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A Space Oddity
by Mike Barklage
(c) 1994
Prologue
Chaos reigned with an iron fist on the bridge of the Satellite of
Love, and Cambot was flustered. There was too much going on, and he
wasn't sure what to focus on. There were flashing lights going off and
alarms sounding all over the ship. There was Gypsy shouting a
countdown into her headset. There were Tom and Crow, yelling about
some nonsense that nobody but Tom or Crow would probably care about.
And there was Joel, trying to read a letter over the din, but not having
much success. Cambot decided to focus on Joel, and hope for the best.
"Twenty seconds to expulsion!" Gypsy exclaimed.
"Okay, alright," Joel shouted, "we've got this letter to read. Let's
put it up on still-store. This one comes to us from --"
"Ten seconds and counting!" Gypsy interrupted. "Ten... nine...
eight... seven...."
"Gypsy," Joel pleaded, "can you turn off these emergency lights?
We've got this letter to read!"
"Sure," answered Gypsy. "One! Expulsion!"
With a short yelp and a burst of steam, Joel disappeared into the
floor. The lights and sirens shut off, leaving an odd silence.
"The hell was that?" asked Tom Servo.
"Yeah! Where's Joel?" added Crow.
"I can explain everything," Gypsy replied. "Cambot, quick, give
me Rocket Number 9!"
Cambot transferred visuals to the outside of the ship. A panel on
the back of the ship opened, and Cambot quickly zoomed in on it. Out of
the open panel slid a large box marked 'Hamdingers'. Then that box
opened, revealing an escape pod.
"He'll finally get to be among his own in the wild," sighed Gypsy.
"Hey, look!" Crow cried. "There's a prize inside that box of
hamdingers! An escape pod!"
The escape pod blasted off and away from the satellite, rocketing
toward Earth. Cambot suddenly realized there was an incoming message
from the pod, and he quickly put it up on the Hexfield Viewscreen. The
viewscreen irised open and revealed Joel inside the cramped compartment
with his knees pressed up against the screen.
"Hey, guys!" Joel exclaimed. "Look at me! I'm on my way to
Earth! Pretty crazy, huh?"
"Hey, what about us?" Crow said. "What are we supposed to do
with out you? Who's going to teach us what it is to be human and stuff?"
"Look, guys, by this point you guys know as much about it as I
do," Joel answered. Static began to drift across Joel's image, looking
strangely like confetti. "I don't have a lot of time. My signal's starting to
break up. I can tell I'm getting out of range. Listen, if you look under that
desk, there's a plaque I made for you to remember me by."
Tom reached under the desk and pulled up the plaque, which is
kind of amazing, considering Tom's ineffectual arms. "Yeah, here it is,"
said Tom, studying the plaque. "Nice job, Joel. Very professional
looking. Really nice job."
"Ah, yeah, thanks," Joel said as the static increased. "I really gotta
get out of here. I'm almost out of range. Listen you guys, be strong and
true! I love you! Bye!"
Joel's image left the viewscreen, and it closed.
"It's been a big day," Crow stated nonchalantly. "Who's hungry?"
"Not yet, you doofus!" Tom replied. "Let's find out what's on the
plaque. Press that button there."
The button was pressed, and Joel's recorded voice was heard
coming from the plaque.
"To all on the Satellite of Love, from Joel," said the plaque.
"Hey! That's us!" said Gypsy. The bots listened closely.
"The whole world is a circus if you look at it the right way,"
continued the plaque. "Every time you pick up a handful of dust, and see
not the dust, but a mystery, a marvel there in your hand. Every time you
stop and think, I'm alive, and being alive is fantastic. Every time such a
thing happens, you are part of the Circus of Dr. Lao."
There was a quiet pause as the recording stopped. Then all the bots
screamed at once, "WHAT?!"
"Circus of Dr. Lao? Oh, brother!" Tom ranted. "Joel leaves and
his last words are from a George Towns movie? I thought it would be
something profound!"
Cambot sensed another transmission from Joel, but Magic Voice
beat him to the punch. "Last transmission from Joel coming in on the
Hexfield," she stated as Cambot opened the Hexfield viewscreen once
again. Joel's picture was barely coming through now.
"Joel, buddy, Circus of Dr. Lao?" Tom said. "I don't get it!"
"Hey, it's my favorite movie! So sue me!" Joel said. "I gotta go!
Hey, see ya later! Sorry, I can't come back! I don't know how it works!
Bye!"
As the Hexfield Viewscreen irised closed again, Crow muttered,
"Wow." Gypsy sighed. "I'm going to miss him!"
"Well," Tom said, "I guess he's gone for good, fellas, and that only
means one thing." He paused for dramatic effect. "I'm in charge."
"I'll race ya to the Mellocups," Crow said, suddenly chipper
again. "I found out where he hides them!"
"Oh, Crow, too soon," Tom said.
"Think they'll send us a new guy?" asked Gypsy.
"Oh, sure, they're bound to," answered Tom. "But until that
happens... PANIC!!!"
All three bots let off strangled cries as they bounced from side to
side, tearing themselves apart in the panic. Cambot avoided Tom as the
stout red robot ran back and forth across the bridge, but felt himself smack
into the side of something large and immobile. Losing his balance,
Cambot crashed into the floor. Then, the robot felt nothing.
Far below the Earth's surface, in Deep 13, TV's Frank watched the
events unfold on the Satellite of Love with increasing levels of anxiety.
He watched Gypsy help Joel escape. He watched Joel reveal his last
words of wisdom to his robotic pals. He watched the bots go into a deep
state of frenzied panic. Then the picture went black. Frank saw horrible
pain in his future. Then, as Dr. Forrester walked in, Frank amended that
last thought -- he saw pain in his IMMEDIATE future.
"Aaaaah," Forrester sighed happily. He was wearing a bath robe
and drying his hair with a towel. "Nothing like a shower to make one feel
new again. I feel great! Nothing can get in the way of my good mood!
What's going on, Frank?"
Frank stammered nervously. "Oh, nothing much. Inventory is
under control... floor needs mopping... Joel escaped from the Satellite of
Love..."
"Well, I see you've got the situation well at hand -- WHAT?!"
Forrester snapped, finally realizing what Frank had just told him. "Joel
escaped from the Satellite of Love?!"
Frank began to slowly back away. "I'd better get started on that
floor," he said quietly.
"Frank, my towel and your hinder have an appointment, but first
we've got to rescue Joel!" Forrester typed a few commands into the Deep
13 console. He read the computer's output. "Oh, no, Frank! He's landed
safely in the Australian outback!"
Frank managed a frightened grin. "Well, let's just hope he landed
on Yahoo Serious."
"Well, that's a good point, Frank," Forrester said before he could
stop himself. Suddenly, he grabbed Frank by the collar. "Can't you see
we're ruined? What are we going to do?"
"We could send someone else into space!" Frank sputtered.
"Who are we going to find at this late date to send into space?"
Mike Nelson stepped in between the two evil scientists, holding a
card in front of them. "You guys sign my timecard?"
Forrester began laughing evilly, and when Frank saw this, he
joined in boss' warped glee. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"
Forrester asked Frank between chuckles.
"You're not going to sign his timecard," replied Frank, also in
between chuckles.
Forrester's glee was wiped off his face in frustration.
Mike added, "Come on, you've got to sign my timecard."
Forrester put on his best snake-oil grin and turned to Mike. "Of
course I'll sign your timecard, young man. In fact, I think you'll be
working for me for a long, long time." The smile very nearly turned into a
sneer. "Push the button, Frank."
Frank pushed the button as Forrester asked, "Say, Mike, what size
jumpsuit do you wear?"
Chapter 1:
Escape
The escape pod landed with a jolt that sent Joel Robinson forward;
the safety belt strained to keep him from slamming head first into the front
viewscreen. The engines powered down with an audible whine, and then
there was silence. Joel glanced over the control panel of the tiny pod. He
had landed in the part of Earth known as the Australian outback, and on
the descent to the surface, the sensors had not picked up any settlements in
a radius of 200 miles.
Joel unfastened the seat belt and looked out one of the pod's tiny
windows. He saw a sun-beaten land, nothing but sand, rocks, and the
occasional sagebrush. `Two hundred miles of this?', he thought glumly.
`I don't think I can make it that far, just walking.'
Joel searched the control panel again. OK. Let's figure out how to
get this thing back in the air, he thought as he examined the panel. It was
covered with various buttons, knobs, levers, 2-D displays, and flashing
lights.
"Hmmmm... onboard computer access switch... antimatter
containment release... technobabble decoder function... Cappucino maker
(out of order)... Ah! Here we go!" Joel smiled as he found a large red
button marked 'Start'. He triumphantly pressed the button, but nothing
happened other than a 'click'.
Joel was confused. Then it dawned on him that this escape pod
must have been designed for a single use, and nothing more. Its engines
were burned out, and it would never fly again. Joel sighed disappointedly.
Standing again, he saw a compartment behind the seat with a small
sign that said 'Emergency Supplies'. He opened the compartment and
found it empty except for a can of Diet Coke and a stale Pop-Tart. "Oh
well," he muttered, pocketing the can of noxious chemicals and the equally
noxious toaster pastry. "What do you expect from a box marked
'Hamdingers'?"
Joel pushed the button beside the pod's door, which opened with a
Star Trek-style woosh. Heat blasted the inside of the tiny, air-conditioned
craft as Joel squinted into the wasteland. "Well!" he said to no one in
particular. "Here we go!" And so he started off walking into the
wilderness, eastward, toward the city.
The sun had almost set when the two creatures came upon the
crashed escape pod. From a distance, they could almost be mistaken for
humans; after all, they were humanoid, with two arms, two legs, and
average builds. But any similarities disappeared once you saw them up
close -- the rough brown skin, red bug-like eyes, and too-large hands.
They were Mole People.
One of them, the one known as Jerry, got out of the rented Solar
Speeder and surveyed the scene. The other one, Sylvia, got out and waited
beside the vehicle. Jerry ducked his head inside the now-deserted pod.
The ship had shut itself off, and the only sign that someone had been here
was a compartment that had been left open.
Jerry left the pod and examined the countryside. He saw footsteps
leading eastward away from the pod, toward the east. He glanced at his
companion. She had seen them, too. Wordlessly, they both climbed back
into the vehicle and raced off, following the footprints.
It was less than 24 hours since he had left the pod, but Joel didn't
care. He had decided to be delirious anyway. The Diet Coke and Pop-
Tart had lasted him through the night, but now he had nothing. The
combination of constant exposure to the sun, lack of water, and endless
barren wasteland had caused him to go slightly mad. Or was he? Joel
didn't know for sure, and he really didn't care. Right now, he was
dreaming of Splunkies.
"Doesn't matter what comes, fresh goes better in life!" Joel yelled,
singing the jingle from the Splunkies commercial.
"With Splunkies, fresh and full of life!
Nothing gets to you, stayin' fresh, stayin' cool!
With Splunkies, fresh and full of life!
Fresh goes better -- Splunkies freshness!
Fresh goes better with Splunkies, fresh and full of life!
Splunkies -- the Freshmaker!"
Joel fell silent, continuing to hum the jingle to himself. He could
almost taste the Splunkie now, wonderfully sweet on his tongue! For a
moment he felt as if he had gained super powers, like in the commercials:
powers that let him shape time and space, control the thoughts of ordinary
mortals, and look annoyingly European. But the feeling, thankfully, soon
passed.
