the cranial hatch.
“He’s beyond a normal service I reckon. We’re gonna have to go the whole hog this time.” She gesticulated to someone on the edge of the set.
"Do we have a spare panelist?" Dara asked as a couple of technicians came on and started to fiddle about with the powerless Milton. Al, the team leader of the Oni Care Team walked on to the set carrying a small flying machine, which he held up so the imp could climb in.
"Cheers Al." Chirped Larry the imp as it powered the machine up and flew off toward the studio's Demon Lounge.
"No worries Larry" replied Al, who then proceeded to check on the rest of the little demons, starting with Arthur, pilot of Maisie Adam.
Meanwhile another technician had brought in something similar to a sack truck which the techno team then started to load Milton on to.
While the techs were fiddling with the knackered comic, Chris Addison's expression turned to a vacant sort of grin, then he took up an upright position and seemingly paused as a hatch on the side of his head opened and his imp leaned out and lit a cigarette, "Last time this happened, we were hanging about for bloody hours." it commented.
About ten minutes after wheeling the dead comic off, Chris from the production team walked in holding a clipboard, "Carol's right, he's completely dead so now we're clean out of Miltons, but we do have a Stewart Francis and a slightly dusty Gary Delaney. If you don't want puns there's an Adam Hills or if that's too tall for you we have a Lucy Porter in green and an Angela Barnes. We also seem to have three David Mitchells, a pink shirted Greg Davies and a couple of spare Andys. I'm pretty sure we have an old Frankie Boyle somewhere, but it hasn't been touched for years."
Dara pondered for a bit and said, "We'll keep going with the pun theme and go for the dusty Delaney. Just make sure this one works please"
"Gary it is. Hang on a mo." Al picked a walkie talkie from his belt and spoke into it, "Jim, they want the Delaney. Dust him off and get him up here."
After another five minutes the technicians returned with a freshly dusted new panelist and wisely performed a few tests on its power systems. When that was given the ok, the Oni care guys brought on Sarah, the imp that controlled Gary and recording started again.
The following day, Milton was sent to a specialist celebrity service facility in Milton Keynes where he underwent a full refurbishment. The studio also put in an order for a brand new Milton in case this happened again.
The imp insisted on brighter shirts for both himself and his Synth, bigger hair and a pay rise.