That train of thought was interrupted when a glint on the horizon
caught Joel's eye. He turned and looked in the direction it had come from.
There was nothing there. Must have been another delusion.
But wait! There! Just beyond that giant dinosaur skeleton! There
it was again! "A transport! I'm saved!" Joel exclaimed, suddenly taking
on a crisp British accent. He waved his arms over his head. "Over here!
Hey! Help! Please, help!"
Joel began to run as the transport came closer. Now he could see
that it was a small brown car with large solar panels and numerous dings
and scratches all over. The solar vehicle came to a stop in front of him.
Exhausted, Joel collapsed onto the ground.
A shadow crossed Joel's face as he looked up and squinted. The
driver was an old bearded man with a brown hood drawn up over his head.
"Ben? Ben Kenobi?" Joel whispered.
The old man grunted. "Nope, sorry, mate. Him, I'm not. But you
look like you could use a lift."
"Gee, thanks, mister," Joel replied, and then he fainted.
Chapter 2:
Existential Pixels and Big G Burgers
When Joel woke up, he was in the back of the old man's grungy
vehicle. There was a dog sitting on his chest, growling at him. Oddly
enough, none of this seemed to surprise him too much.
The old man turned. "Ah, good, you're up and about." When the
dog growled again, he said, "Oh, and don't mind him. In fact, he seems to
have taken a liking to ya!"
"Yeah, sure," Joel muttered. He picked the dog up (carefully) and
set him down on the floor of the car. Then he sat up, rubbed his eyes, and
leaned forward. "Where are we?" he asked, looking out the window.
"You're lucky you got up when you did, 'cause we're almost there!"
"Where's there?"
"Why, the city, of course. Civilization! That was where you were
going, right?" The old man glanced at him and grinned.
"Well, yeah. But how did you know?"
The old man's smile faded, and he turned back to the road. Joel
decided to pursue the question.
"Which city are we going to?" When the man still didn't say
anything, he added, "And who are you, anyway?"
The old man's eyes darted from side to side, as if searching for
something. "All right... I'm, uh, John. And his name," he said, referring to
the dog, "is, er... Spot."
Joel suspected something, and rightly so. "There's something
funny about this. Why did you sound like you just made up your own
names?"
"Because the $#*%ing author didn't give us any!" the man
exploded. He rested his head in his hand. "I'm just a minor character,
okay? Are you happy now?" He sighed. The old man seemed to have
lost his Australian accent as well. "The author was too lazy to even give
me a name. That bastard just wants to get on to write the nifty bits that
take place in Deep 13 and stuff." He downcast his eyes. "I'm just a plot
convenience to get you to another part of the story."
Joel looked confused. "What are you talking about?"
The old man looked up again. "See, me and the dog here are aware
of our fictional existence as characters in a story." In the back seat, the
dog nodded. "You don't know because you're a Main Character. You'll go
on to other places, other adventures. But as soon as you leave this car, me
and the mutt back there cease to exist!"
Joel was silent but wide-eyed. The old man continued in a
confidential tone.
"When you get to the city and we exit the story, always remember
this." He grew even quieter. "We're all nothing but ASCII characters on a
computer screen."
Joel thought this over. "Whoa," he said finally.
They rode on in silence.
Joel waved after the solar car as it sped off down the road and into
oblivion. `Strange man', Joel thought. The old guy had taken it rather
well that he would cease to exist once Joel got to the city. Joel rather
thought he was going to miss Old Man and Dog. `I hope they get a part in
another fanfic. They deserve at least that much.'
Joel turned his attention to his new surroundings. It appeared that
he had been dropped off in the downtown section of the still-as-yet-
unnamed city. He was surrounded on all sides by tall, gleaming, black
buildings. People of all sorts passed him as he strolled down the sidewalk.
A few glanced questioningly at his dirty red Gizmonic jumpsuit, but most
just ignored him.
Then a large, brightly colored sign caught Joel's eye. It had a giant
gray 'G' up on stilts, and under that, in smaller letters: Home of the Big G
Burger. "Wow! They've got one in Australia! They're everywhere now!"
Joel exclaimed.
Without thinking, Joel started for the door but caught himself after
taking a couple of steps. He felt a bit of apprehension. After all, Big G
was owned by the Gizmonic Institute -- the same Institute that sponsored
Deep 13, that had kept him imprisoned for four and a half years. But as
someone left the restaurant and the door stood open, the smell of food
wafted out and into Joel's nose. His stomach growled impatiently.
"What the heck," Joel said, "they've got the best Splunkies this side
of anywhere!" He entered the restaurant.
The inside of Big G was a carbon copy of every other fast food
restaurant in existence: brown, sterile, and artificially friendly, with a few
potted plants hung at various strategic points. Joel walked in and smiled at
the young teenager behind the counter, who did not return the smile.
"Can I help you, sir?" said the teenager in a voice that cracked with
puberty. His face was a connect-the-dots puzzle of zits.
"Yes," replied Joel, scanning the menu above the kid's head. "I'd
like... uh... two Solarburgers and an... Orange Splunkie."
The teenager typed the order into the register. "Would you like
fries with that?"
"Er... no."
"That will be $14.78."
"$14.78?!" Joel exclaimed. "Geez, I've been in space too long."
Then a sudden realization struck him -- he had no money. "Hey, listen,
uh, I don't suppose I get an employee discount or anything, do I?" he said,
pointing to the Gizmonic logo on the left breast of his jumpsuit. "Like,
free, or something?"
The worker stared at him vacantly. "No, eh?" Joel said. "Well,
what about --"
He didn't get to finish the sentence as he was struck on the head
with a heavy object. The last thing Joel felt was scaly hands dragging him
out the door. And the last thing he heard was a cracked voice saying, "Sir,
does this mean your order is to go? Sir??"
Chapter 3:
The Evil Plan of World Domination
Joel sat up and immediately wished he hadn't, as pain shot through
his head. He felt like there were an infinite number of monkeys in his
head, all tapping on his brain, trying to work out a script for Hamlet. He
cradled his head in his hands for a moment, then felt his scalp. There was
a large painful lump there that wouldn't be going away for a while.
When the pain finally subsided a bit, he took a gander at his
surroundings. He was in some kind of storeroom, from the looks of it.
The dim light emanating from a single light bulb shone on a room piled
with junk. Joel thought there was something familiar about this place.
Fortunately, whoever had kidnapped Joel had not bothered to tie
him up, so he was free to explore the place further. He examined some of
the larger pieces of junk in the middle of the room. One of them, a waist-
high machine that reminded Joel of a copier, caught his eye. It was
covered with a thick film of dust. `The janitor at this place must not be
very good,' thought Joel as he wiped off some of the dust. He revealed a
small logo on the top that said 'Wish Squisher.'
"Wish Squisher?" Joel said curiously. Then his eyes slowly
widened. "Wish Squisher! Oh no!"
He knew exactly where he was now. How could he have not
noticed before? There, sets of Johnny Long Torsos piled in one corner.
There, a crate of Unhappy Meals. There, the highly explosive Tank Tops.
The Breakfast Bazooka. The Squaremaster. He recognized most of them
now. It was the Invention Storeroom in Deep 13.
As if on cue, Joel heard fingers on a keypad outside, and the door
unlocked and slid open. In walked Dr. Clayton Forrester, followed closely
by Frank. Joel could see Jerry and Sylvia standing behind them in the
hallway.
"So good to have you back, Joelykins!" sneered Forrester,
resplendent in his matching neon green glasses and lab coat. "Frank and I
were just talking about you. We're going to have SO much fun together."
Dr. Forrester and Frank both began to giggle morbidly.
"What are you going to do to me, sirs?" Joel swallowed. "Are you
going to kill me?"
"Perhaps," replied Forrester. "Perhaps not. Death may be too
good for you." The evil doctor waved his hand. "No matter. I'm not here
to deal with you, anyway. I'm here to make a pickup." He gestured to the
two Mole People, who rolled a dolly into the room. They followed
Forrester to an area of the room that was relatively free of junk and old
experiments. In the middle of this area sat a machine that stood about
waist-high. It was topped with a computer console and monitor. Forrester
ran his hands over it greedily as if it were the Hope Diamond.
"Joel, meet the Fictional-Character-Creating Machine of Death
(patent pending)!" Forrester laughed giddily, wringing his hands. "Do
you want to know what it does? Tell me you want to know what it does!"
"Um, does it create fictional characters?" Joel asked warily.
"No, you imbecile! It creates fictional characters!" Forrester took
a moment to calm down. "The idea behind the Fictional-Character-
Creating Machine of Death (patent pending) is really quite simple. It takes
any fictional character that has appeared on tape, turns energy into
matter... and CREATES them!" He paused for dramatic effect. "I
formulated a plan to go along with it. Would you like to hear it?"
Without waiting, Frank stepped in. "It's called Forrester's Evil
Plan of World Domination, and boy, is it evil! Evil!"
"That's enough, Frank!" Forrester continued, as Frank whispered,
'Evil!' one more time. "You see, Joel, my Evil Plan of World Domination
makes use of this machine. I --"
"He'll create the most vile, the most evil, the most villainous
people ever seen on film or television!" Frank interrupted again, grinning.
Forrester began fuming. "Shut up, Frank!"
"Then he'll set these creations loose on the world!"
"Frank, I may have to hurt you!"
"They'll have no choice but to surrender to him!" Frank laughed,
oblivious of Forrester's anger.
"Frank," Forrester grated through barely-contained rage. "Frank,
remember the Squeegie."
A look of abject terror filled Frank's face. "I'll be quiet," he said in
a small voice, backing away into a corner.
Forrester turned back to Joel. "Now then, where was I? Oh, yes.
Obviously we have to create characters I can control. In an early
experiment with this machine, I created the 'Hey, Vern!' guy, and, well,"
Forrester's face became dark, "he had to be destroyed." He brightened
again. "But then it hit me. I know where I can find the most vile and
corrupt villains who WILL do my bidding -- from the films we have
stockpiled right here in Deep 13!"
Forrester smiled at the shocked look on Joel's face. "That's right,
Joely-poly. Imagine, watching Gaos rampage in New York, while
Trumpy terrorizes the populace, with Mr. B Natural at my side. Oh, it'll
be beautiful!" He snapped out of a far-away look and turned his attention
back to his machine. "It's time to set my plan into action."
As Jerry and Sylvia carted the machine out with Frank following,
Forrester turned back to face Joel. "And as for YOU, Boobie, I'll deal with
you later... and it will NOT be pleasant." Joel could hear Forrester's
laughter long after the door had slid shut.
Joel sighed and slumped frustratedly against a wall, next to a pile
of mechanical odds and ends. Somehow, he would have to get out of here
and stop Forrester, but how? The door was locked from the outside, and
even if he did get out, he'd have to either escape Deep 13, or find the
machine and destroy it -- and probably die trying.
As he thought, he absentmindedly picked up a small piece of
equipment from the pile. A CPU chip. He picked up another one. A
motherboard. He snapped the pieces together and searched the pile again.
Something registered somewhere in the back of Joel's brain, but he wasn't
really paying attention. He just kept putting pieces together, the way he
always did. He wasn't sure how he did it, he just DID it. But whenever he
did this, the end result was something good.
So Joel did what he did best -- he built a robot.
Chapter 4:
Beeper
Joel stepped back and surveyed his handiwork. The robot stood on
three legs that were bendable at the midpoint. Retractable wheels were on
the end of each leg. If it extended to its full height (which was about two-
thirds of Joel's height), it looked like a camera on a tripod. If it squatted
down, it looked like a mechanical spider (except that five legs were
missing). These legs were connected to a silver trapezoidal torso that
contained most of the robot's gears and mechanical functions. Long,
spindly arms hung limp at the robot's side.
The robot's head was silver and cylindrical. It had two coin-shaped
eyes that made it look as if it had glasses. Its mouth consisted of a large
metal jaw, connected at either side of its head, covering up a small maw.
Right now, there was a panel open in the back of its head, exposing
various wires and electrical doo-dads, as Joel put the finishing touches on
his creation.
It was time, Joel decided. He reached his finger into the opening in
the robot's head, flicked a switch, then quickly closed the panel. He
waited. Nothing happened. Then the robot's eyes lit up; but Joel could
sense there was something wrong. He heard a beep. Its head began to
spin around and around, faster and faster. The beeping also became faster,
and louder. Smoke poured from the robot's neck. The spinning and
beeping had reached a fever pitch when Joel grabbed the head, reached
into the panel, and turned the thing off again. The bot's eyes went dark, its
body limp.
Joel examined the robot's innards, trying to figure out what went
wrong. After a bit, he tried again. He flipped the switch, closed the panel
and waited. The robot's eyes lit up again. This time, it looked slowly
from side to side, its eyes finally resting on Joel.
"Hi," said the robot.
"Hi, robot. How ya doing?" asked Joel.
"I make a good living. Say, who are you?"
"I'm Joel," the human said. "I created you."
"Oh," the robot said. It paused. "Who am I?"
"Um... I think I'll call you Beeper."
The robot's eyes looked from side to side. He looked confused.
"Beeper? What the hell kind of a name is that?"
"I don't know. I guess I like it better than Spinner."
"Oh, okay," Beeper said. "So, what's for lunch? I could go for a
sammich."
Joel smiled bitterly. "Unfortunately, nothing's for lunch right now.
We have to figure out a way to get out of here first."
"Why not use the door?" Beeper asked innocently.
"It's locked."
"Not a problem!" The door unlocked and slid open. Joel just
stood there, his jaw nearly touching the floor.
"How did you do that?!" Joel asked incredulously.
"Easy. You built the door controls right into my high-level
functions! You didn't know?"
"No."
"Well, you do now! Come on, let's get out of here, I'm hungry.
And close your mouth, it's disgusting!"
Joel closed his mouth with a click of his teeth and followed Beeper
out the door.
They had made their way quickly through Deep 13, searching for
Dr. Forrester's evil machine. Joel knew the layout of the vast underground
laboratory, and Beeper could open all the locked doors, but they still had
not had any success. But the search would have to wait for right now, Joel
decided, as they heard footsteps coming their way. Joel and Beeper
quickly scurried into a convenient broom closet and waited.
Joel opened the door a crack and watched carefully. He heard
humming as the footsteps drew nearer. The footsteps stopped, and Joel
heard the scratch of pen on paper. He recognized the song as Ace of
Base's "The Sign." Then the hummer came into view. He was dressed
entirely in black, and had white hair with a strange little Superman-style
curl on his forehead. Joel smiled. It was only Frank, making his daily
check of the communications systems.
"Who is that, Joel?" whispered Beeper, who was below Joel and
peering through the same crack in the door.
"It's only TV's Frank," Joel whispered back. "He's an okay guy.
He just spends too much time around Dr. Forrester."
Meanwhile, Frank had stopped humming and started singing.
While he sang, he did a little dance that can only be described as a cross
between the Funky Chicken and a man dying in an electric chair.
"Oh, I saw the sign!" Frank sang, inserting his patented 'Frank
Noise' at appropriate intervals. "And it opened up my eyes! I saw the
sign!" Joel couldn't help thinking that if Ace of Base were here, they'd be
crying.
"Joel, what's he doing?" Beeper asked cautiously. "He's scaring
me."
"Well, he WAS checking the communications array. Now he's just
singing badly." Joel paused for a second, thinking. "Beeper, I need to use
that array, but we have to get Frank out of the way first. Any ideas?"
Beeper looked around, his eyes illuminating the dark closet. "How
about that tranquilizer gun back there?"
Joel tried to find where Beeper was looking, and, sure enough,
there was a dart gun. He picked it up, hefting its weight. He smirked.
"Groovy," he said darkly. He checked the chamber; there was one dart
left. A thought occurred to him. "Why would the Mads keep something
like this in a broom closet?" Then he shook his head. "Never mind. After
all these years, I've learned to stop asking questions like that."
Tranquilizer gun in hand, Joel slowly opened the door. He tried
not to make any noise, although he was not sure Frank would notice the
London Symphony Orchestra playing the 1812 Overture at this point. The
mad assistant was still caught up in slaughtering his pop song of choice.
And so Joel was easily able to shoot Frank in the hinder with his
tranquilizer gun.
Frank immediately stopped singing. He turned around and saw
Joel holding the now-empty gun. "Oh, hi, Joel," he said. Then his head
snapped back, and he collapsed on the floor.
"Is he going to be okay, Joel?" Beeper asked, emerging from the
broom closet.
"Oh, sure, he'll be fine. We'll just tag him and release him back
into the wild." Joel dropped the dart gun and began to fiddle with the
communications system.
"Who ya gonna call?" said Beeper.
"Some old friends of mine," Joel said, not picking up on the setup
line. "Right now, they're trapped in space... and I'm gonna try to bring
them back!"
Chapter 5:
Satellite of Love
"Well, what about The A-Team?" asked Mike between sips of Diet
Cherry 7up. He swallowed and winced as slight pain ran through his head.
The bandage on his head had come off a couple of days ago, but there was
still some pain left from where the Mads had conked him on the noggin.
"Yeah! There ya go! Rough and ready for action!" exclaimed the
golden robot to Mike's left.
"Please! I thought we were discussing the GOOD shows of the
early '80's," said the red robot to Mike's right. The three were on the
bridge of the Satellite of Love, each with a carbonated beverage of their
choice.
"C'mon, Tom, what's wrong with The A-Team?" asked Crow.
"What's wrong?! Plenty!" huffed Tom Servo. "Okay, I'll give you
that these four goofballs were trained special agents and fought in
Vietnam. I'll even give you that George Peppard, who looks old enough to
have served in World War II, let alone Vietnam, served with them." Tom
took a deep breath. "What about the fact that at the end of EVERY
episode, our heroes ended up being locked in some garage somewhere by
the bad guys, and they just happen to find enough materials and tools to
build some kind of super-tank thingy out of a car. And THEN, once they
got out, they started wreaking havoc on the bad guys. But did anyone ever
get injured or killed? NO! An enemy car could do a jump, flip, triple
pirouette, and explode in a ball of flame, but the driver always somehow
escaped without a scratch! Perhaps the producers thought they were doing
something GOOD for children by showing that nobody had actually died,
but what they actually ended up doing was showing that violent acts had
absolutely NO consequences! Hey kids, wanna total your dad's car? Sure,
go ahead, you'll be fine!"
"Geez, Crow," Mike asked the red robot quietly. "Did I touch
some kind of nerve here?"
"I'M Crow," the golden robot said dangerously.
"Uh, I mean, Tom," Mike said quickly.
"Boy, that must have been some conk on the noggin," muttered
Crow, rolling his eyes and shaking his head.
"And it wasn't just The A-Team," Tom continued, not noticing the
interruption. "Cheesy acting, asinine plots, and juvenile conventions were
commonplace among the popular dramas of the late '70's and early '80's. I
mean, come on, Mike! The Love Boat? Fantasy Island? The Dukes of
Hazzard? Oh, PUH-LEEZE!!"
"Tom, you're completely overlooking the truly good shows of that
era! What about Hill Street Blues, huh?" said Mike.
"Okay, I'll give you that one, but remember that it was created by
Steven Bochco... who later did Cop Rock," replied Tom.
There was an uncomfortable silence, which was then broken by all
three saying, "Ewwwwww..." at the same time.
"Anyway, Tom," Mike said, shaking his head, "I think you're not
giving these shows enough of a chance. I mean, I grew up with these
shows! They're not all bad!"
Tom shook his head, but said nothing.
"Besides," Mike continued, "they had some great theme songs!"
"Yeah!" Crow interjected.
The human and two robots began to spiritedly sing the theme to
The A-Team, complete with simulated machine gun fire at the appropriate
points. "Da duh da! Duh duh dum (boom-boom)! Da duh-da da! Da
duh-da-da-da (boom-boom)!"
The fun was interrupted by a flashing red light on the counter.
"Whoa!" said Tom. "We got something coming in on the Hexfield
Viewscreen!"
"The what?" asked Mike, but the screen had already opened, and
there stood Joel.
"JOEL!!" yelled the two robots. They began racing around,
repeating the name over and over again. "JoelJoelJoelJoelJoel -- "
"Okay, okay, you guys!" Joel smiled. "Cut it out!"
"Oh, it's good to see you again!" gasped Tom.
"Hey, I recognize you," said Mike. "You were here before! I
helped you escape! Now they've got ME up here instead!"
"Sorry about that," replied Joel. "I didn't know they would do that
to you. But that's not important right now. Listen, I'm down here in Deep
13, and I think I can reroute this control panel to give me access to the
SOL control functions. I'm going to try to get you down from there!"
"If you need to, just get Frank's keys," said Mike. He noticed
Frank's slumbering form on the floor behind Joel. "What didja do to him,
anyway?"
"Um... let's just say Frank's gone bye-bye for a little while," Joel
replied while examining the communications array. In the meantime, a
glowing pair of eyes peered around Joel's elbow.
"Say, who's that, Joel?" asked Crow.
Joel looked startled, but then he noticed Beeper studying the
satellite's inhabitants, and he smiled. "Oh! Beeper, meet Tom Servo,
Crow T. Robot, and, uh, Mike, is it? And guys, meet Beeper. I just made
him today. I guess," Joel paused cautiously, "I guess that makes him your
little brother."
"Wha... huh?" gaped Tom.
"Little brother?" said an equally astonished Crow.
"Why, this opens up a whole new WORLD that I never thought
about before!" The two bots talked to each other conspiratorially.
"You know what this means, right, Tom?"
"I think I do, Crow!"
They both turned back to the viewscreen.
"Oh, Beeper," Tom said slickly. "You know what it means when
you're our little brother, hmmmm?"
"It means you have to clean our rooms for us," said Crow.
"And the loadpan bay," said Tom.
"And you have to give us any ram chips you have."
"Or ever have."
"Yeah! And you, uh, have to let us snigger on ya and stuff."
"And..."
Beeper hid behind Joel, who was half turned around trying to
comfort the baby robot, while reprimanding the two older bots. "Hey!
Come on, you guys!"
"Aw, whatsa matter, baby?" Tom said, noticing Beeper's
intimidation. "Gonna cry, baby? Huh? Gonna cry?"
"Noonan! Noonan!" Crow joined in the taunting.
"One-two-three, CRY! One-two-three, CRY!"
"HEY!!" yelled Joel. "Come on! He's only a few hours old! He's
not ready to defend himself yet against the likes of you two. Now, come
on, say it."
Tom and Crow sighed. "We're sorry," they said in unison.
"That's better," said Joel. "But I think I'm going to have to keep
you two away from Beeper for a little while." Joel continued to fidget
with the control panel.
"Oh, uh, by the way, Joel," Tom stuttered. "After you left, we kind
of... panicked. And, uh, we kind of broke Cambot."
"It's was all Gypsy's fault! She bumped into him!" Crow yelled.
"Crow, it doesn't matter," Joel said patiently. "How is he now?
Could you fix him?"
"I really don't know how," Mike said. "What should I do?"
"I don't know," Joel answered. "If I can get you down, I can fix
him myself. In the meantime, just do your best, I suppose. Look in my
old room; there's a book in there called E-Z Bot Repair. That should help
a bit."
Suddenly there was a voice that reverberated from the halls behind
Joel. "Frank? Oh, Frank!" said the voice. "Are you done with your
equipment check yet?"
"Uh-oh, guys," Joel said quickly. "It's Dr. Forrester! I'm gonna
have to come back again later! Be good! And say hi to Gypsy for me!"
Joel pressed a few buttons, and the viewscreen irised closed. The
last thing heard was Forrester yelling. "We're late for our salon
appointment! I know how cranky you get if your curl sags!"
"Who was that masked man?" asked Mike. "I sure hope he comes
back."
"Yep," said Tom. "You know, I'm sure there's a lesson to be
learned from all this. But what is it?"
Everybody thought for a moment. Then Crow said, "Don't watch
the fX network?"
"D'oh!" Laughter filled the satellite.
A brisk wind whipped through the valley as Joel stepped out of the
express elevator leading to Deep 13. Joel was thankful for the wind as he
let out a breath he had long been holding and breathed deeply. The Deep
13 elevator was disguised as a Port-a-John, and no expense had been
spared to keep up the illusion. A convincing illusion it was, too, complete
with the wonderful aromas associated with portable toilets.
Beeper followed Joel out of the elevator/toilet. "Whhoooooo-
eeeee!" the robot yelled at the top of its voice card. "No wonder Dr.
Forrester is always in a pissy mood, if THIS is how he gets to work!"
"Naw," replied Joel. "He enjoys it, I think. A little too much,
maybe."
The wind blew a bit harder, and Joel shivered. Gray clouds
blanketed the sky overhead. Minnesota in November is not a pleasant
place, Joel thought.
Joel hugged himself for warmth as he reaquainted himself with his
surroundings. He had not been here for quite some time. He was in a
valley that was completely owned by the Gizmonic Institute. Shadowing
the valley was what was possibly the tallest mountain in Minnesota,
though merely considered a hill anywhere else. Standing on the side of
this hill, in pure Hollywood style, were the letters 'GIZMONIC
INSTITUTE'. Buildings were scattered through the valley, with one
building in the center of it all -- a large building shaped like the letter G.
The place was deserted, except for a few laborers scattered here and there.
"Joel, what does the Gizmonic Institute DO, anyway?" Beeper
asked.
"They are the Institute for the Advancement of Naive Science,"
Joel answered. "Basically, they make money off their fast food chain and
a whole bunch of other stuff, and give those funds to people like the Mads.
Bad way to spend money, if you ask me."
There was a long silence, until Beeper asked another question.
"So, Joel? What are we going to do now?"
"We're going to the authorities," he answered. "the police, the
government, anybody. Forrester has got to be stopped! But first we'll
need some transportation out of here. This isn't a good place to be."
"You're right," quipped a voice that definitely did NOT belong to
Beeper. Before Joel could turn around to see who it was, he was hit on the
head with a heavy object and blacked out.
Chapter 6:
Gizmonic Institute
Joel's return to consciousness was slow and painful. Bit by bit,
his memories of recent events came back to him. Whoever had hit him the
second time had done it in the exact same spot on his head as whoever had
hit him the FIRST time. "Oh man, that's never going to heal," he
muttered.
He tried to reach up and rub his aching head, and that's when he
found out his hands were tied behind him. He also realized he was sitting
up in a chair. Everything was dark. "I can't see!" Joel panicked. "Oh,
wait, my eyes are just closed."
Feeling a bit silly, he opened his eyes. He immediately wished he
hadn't. He was in a small, black room with a single bright light shining on
top of his head. There were two men in the room with him. One was a
fat, burly man with a receding hairline and a permanent grimace on his
face. The fat man was wearing a suit with the Gizmonic logo emblazoned
on the breast, and a tie that only came down halfway on his chest. Joel
recognized the other one as the cashier at the Australian Big G restaurant.
"You sure this is the guy?" the large one grumbled.
"I'm absolutely sure, sir," the other said in his cracked voice. "This
is the guy who didn't pay."
The big man pulled the light down from the ceiling and set it down
in front of Joel's face. He could feel the lamp's intense heat.
"Okay, buddy, you're in trouble now! You'd better have a good
explanation for stiffing us!" the interrogator growled.
"All this is over $14.78?" Joel asked incredulously.
"Yeah," the burly man replied in a dangerous voice. "Now we
want our money!"
"But," Joel stammered, "but, I didn't even get my food!"
"Doesn't matter. Your order was already put into the computer by
this little turd." Joel's eyes flicked over to the teenager, who was sitting in
the corner gazing off into space. He wasn't even paying attention.
"Because of you, Mr. Robinson -- yes, we know who you are -- our
account was over fourteen dollars short!"
Joel paused. "So?"
The interrogator couldn't believe what he was hearing. "So?" he
sputtered. "So?! We were fourteen dollars short! Don't you know what
that means? Layoffs! Internal audits! Mass hysteria!" He was now two
inches in front of Joel's face. "Mr. Robinson, YOU were responsible for
the single biggest shakeup in this institute's fine history! Now WHAT do
you have to say for yourself??"
Joel coughed in spite of himself; the man's breath smelled like a
combination of spoiled milk and dog vomit. It almost made him wish for
the smell of Forrester's elevator. "Uh... oops?" Joel said, answering the
man's question.
The interrogator exhaled. "Enough of this. You are to be
imprisoned for an indefinite period of time, after which you will likely be
executed." He smiled. "But if you're lucky, maybe I'll read you some of
my poetry first. Guards! Take him away!"
Two large, muscular guards walked into the room from behind
Joel, lifted him from the chair, and carried him out.
Joel was thrown awkwardly into his cell. He landed on his back,
rolled twice, and finally came to a rest leaning upside-down on the
opposite wall. The cell door shut with a clang that echoed off the walls for
a few seconds before all was silent. Joel gingerly righted himself.
He was in a cavernous cell lighted by a single torch whose light did
not reach the whole room. The opposite end of the cell was in total
darkness. The sound of dripping water came from some unknown part of
the cell, but when Joel looked closely at the area in which he stood, he
found it dry as a bone.
The single torch drew Joel's attention again. Joel couldn't quite put
his finger on it, but there was something odd about the way it was burning.
It just seemed to burn too... FAST. He examined the wooden handle and
found an inscription:
"GIZMONIC GENUINE TORCH REPLICA
Looks like the real thing!
Burns for months! Doesn't need replacing!"
Figures, Joel thought. The Gizmonic Institute probably patterned
this whole place to look like an old-time dungeon, but none of it was real.
Joel guessed that dripping water he had heard before was a recording, too.
He sat down glumly on an authentic replica of a dirty old cot and put his
head in his hands.
Joel thought he heard some kind of music faintly. He attributed it
to being hit on the head twice in a span of 24 hours and disregarded it.
But the music persisted, and became louder. It was strangely familiar.
Four notes played over and over again. It was maddeningly catchy and
annoying at the same time. Joel tried to place where he had heard it
before, but could not.
Then Joel heard something else. A shuffle of footsteps, coming
closer and closer. There was someone in the cell with him! Joel was
immediately on his feet and peering off into the murky distance. "Who's
there?" he yelled, his voice echoing loudly. There was no answer. Joel
could see a moving blur in the darkness ahead, quickly becoming more
substantial. Recognition dawned on him, making his stomach do flip-
flops in an odd mixture of relief, surprise, and dread. ("Whew! AH! Uh-
oh!" it said.)
The stranger was of average height and build, and he was dressed
in old, ratty clothes and a wide-brimmed hat. He had a tall walking stick
in one hand and seemed to walk with a strange, teetering limp. His
eyebrows jutted out at funny angles. But the most noticeable thing about
this strange man were his enormous knees, bulging against the legs of his
pants.
"I aM... TorGo," the man said in a haltingly awkward speech. "I
USed tO... taKe CaRe of tHe pLacE... whiLE the MaSTeR waS... awAy."
"Er, hi, Torgo," Joel said. "What are you doing here?"
"wEll," Torgo began, "mY job wiTh... the MaSter kinD of... fELl
tHroUgh. AfTer thAt, I sTaRteD... ToRGo'S PizZa. ThaT waS gOIng...
pRetTy wEel uNTil I had To... dEliveR to... DeEp 13. I dOublE parKeD
in tHe... GizMonIc paRkINg loT. And... I waS seNTenCed to... 15 yEarS
in pRIsoN."
"Wow, tough luck, Torgo."
"AcTuallY, iT's noT... tHat bad. A cHeaP... pLacE to liVe, anD all
The... foOd I caN eAt. The rOAchEs... taStE pretTY goOd, tOo."
Joel grimaced. "I'd hate to break it to you, but those roaches are
probably mechanical."
Torgo stared blankly at Joel. "sO?"
Sighing, Joel said, "Well, at least you are only imprisoned. I'm
going to be killed."
Torgo ambled over to Joel and sat down on the cot beside him.
"SorRy, duDe." He shuffled around on the cot. Joel couldn't see what he
was doing. Then Torgo produced a long tan object and offered it to Joel.
"CrAZy bReaD?"
"No thanks," Joel declined it with a wave. Torgo put the crazy
bread back wherever he had kept it.
They just sat there in silence.
It was a dark and stormy night. (No, really, it was!) Thunder
rumbled through the dark Gizmonic Valley as two figures appeared on the
roof of the G-shaped Gizmonic Building. A cold wind blew back Clayton
Forrester's pony tail, and his lab coat fluttered as well. Close behind him
was Frank, who was, for no apparent reason, wearing lederhosen.
Lightning illuminated the valley for a split second, revealing another item
on the roof of the Gizmonic Building. A machine. The Fictional-
Character-Creating Machine of Death (patent pending).
"Hey, Dr. Forrester," asked Frank, "what are we doing tonight?"
"Same thing we do every night, Frank," replied Forrester. "Try to
take over the world!" He inhaled deeply. "Are we ready to put my Evil
Plan of World Domination into effect?"
"Ready when you are, Steve-a-reeno!" came Frank's chipper reply.
Forrester paused for dramatic effect. "Then it's time for the world
to meet its new master!" They went to the machine and began their
attempt at history.
Chapter 7:
Jailbreak
"Okay, your turn, Torgo," Joel said.
"Um... I sPy... wiTh mY LitTle... eyE," Torgo looked around the
dark cell. "SoMEthIng tHat stARtS... wiTh thE letTeR... 'R'."
Joel sighed and closed his eyes, as if he felt a migraine coming on.
"Let me guess," he said, exasperated. "Is it a rock?"
Torgo look suprised. "HoW diD yOu knOW?"
"Torgo, the answer has been 'rock' for the past three hours," Joel
sighed. The combination of being incarcerated here with Torgo and
hearing that blasted theme music for 36 hours straight was getting to him.
"Now, there's more than rocks in here. Can't you think of SOMETHING
else? PLEASE??"
"OkaY," Torgo examined the room again. "I spY WIth my littLe
eYE... soMeThinG thAt staRTs... WitH the leTTeR... 'S'."
Joel began guessing. "Um, let me see... is it 'sand'?"
"NoPe."
"Okay... how about 'shadow'?"
"WrOng agAIn."
"Hmmm... okay, Torgo, I give up."
Torgo smiled. "It'S... 'StoNe'!"
Joel put his head in his hands and began to cry.
There was a light tapping at the door. Joel looked up and listened.
There were no more sounds. "Who's there?" Joel asked, fearing the worst.
Suddenly the door exploded into the room, sending artificial wood
fragments everywhere. Joel was far enough away from the door to be safe
from shrapnel, but he ducked anyway. As Joel's ears stopped ringing and
the dust began to settle, Joel slowly peered through the smoke. He saw
brightly-lit eyes on top of a robot-shaped body.
"Ach, laddies!" Beeper shouted in his best Scottish drawl.
"Doonchta know a jailbreak when ya see one?"
"Beeper!" Joel exclaimed. "What are you doing here, you crazy
robot?"
"Rescuing you, silly!" Beeper saw Torgo as he got up and started
following Joel out of the cell. "Say, Joel, who's the weirdo with the theme
music?"
"I aM... ToRGo," began the big-kneed fellow. "I... taKe cARe oF -
-"
"Okay, Torgo, we know," Joel said, cutting him off. "Beeper, this
is Torgo. Don't ask. We have to get out of here!" Joel darted out the
door, but stopped short. He pointed a finger at Beeper. "Oh, and Beeper...
if you EVER quote from Star Trek V again, I will deactivate you, do you
understand?"
"Yes, sir," Beeper said obediently.
For all the menacing threats and big talk of Gizmonic's chief
interrogator, it was rather easy to escape from the detention area. Joel and
Torgo followed Beeper through a long, poorly lit tunnel that gently sloped
upward until they came to a door.
"Beeper, what's on the other side of this door?" Joel asked. "And
how did you get through it?"
"Um, let's see..." Beeper thought for a moment. "A fat sleeping
guy... and I just walked in."
"What?" Joel had a hard time believing that.
"Really! Check for yourself!"
Joel opened the door and saw that Beeper was right. He was in a
cavernous room decorating like an office building lobby, with potted
plants, a marble floor, and a small fountain off to the side. Various doors
led off to unknown places, and there were two elevators on the far end of
the room. In the middle of the room was a circular desk, and in the middle
of the desk was a fat security guard. He was sleeping in his chair, his feet
up on the desk. His snoring almost drowned out the television set that was
blaring on the desk in front of him..
Joel crouched by the door and prepared to slink stealthily to the
elevator, but Beeper stopped him. "Don't worry about it, Joel! This guy is
out cold! There's no way he'll hear you!"
Joel shushed him loudly. "Maybe," he whispered. "But I don't
want to take a chance."
Just then, the television program came back from commercial. It
was some kind of newscast, and it caught Joel's attention.
"This is PCN -- Plot Convenience News," reported the news
anchor. "Our top story: the city of Minneapolis has been under siege for 7
hours now, as radioactive monsters rampage through the town's center."
Joel darted to the security guard's desk to get a closer look. "The National
Guard has been called out to evacuate the city and to try to kill or capture
the monsters, but hope is waning on this dark day.
"A total of four monsters have been sighted. One of them is
described as a cross between a lizard and a dog, with a large horn on its
nose. It also has a tongue it uses as a battering ram and a rainbow weapon
that blows stuff up real good. The second one stands on two feet, has
wings and a pointed head, and shoots laser bolts out of its mouth. It
enjoys scuba diving, long walks on the beach, and crushing insignificant
mortals. Our third bachelor walks on four feet and has a giant knife for a
nose. It is also a struggling playwright and wants to be known for its work
in the theater. And finally, there's... the Stinky Guy.
"No one is sure of the origins of these horrible monsters, or who is
responsible. For now, all the nation can do is hope and pray."
"That's Forrester's doing, all right," Joel said angrily. "I recognize
Baragon, Gaos, and Guiron from the Gamera movies. But I'm not really
sure where they found the Stinky Guy..."
"...and, in an unrelated story," the TV newscaster continued,
"Minneapolis officials expressed pride yesterday over their acquisition of
Tokyo Tower from Japan. Reportedly costing several million yen and
some Levis jeans, the Tower was unveiled yesterday in its new home, near
the Mall of America..."
"It's only a matter of time before Forrester makes his demands to
the world. Beeper, there's only one way to stop this thing: we have to
fight fire with fire. Come on, let's find that machine."
"Hey, Joel!" Beeper whispered. He glanced at the snoozing guard's
holster. "That might come in handy."
Joel slowly reached behind the desk toward the guard's belt. The
sleeping guard didn't stir. Joel took the laser gun out of the holster and
tucked it into his own belt. Then Joel realized something was missing.
(No, nothing like THAT...)
"Hey, Beeper, where's Torgo?"
"I guess he's still in the tunnel," Beeper answered.
Joel gestured toward the tunnel door, and Torgo made his way
toward the desk. His theme music got louder as Torgo got closer. It was
so loud, it could be heard over everything else in the room. The sleeping
guard began to stir.
Joel waved his hand hurriedly as if fanning Torgo. He started to
panic. "Can't you turn that theme music off?"
"SoRry," Torgo replied, equally flustered.
"Come on, let's get to those elevators." Joel headed down the
room.
The guard awoke with a start. He quickly scanned the room.
When he saw Joel, Torgo, and Beeper, he reached for his gun. When it
wasn't there, he pushed a button on his desk, and a loud buzzer sounded
throughout the building. Suddenly, hundreds of guards poured out of
every door in the room. They were all brandishing laser pistols. One of
them fired at Joel, screamed "Halt!", then muttered to himself about
getting those mixed up again. Then the rest of the guards opened fire.
The escaped trio bolted down the room toward the elevators.
Beeper extended the wheels on his legs and was making good time. But
Torgo was lagging behind, his misshapen legs not carrying him fast
enough.
"Hurry, Torgo! You've got to run faster!" Joel screamed to him.
But Torgo still couldn't go any faster.
"Run, Torgo!" Beeper yelled. "Run like you was runnin' from the
Master!!"
"ThE MAsTeR??" A terrified look crossed Torgo's face, and
suddenly he shot forward in a burst of speed, passing both Joel and Beeper
in a flash.
Joel felt the heat of a laser bolt whiz past his ear. They were
running at full speed, but they were only about halfway between the
guard's desk and the elevators. Joel stopped, wheeled, and fired a couple
of rounds at the oncoming horde of soldiers. One laser bolt hit the mark,
and a guard fell clutching his arm. Joel turned again and ran away from
the guards again, who were in hot pursuit. There were already numerous
scorch marks on the far wall from the laser fire.
Out of breath and clutching his laser gun to his chest, Joel finally
arrived at the pair of elevators. Beeper and Torgo were already in the one
to the right. Joel made a motion as if to enter that elevator, but he
suddenly entered the left.
"Joel!" Beeper yelled. "Come on! What are you doing?!"
Then Joel reappeared and entered the right elevator. He quickly
pressed the 'G' button for the ground floor, and breathed a sigh of relief as
the doors closed. The elevator lurched upward, and a light electronic
voice counted the floors. "23... 22... 21..."
"Joel, what the heck were you doing?!" Beeper asked.
Joel smiled, despite his weariness. "I was making sure we weren't
followed."
One of the guards swore under his breath as the right elevator's
doors closed. He couldn't believe the prisoners had escaped despite the
barrage of laser fire. As soon as the group of soldiers reached the
elevators, he immediately took charge.
"Okay, I want you twelve in here with me," he said, pointing to a
group of the men. "The rest of you, take the stairs and try to catch up.
They'll be heading for the surface."
They piled into the left elevator, and the commanding guard
motioned to push the button for the ground floor -- and he screamed
"DAMN!" Now they would never catch up with the prisoners!
Every single one of the elevator's 23 buttons had been pushed.
Chapter 8:
Army of Darkness
Joel held his laser pistol at the ready while his two companions
exited the small building that served as the entrance to the underground
prison. He hoped his ploy of pushing all the buttons in the other elevator
had worked. They had encountered no more resistance, so he thought
maybe it had. Scanning the room, he saw no one at all, and he followed
Beeper and Torgo outside.
The valley was equally deserted, but they ran a few more miles
before finally stopping. With the prison behind them, they relaxed a bit,
and sat down to catch their breaths. Joel dropped the gun beside him and
rested under a tree.
"I think," he said between gasps, "we're safe for now."
"Thank God," Beeper muttered. "The treads on my wheels are
worn almost to nothing." He retracted the wheels and was again walking
his three legs.
Soon they finished resting and continued back on the path toward
the main Gizmonic valley area. They still did not see a living soul in the
valley, but Joel shrugged it off. Perhaps it was a weekend, or something,
and everyone was off jet-skiing.
"Joel, what were we looking for, again?" Beeper asked. He had to
speak over theme music, whose owner followed close behind.
"Dr. Forrester's machine that creates fictional characters," Joel
replied. He thought deeply. "I still don't know where it is. Now, if I were
a mad scientist with an evil device of world-crushing power, where would
I put it?"
As Joel thought out loud, Beeper was distracted by a large sign and
wandered off.
"Hmmm... if I wanted to create huge monsters, it would have to be
outdoors. So that rules out Deep 13. And the monsters were sighted in
Minneapolis, so maybe the Mads moved the machine there..."
"Hey, Joel!" Beeper exclaimed. "The machine is on the roof of
the Gizmonic Building!"
"Yeah, right, Beeper," Joel said sarcastically. "How do you
know?"
"It says right here in the directory."
Joel looked at the sign Beeper had found. The top of the sign said
'Gizmonic Valley Directory.' Joel was slightly peeved that Beeper had
found this instead of him, but he put it behind him. He scanned the
categories, skipped the Department Stores, Food, and
Shoes/Socks/Apparel headings, and then found the Mad Scientist Evil
Machines of World-Crushing Power heading. He ran his finger down the
list.
"Dr. Bob's Orbiting Plasma Gun... Dr. Foozle's Amulet of
Incredible Power... Dr. Ehrhardt's Giant Mackerel That Can Shoot Lasers
Out of Its Eyes... ah, here we go! Dr. Forrester's Fictional-Character-
Creating Machine of Death (patent pending). Roof, Gizmonic Building.
Well, Beeper, you were right."
"What, you thought maybe I was lying?" Beeper said.
Joel turned and trudged down the dirt path. "Well, let's get going.
We have a world to save!"
Joel, Beeper, and Torgo crouched in the bushes outside the
Gizmonic Building and watched in dismay at the guards patroling the
entrance.
"This place was never guarded before," Joel whispered. "I wonder
what changed that."
"Do you think they're looking for us, Joel?" Beeper asked quietly.
"I don't think so," Joel answered. He studied the four guards
closer. They looked to be middle-aged, and they wore a jumpsuit belted at
the waist. Each had some kind of ray gun in a holster. "You know, there's
something familiar about those guards, but I can't quite put my finger on
it."
"So, what's the plan, boss?"
Joel gestured to his two companions and walked in a crouch away
from the building. Torgo and Beeper followed him as stealthily as
possible. Once they were a safe distance away, Joel spoke.
"First things first. We're going to need stealth on this mission, and,
Torgo, your theme music is a dead giveaway. So," Joel shook Torgo's
hand, "I wish you the best of luck in... uh... whatever you do."
Joel grimaced. Torgo's palm was unsettlingly sweaty.
"ByE," Torgo said. He staggered off into the woods. Joel wiped
his hand on his jumpsuit.
"As for us, I know of a back way into the building." Joel paused.
"I used to be a janitor here, you know."
"Yeah, I know," Beeper replied. "We all know. Enough! Let's get
moving, teen gang!"
Joel smiled. Then he stopped, the smile disappearing off his face
as if he remembered a painful event from long ago.
"Teen gang... I know who those guys are now," he muttered.
"Teenagers from outer space. I hate those guys. Forrester must have
taken over the building using an army of his evil creations. Maybe even
the whole valley. It's even worse than I thought."
They stood in silence for a bit. Then Joel drew his laser pistol.
"Let's go," he said to Beeper, and they began to walk to the back of
the Gizmonic Building.
Joel peered up over the bushes at the service entrance. There were
no guards in sight. It looked safe. Apparently, Forrester had overlooked
this entrance. Joel motioned to Beeper, and they quickly walked up the
ramp. The door had no handle, but there was a clear plastic plate to the
side with a bright red handprint on it. Joel put his hand on the plate. The
door beeped at him and slid open.
"All these years, and they never removed my access print," Joel
said with a smirk. He and the robot entered the building.
They emerged in the middle of a sterile white hallway that curved
inward on either side of them. Somewhere in the distance, Joel could hear
the faint clicks of boots on the floor. They were most definitely not alone.
Joel drew his laser pistol and held it in front of him, cop-show style.
"We've got to get to the roof. Come on, the elevator is this way."
Joel started off down the hallway. Beeper followed, extending his wheels
to make less noise.
Joel traveled slowly and cautiously, peering around every corner
and frequently looking behind him. They continued to hear footsteps, but
they encountered no one. Just when Joel was wondering if those footsteps
were just a figment of some deranged imagination, the footsteps got
louder. Joel could just make out faint talking as well. Someone was
coming!
Joel looked around frantically for someplace to hide. He ran back
through the hall as quietly as possible, gesturing to Beeper to follow him.
He hurried to a door and tried his handprint on the access panel. No luck -
- the door just buzzed at him. The guards were getting closer. Joel went
to another door and tried again. This time, his attempt was successful, and
the door opened. He darted inside and roughly pulled Beeper in with him,
who gave a strangled "Whoa!" Just as soon as the door closed again, the
two space teens who served as guards came around the corner.
Joel slumped against the door in the dark room. He could hear the
teen guards chatting in the hallway outside.
"So, are you going to the dance tomorrow night?" asked one in a
deep voice.
"Golly, no," replied the other. "Herniated disc, remember?"
"Oh, yeah. I was going to ask Betty to go, but she said she had
bridge club that night." There was a pause in the conversation. "Say, did
you ever pick up those CD's I told you about?"
"Actually, I did. Good investment. They should mature in a few
years. And if they don't, I may well sentence you to TORTURE!!"
"Gee, that's swell..." And with that, they faded from earshot.
Joel waited a few moments to make sure they were gone. He
stood.
"You've got a gun, right?" asked Beeper. "So why didn't ya blast
'em?"
"That would raise an alarm," Joel answered patiently. He opened
the door. The hallway was deserted again. "And stealth is the name of the
game, remember?" He headed back out into the hall.
"Still think you should've blasted 'em anyway," Beeper muttered.
He followed.
"Come on, Beeper, we're almost there!" Joel whispered. Beeper
hurried behind him. "Now, if memory serves me correctly, the elevator to
the roof should be..."
They turned a corner and stopped. Joel's memory had been correct -
- they had found the elevator. Unfortunately, at this point in time it was
being guarded by an extremely large, bald-headed man. He was dressed in
a white suit that was probably clean at some point, but hadn't been in a
long, long time. The man's mouth hung wide-open, and he stared vacantly
off into space. He seemed to have 'stupid' written all over him.
Joel tried to duck back around the corner, but it was too late. The
huge guard had already seen him.
"You not... uh... supposed to be here," the man said in a mixture of
a wheeze and a grunt.
"Oh, hi, Tor!" Joel smiled as best he could. He quickly holstered
his gun. "Fancy meeting you here!"
"Not supposed... be here," Tor repeated, shaking his head.
"What makes you say that, Tor?" Joel asked, buying time.
"Doc-tor... Fo-... Forr-..." Tor stumbled on the name.
"Forrester?" Joel helped him out a little.
"Yeah..." Tor continued, his brow furrowed in thought. "He say...
no one use... big lifty thing..."
Joel got an idea. "But I'm here to fix the big lifty thing. I mean,
the elevator." He reached up to put his arm around Tor's shoulders in a
friendly gesture. "You see, Mr. Johnson (or can I call you Lobo?), this
elevator is broken. And your boss, Dr. Forrester, sent for me and my robot
assistant to fix it."
"Hidey-ho!" Beeper said at his mention.
"So if you don't let us use the elevator, we can't fix it. And if we
can't fix it, your boss is going to be reeeeally mad. Do you want your boss
to get reeeeally mad at you?"
Tor shook his head. "No... but..."
"Ah-ah-ah! No buts! We have to get that lifty thing fixed!" Joel
pushed the button for the elevator, and it opened. He and Beeper got in.
"Dr. Forrester is going to be pleased with you, Tor! I'm glad we could
help you out! Bye-bye!"
"Bye..." Tor said as the elevator door closed. After a minute or so,
he resumed staring blankly into space.
Chapter 9:
Movie Sign
"Well, that was easy," Joel said.
"Yeah, Joel," replied Beeper. "I just have one question. Did that
machine create Tor Johnson? Or did it create Tor in one of his many roles
as big, stupid guys?"
Joel thought. "I'm not sure. He never referred to himself as Tor.
Or as anything, for that matter. I would assume that was Tor Johnson not
as Tor Johnson, but as Lobo."
Beeper grunted. "Food for thought, anyway," he said.
At that point, the elevator lurched to a stop, and the door opened.
Joel and Beeper exited the lift and found themselves looking at a flight of
stairs. At the top of the stairs was a trap door. Light shone through the
cracks of the trap door. They quickly ascended the stairs, popped open the
hatch, and scampered onto the roof.
The top of the Gizmonic Building was shaped like the rest of the
structure; it was a giant G, with small spokes jutting out at regular
intervals. They had emerged opposite from the bar in the G. The machine
sat unguarded directly on the other side. It was on the very edge of the
building, on one of the spokes. Joel and Beeper ran around the outside
edge of the G to the machine.
Forrester's Fictional-Character-Creating Machine of Death (patent
pending) was still operational. The computer and monitor were both on.
Joel looked it over.
"Oh no," he grated. "Oh god no!"
"Joel! What's the matter?" Beeper said, concerned.
"This is evil! Do you hear me, Forrester?!" he yelled to the sky.
"It's EVIL!!"
"What is it?!"
Joel bowed his head. "This computer. It's... it's... a Macintosh!!"
"Oh," said Beeper. "Well, come on, it's not that bad. We have a
job to do, remember?"
After a few moments, Joel responded, "Yeah, I know." He
reluctantly gripped the one-buttoned mouse, and set to work. A little
animated clown appeared on the screen, who pointed him to the mad
scientists' README file.
"According to this," he said, examining the file, "there are two
categories of creations: man-sized, and monster-sized. The man-sized
ones are formed right here on the roof, while the monster-sized ones are
formed on the ground below, a safe distance away.
"In addition, all the movies in Deep 13's stockpile are available on
CD-ROM." he gestured to a collection of CD's at the foot of the machine.
"Simply select the movie, pop it into the computer, and select the character
from the film to create."
"Sounds easy enough," Beeper said. "Who's first?"
"First, we have to stop the monsters rampaging in Minneapolis,"
Joel replied. He stopped momentarily. "Can you believe I just said that?"
He shook his head and reached into the pile of CD's. The CD he picked
out was marked "#212: Godzilla vs. Megalon".
"Fight fire with fire," he said quietly. He put the CD into the drive
and clicked on the happy little Godzilla icon. After asking for
confirmation six times (to which Joel clicked on the 'yes' icon), the screen
went blank except for a window that said 'Working... Please Wait'. Joel
and Beeper waited.
"You know," Joel said conversationally, "this system works
differently from any other Mac I've ever used."
"Well, there's your reason," Beeper replied. "This doesn't use
System 7. It looks like a modified version that Dr. Forrester must have
invented -- System 666."
Suddenly, the whole machine shuddered, and a bright bolt of
electricity shot from the back of it, away from the building. Joel shielded
his eyes. The electricity was going in erratic directions, but always in the
same general place. And inside that space, something was forming. A
huge green lizard, taller than the Gizmonic Building, was slowly
becoming clear. Then, with a mighty roar, Godzilla existed.
While Godzilla was still coming to terms with his sudden creation,
Joel quickly ejected the CD and put in another one. This one was marked
"#312: Gamera vs. Guiron". He clicked the Gamera icon and waited. Just
as Godzilla began to wander around the valley, another bolt of electricity
shot out of the machine. Joel, Beeper, and the huge monster watched as
Gamera was created.
Gamera and Godzilla roared and gave each other a high-five.
Gamera pointed at Godzilla and roared again in the monster version of
saying, "You the man, you the man!" Godzilla gestured to the rest of the
valley, and Gamera nodded in return. They then began systematically
destroying the Gizmonic Valley.
"Oops," Joel said as the Hollywood-style 'Gizmonic Institute' sign
was burned into rubble. "I didn't mean for THIS to happen."
"How do we stop them?" Beeper asked.
Joel stepped to the edge of the building and waved his arms over
his head. "Guys!" he yelled. "Hey you guys! You two big green ones!"
This seemed to get Godzilla's and Gamera's attention, and they walked to
the Gizmonic Building, stepping on three smaller buildings in the process.
"I didn't create you to do this," Joel continued, now that he had
their attention. "You need to go to Minneapolis!" The monsters looked
confused. "Fifteen miles south of here!" They still looked dumbfounded.
Finally he pointed toward the south and said, "Go this way!" However,
the monsters still seemed a bit reluctant. After all, why go all the way to
Minneapolis, when there's all this neat stuff to trash right here?
"You need to save the city from four monsters! You need to stop
the evil overlords from winning!" Godzilla and Gamera looked at each
other, then back at Joel. Still no go.
"Um..." Joel played his last card. "You get to kick some ass?"
The two monsters let out a ferocious roar and raced off toward the
north, crushing various Gizmonic buildings along the way.
"Well, now that THAT is over with," Joel sighed, "it's time to
create some help for us against Forrester. And I know JUST the guy to
help us, too."
Joel selected a CD from the collection at his feet. It read "#502:
Hercules".
"Not only that," Joel said as he popped the CD in, "it's the Steve
Reeves Hercules, not some phony Italian schmuck."
Joel clicked on the Hercules icon. This time, the creation process
was nearly instantaneous. Electricity shot out of the machine again, this
time directed to a spot on the roof just a few meters away. Moments later,
Hercules appeared in that spot.
"Hey, Herc, how's it going?" Joel greeted him happily.
"Oh, not bad," Hercules replied, flexing his muscles a bit.
"We're going to need you to bust some heads later on," Joel said.
"Is that okay with you?"
"Me? Bust some heads?" Herc laughed. "Do you really need to
ask?" His smile quickly turned into a yawn and a stretch. He laid down on
the roof. "I'm so sleepy I can barely keep my eyes open. Wake me when
you need me."
"What a great guy," Joel said, awed by the slumbering superhero.
Dr. Clayton Forrester walked briskly through the halls of the
Gizmonic Building. He was wearing an old-style World War II uniform.
Four over-sized stars stood out on his Patton-esque helmet. Frank
followed closely behind, also wearing a uniform. He was reading
something on a clipboard.
"So, Frank, what's first on the agenda today?" Forrester asked,
putting on a pair of white gloves.
"Let's see," Frank began. "First, I believe you wanted to create
some more soldiers for your army."
"Ah, yes. And after that?"
"After that, we invade Iowa."
"Excellent, TV's Lt. Frank. Or is that Lt. TV's Frank?" Forrester
said. "Never mind. Let's get right to work, shall we?" They headed to the
elevator.
They arrived at their destination to find Tor Johnson still on guard
duty.
"Ah, Mr. Lobo, good to see you again," Forrester said cheerily. He
looked around. "Didn't I put Mitchell on duty here to help you? Where is
he?"
Tor just stared at Forrester. Frank raised his hand, getting his boss'
attention.
"Um, Dr. Forrester --" Frank began.
"That's GENERAL Forrester."
"Right," Frank corrected himself. "Gen. Forrester, I talked to
Mitchell before. He said he needed to go on a beer run."
Forrester glared at Frank. "A beer run?"
"Yes, sir."
"And how long ago was this?"
Frank checked his watch. "Um... two days ago, sir."
Forrester looked angry enough to snap Frank like a twig. He
turned to Tor. "Lobo, did anyone use this elevator?"
Tor thought for several minutes. Wisps of smoke came out of his
ears. Finally, he spoke. "Nice man and robot... come to fix... lifty thing."
"A nice man... and a robot," Forrester fumed. His moustache
quivered. Wisps of smoke threatened to come out of HIS ears, too.
"Frank!"
"Yes, sir!"
"Gather all the henchmen. We're going to the roof!"
"So, Joel, who else are we going to create?" Beeper asked.
"Well," Joel replied, "there was only one other idea I had about
this." He fumbled through the CD's until he found the one he was looking
for. He showed it to Beeper. "It's time to call out the heavy artillery."
Joel put the CD, which was marked "#501: Warrior of the Lost
World," into the machine's computer. He went through the cycle of
clicking and waiting, until on the ground sat a vehicle of awesome
destructive potential: Megaweapon.
"Hey, Megaweapon," Joel yelled to the modified garbage truck.
"Things could get a little rough soon. Are you gonna help us out?"
"Hey, no problem!" Megaweapon yelled back.
"Thanks!" Joel made an A-OK symbol with his fingers. He
stepped back from the edge of the building. "I think we're set," he said to
Beeper.
Suddenly, the trap door burst open. A dozen armed space teens
flooded out and took up formation around the trap door. Before Joel had
time to react, they had pointed their ray guns at the two intruders.
Joel froze. There were armed guards in front of him, and a lengthy
drop off the building behind him. He and the robot were trapped.
Chapter 10:
Monster Mash
Downtown Minneapolis had seen better days. Most of it was now
in ruin, smoke from numerous fires darkening the sky. Buildings lay
crushed into smoldering heaps of slag. The few people who had not
evacuated were either jamming the roads in a futile attempt to escape, or
they were running around screaming in an equally futile panic.
The culprits of this destruction made no attempt to hide
themselves. Two of the monsters, Guiron and Baragon, were currently
engaged in a little game in the middle of Interstate 394. They pushed the
abandoned cars around the road like Hot Wheels, making tire-squealing
noises at appropriate times. Occasionally, a car would hit something and
explode in a ball of flame. When this happened, both monsters laughed and
laughed. They were both still slightly buzzed from the Bud Light truck
they had found in the road and subsequently ate.
The other creature, the bird-like one called Gaos, was perched atop
a tall building, snagging on passing cars. If the people scurried out of their
cars and ran away, he would snag his gooey monster mucus on them, too.
It was disgusting and juvenile, but Gaos didn't care. He was just playing
with his food until he got hungry again.
Suddenly, a scream tore across the city. Gaos looked toward the
north. His jaw opened in surprise at the two enormous figures making
their way towards the three of them. Gamera... and Godzilla!
Godzilla let out a terrible roar. Roughly translated, it meant,
"We're here to chew sushi and kick ass... and we're all out of sushi!"
Gaos yelled and gestured to his monster buddies. Baragon and
Guiron put down their toy cars and turned their attention to the coming
fight. They trudged on all fours towards the approaching monsters.
Guiron swung his knife-shaped nose at a nearby building, neatly slicing it
in half. He was ready. In turn, Baragon stuck out his tongue at another
structure, knocking a huge hole in it. He was ready, too.
Gaos flapped his rubbery wings and took flight. He shot through
the air and dove at Gamera and hit him, knocking the big turtle on his
back. Gamera flailed around helplessly, trying to right himself. Godzilla
grasped Gamera's arm and pulled him up to his feet. In the meantime,
Gaos had circled around again and was making another pass. This time,
the flying monster opened its mouth and shot a laser beam at Godzilla.
The beam hit Godzilla in the arm. Green blood spurted out of the wound.
Godzilla was now extremely pissed. Ignoring the pain in his arm,
he breathed flames at Gaos and scored a direct hit. Gaos crashed on the
ground with an earth-shattering thud. His left wing was on fire, and he
rolled around on the ground, trying to put it out.
Baragon took this opportunity to sneak up on the two combatants
(or, at least, sneak as well as a 100-ton, 12-story, 4-legged monster CAN
sneak) and shoot his tongue at them. His industrial-strength Destructo-
tongue barely missed Godzilla. Baragon retracted his tongue and fired
again. But the giant lizard, showing amazing reflexes, reached out and
caught the tongue in midair. Godzilla dragged the other monster by his
tongue across the city until he reached the tallest building. Then he
wrapped the tongue around the skyscraper several times and tied it off
with a nice little square knot.
Meanwhile, Gamera had his hands full with Guiron, who was
making leaping stabs at him with his huge knife-nose. Every time Guiron
would lunge at him, Gamera would dodge him, bullfighter-style. Finally,
Gamera maneuvered into hand-to-hand combat distance and decided to try
a tactic that had worked once before. Wrapping Guiron in a huge bear
hug, Gamera retracted his hind legs into his shell, powered up the atomic
batteries, and lifted both of them into the air. When they had risen several
hundred feet, Gamera made a U-turn and did a nose dive toward the
ground. At the last possible moment, he let go of the still-struggling
Guiron and pulled up. Guiron's nose stuck into the ground with a
sproiiiinnnng! He was sticking straight up out of the ground, and he was
completely helpless.
Gamera was hovering in midair like a Harrier, surveying his
handiwork, when Godzilla screamed frantically at him. He was gesturing
toward the south, and Gamera saw what he was pointing at. Gaos had
gotten back up and was flying away! Godzilla immediately ran after the
escaping creature, but there was no way he would catch up. Gamera
turned on the afterburners and chased after Gaos.
The wounded Gaos was no match for Gamera's rocket power, and
the turtle caught up after only a few miles. Gamera shot toward him like a
bullet and knocked the flying bat/lizard out of the air. Gaos landed square
on top of the evil (and now abandoned) structure known as the Mall of
America. He fell through the roof, squashed a couple of stores, and came
to a rest on the bottom floor.
Gamera landed on another part of the Mall, his legs crashing
through the roof. He stood waist-deep in the Mall, and he had to knock
down portions of the roof and other structures to get to Gaos. Gaos was
still recovering from the spill, and was just now getting to his feet.
Gamera came closer, stepping on a Radio Shack store with a satisfying
squash.
Gaos finally noticed Gamera just as the giant turtle was close
enough to reach out and touch. Gamera took a swing at Gaos, a left hook
that sent the other monster flying. Gaos quickly recovered and put up his
dukes. The turtle hit Gaos with two right jabs, then an uppercut, but Gaos
easily blocked them.
Then Gamera, abandoning the boxing tactic, through his arms
around Gaos and lifted him above his head. He threw the monster down
onto the Mall in a tremendous body slam that shook the structure's very
foundation. Gamera leaped on top of Gaos. The two of them struggled
and began rolling across the Mall. They had destroyed about half of the
shops (including, but not limited to, Sears, Bloomingdale's, Chess King,
and the ultimate evil, The Gap), before coming to a stop.
Gaos kicked Gamera off of him, and they both staggered to their
feet. Gaos opened his mouth and let loose another ray of energy that hit
Gamera in the shell. It was painful but not debilitating, and Gamera came
back with a little fire of his own. It hit the mark, and Gaos' body was
engulfed in flame. It let out a horrible screech. Gamera calmly walked up
to the burning monster, swung his fist, and knocked Gaos' head off.
As Gaos' body burned in the middle of a major tourist attraction
(now ruined), Godzilla finally arrived. He was out of breath, but when he
saw Gamera's accomplishment, he roared happily. He then asked Gamera
about the fourth monster -- the Stinky Guy. Where was he? Gamera
replied that he didn't know. Then Godzilla caught a whiff of something
awful. He looked on the ground, and saw a small figure, and stepped on it.
Then he lifted his foot, and he grimaced, holding his nose.
I think I just found him, he told Gamera. Godzilla scraped the
putrid jelly off the bottom of his foot on what was left of Macy's.
That done, the two monsters let out a victory roar that pierced the
smoke-filled air. Gamera glanced at a tall structure next to the Mall, and
Godzilla nodded. They walked over to it, and, for old times' sake,
knocked over the Tokyo Tower. They roared in delight again as it fell on
Camp Snoopy.
And so, they went back up north to finish off the last two monsters.
And after that, they traveled Tokyo to terrorize that poor city once again,
stopping off only long enough to get some Heinekens.
Chapter 11:
The Climactic Battle Scene
"Drop your weapon!" one of the space teens demanded. "Slowly!"
Joel slowly pulled the laser pistol out of his belt and tossed it on
the ground in front of him. He raised his hands over his head.
Dr. Forrester burst through the open trap door. He took one look at
the scene and suddenly lunged toward a space teen.
"You fools! Put those ray guns away!" he said, grabbing one of the
guards' weapon. He gave it back to the guard, who holstered it. "You
might hit the Machine!" All of the other guards took the orders as well,
and they holstered their guns.
"So, Joel, we meet again," Forrester greeted him snidely. Frank
appeared behind the doctor. "And there will be no escape from me this
time! You know what they say -- third time's a charm."
"Do you expect me to sit by and let you take over the earth?" Joel
stated with as much dignity as a person can while holding his hands over
his head.
"No, Mr. Robinson, I expect you to die!" He gestured to the teen-
aged guards. "Seize them!"
The guards began to march across the building, around the outer
edge of the 'G'. They were taking their time, but Joel still began to sweat.
He frantically searched for a solution -- and then remembered Hercules,
who was still sleeping.
"Hey!" Joel said in a half-whisper, half-scream. "Hey Herc! Wake
up!!"
Hercules still didn't stir. Joel quickly walked over and kicked him
lightly in the ribs. Finally, the great warrior stirred.
"Grzzxynz -- wha... huh?" Herc said.
"Herc! We need your help!" Joel gestured toward the approaching
soldiers.
Hercules yawned and stretched. The guards were almost upon
them, but Herc just stood there, scratching himself. Then, finally, just as
the guards came within reach, the musclebound hero went into action. He
grabbed the first one and easily tossed him over the side of the building.
He punched one guard, knocking him unconscious, and lifted another over
his head. Herc threw the helpless soldier at three others, who were
knocked down under their comrade's weight.
Joel took this opportunity to lunge for the laser pistol that lay a few
meters away. Just as he wrapped his fingers around the gun, a heavy boot
came down on his hand. Joel grimaced in pain as the teen-aged guard
stepped on hand, but he managed to hang into the gun. He saw that the
guard was reaching for his ray gun, and did the only thing he could do at
that point: he bit the guard on the leg. The guard screamed and dropped
his gun. Joel removed his hand from under the boot, stood, and aimed his
pistol all at the same time. Just as Joel was ready to fire, the guard
grabbed at his arm and pushed it upward. Joel's shot went into the air.
The two struggled for the gun. Joel was trying to wrest his arm away from
the guard's powerful grip.
Finally, the guard regained enough balance to lift his leg at Joel's
chest, and he kicked him away. Joel landed on his back, dropping his
pistol in the process. The guard sneered, retrieving his ray gun from the
ground. He aimed the gun at Joel's head.
Suddenly, with a loud "Hi-KEEBA!", a metallic blur shot toward the
guard. Beeper rammed into him with an impact that sent the guard
staggering backward to the very edge of the building. There, he teetered,
waving his arms wildly in an attempt to regain his balance and not fall.
Beeper rolled up to him, stuck out a long, spindly arm, and gently pushed
him. It wasn't a hard push, but it was enough to send the guard hurtling
off the edge to the ground below. Joel nodded his appreciation to Beeper.
Meanwhile, Dr. Forrester watched the battle with increasing dread.
"Frank," he gestured to his white-haired assistant, "bring in the big guys.
And the rest of the army, too."
"Okay, Steve," Frank replied. He unhooked a comm device from
his belt and began talking into it.
Hercules, with a little help from Joel and Beeper, easily dispatched
the last of the remaining teenagers from outer space. With that done, he
three began to stalk menacingly toward Forrester and Frank.
"It's over, sirs," Joel stated. "You and your evil plan are doomed!"
"Not so fast!" Forrester smirked. He held up a finger, motioning
for quiet. Joel listened. In the distance, he heard a faint tromp-tromp-
tromp that was getting louder. It seemed to be coming from all over,
echoing off the hills. Joel turned, and that's when he saw the legions of
soldiers marching toward the building.
There were at least a couple hundred soldiers in the army, and Joel
could make out four distinct types. There were a lot more space teens,
seemingly a favorite of Dr. Forrester's. The teens held vicious killer
shrews at the end of leashes. Beyond them were some eye creatures (both
the male and female, with less plumage) and some giant leeches. Joel was
in awe of the sheer number of them.
"You see, Joel," Forrester smiled. "It is not me who is doomed,
but you! There is no escape from me!" The mad scientist laughed until he
was gasping for breath. He finally regained control of himself. "And
Frank and I have a little surprise for you, personally, Joely!"
Frank walked over to the open trap door and whispered something
down into it. He waved for someone to come up out of the hatch.
Someone did -- a large, musclebound man with very little clothing and two
swords on his back. Joel recognized him.
"Ator," he said. As the warrior drew his swords and waved them
menacingly, Joel motioned to Hercules. "Herc, I think we're gonna need
your help again."
"My pleasure," Herc replied. He walked up to Ator and went into
a defensive crouch, taunting him to attack. "Come here, you little rip-off!
Come on!"
Ator lunged and swung one of his swords at Hercules, who ducked
out of the way. Ator recovered quickly and hacked at Herc again. This
time, Herc moved behind Ator and gave him a two-fisted, Kirk-style
karate chop to the back. When Ator fell, Herc leaped on top of him,
grabbing the other warrior's wrists. He banged Ator's hands against the
roof until he dropped his two swords. Herc shoved the swords away and
got off of Ator.
"Now we'll settle this like real men!" Herc grunted.
Meanwhile, Joel had run to the edge of the roof and was directing
his counter-assault against Forrester's army.
"Megaweapon!" he yelled. "There's about two hundred of them,
over there! Can you handle them?"
Megaweapon's answer was to gun his engine and power up. He
rumbled toward the oncoming horde, flame-thrower ready, his treads
tearing up the Gizmonic soil. The commanding officer took one look at
his new enemy and signaled for a halt. The first row of soldiers went to
one knee and aimed their standard-issue ray guns at Megaweapon, while
others unleashed their killer shrews. The officer ordered his soldiers to
fire.
Their death rays bounced harmlessly off of Megaweapon's
invulnerable hull. The killer shrews didn't fare much better, and a large
portion of them ended their service to the army by being crushed under the
huge vehicle's treads. Megaweapon hit the accelerator and drove into the
mass of soldiers, running over some and scattering the rest. The battle that
followed was largely one-sided, with Megaweapon running over or firing
his flamethrower at the panicking army.
Joel watched the chaos with a certain satisfaction. Then a
strangled cry from behind him tore his attention away. The source of the
cry was Ator, and he had been hoisted into the air by Hercules.
"No!" Ator said lamely.
Herc just smiled, and threw Ator down. Hard. So hard, in fact,
that Ator crashed through the roof and landed a couple of floors below
that.
Herc turned back to the two mad scientists. "Next!" he yelled.
Forrester didn't say a word. He just stepped to the side and
presented his next ally.
"Oh my god," Joel whispered.
Their new foe was dressed like Peter Pan on a bad day. Joel
couldn't tell if it was a he or a she. It smiled broadly as it did a little
dance. Like a Lovecraftian horror, it seemed to exude evil from every pore.
"Mr. B Natural..." Joel backed up, his eyes wide. "Herc, uh, go
get her! Herc?"
Hercules was on his hands and knees, sobbing like a newborn
child. In between blubbers, he was muttering something unintelligible.
He eyed Mr. B like a deer caught in a pair of headlights.
Suddenly, the demon spoke. "Why, hello there, Mr. Hercules," it
said cheerily to the blubbering superhero, "I'm here to wake the spirit of
music inside you!"
Hercules screamed and fled in terror. He flung himself off the side
of the building.
Mr. B Pointed at Joel. "And you!" it continued happily. Joel felt
a shiver run up his spine. It pointed at Beeper. "And you!"
Joel was frozen. "Beeper, if you have any ideas, now would be a
good time to tell me," he said to his companion.
"Sorry, Joel," Beeper replied. "Right now, I am terrified beyond
the capacity for rational thought."
Suddenly, Joel felt himself being lifted into the air. He looked
around frantically, and saw the source of his unexpected flight. While
everyone was preoccupied with Mr. B Natural, no one had noticed
Trumpy coming around on the other side. The little brown Alf clone was
staring at Joel with brightly-lit eyes.
An androgynous demon on one side, and a magical alien on the
other, both bent on destroying him. Briefly, Joel wondered if his situation
could get any worse. `Oh well,' he thought, `at least Trumpy can only do
stupid things.'
Beeper's shout pierced his reverie. "Joel! Look over there!"
Joel twisted around in midair and followed Beeper's gaze. It was
Megaweapon -- he was on a collision course for the Gizmonic Building!
The building shook as Megaweapon impacted against the side.
The first thing to fall was Forrester's Fictional-Character-Creating
Machine of Death, which smashed into a zillion pieces on the ground
below. The second thing was Trumpy, who was standing near the Machine.
The alien's spell was disrupted, and Joel fell back onto the roof.
He stood quickly. "Beeper, we've got to get out of here!" he
yelled. "This whole building is going to collapse!"
They raced toward the trap door, getting there just in time for Dr.
Forrester to slam it in his face. He and Frank had escaped at the first sign
of trouble. Joel tugged at the door's handle. It was no use -- it was locked.
Joel looked behind him. About a third of the building had been
destroyed, and it was still coming. Slowly but surely, parts of the roof
were crumbling and falling on the ground below. It was only a matter of
time before the whole roof would fail to exist.
Joel and Beeper stood on the very edge of the roof. The human
looked at the long drop below.
"There's nothing else we can do," he yelled over the din of
destruction. "We're going to have to jump!"
Half the building was now destroyed, and still it kept going.
Beeper looked down. He gulped, which is difficult for a robot to
do. "Ready when you are," he replied.
"Okay," Joel said. Behind him, the crumbling roof had almost
reached them. It was getting hard to maintain his footing. "One... two...
THREE!"
They hurled themselves off the building just as the last of it
crumbled to the ground. Joel felt his stomach lurch into his chest. He shut
his eyes tightly and waited for the hard, unforgiving ground to hit him.
Instead, he landed on something soft and squishy that said, "Oof!"
Joel opened his eyes. He was clutching Beeper tightly, something
he had not realized he had been doing. He also realized that the soft,
squishy thing he and Beeper had landed on had been TV's Frank.
Joel felt like laughing. "Well, of all the dumb lu--"
His sentence had been cut off again, as he felt himself being hit on
the head by yet another blunt instrument. Just before he blacked out, he
saw Dr. Forrester's red, angry face; and after that, nothing.
Chapter 12:
Into the Sunset
Joel woke to a painful darkness that was becoming all-too familiar.
He reached up and felt the large bump on his head. He grimaced.
"That's three times now!" Joel shouted angrily. "I'm really
started to get tired of it!"
He opened his eyes and found himself inside some kind of a
spaceship. He was strapped into a chair in front of the ship's control panel.
He saw Beeper likewise strapped into the chair next to him. Beeper's eyes
were dark, and he was not moving.
Joel unfastened himself and moved over to Beeper. He opened the
panel in Beeper's head and flicked a switch. After a moment, the robot's
eyes lit up, and he turned to face Joel.
"Hey, Joel," Beeper said. "I had the weirdest dreams. One of them
involved me, grape jelly, a penguin, and for some reason that I still can't
quite fathom, Garrett Morris."
"I don't think I want to hear about that," Joel replied.
Beeper noticed his new surroundings for the first time. "Joel,
where are we? Wha happa?"
"I'm not quite sure," Joel said. He sat back down and analyzed the
controls. He found the button he was looking for and switched on the
front viewscreen. A vision of space greeted him.
"It looks like we're in a high Earth orbit," Joel stated. "What we're
doing in it, I have no idea."
A small red light flashed on the controls. Further analysis revealed
that this meant there was a message incoming. Joel pressed the
appropriate button, and the head of Dr. Forrester appeared on the
viewscreen.
"Ah, good to see you awake, Booby," he sneered. "I trust you slept
well."
"What are you doing with us, Dr. Forrester?" Joel demanded.
"Well, when you landed on Frank while we were trying to escape
from the building, my first impulse was to kill you right there," Forrester
replied. "But then, I figured, death would be too good for you. Too good,
for someone who single-handedly destroyed the Gizmonic Institute and
my wonderful Machine along with it. You cost me, Joel. No more world
dictatorship. No more grandeur. I won't even get any more funding from
Gizmonic, now that it's defunct." The mad scientist was sad and angry at
the same time. "You cost me a lot."
Perhaps, somewhere deep down inside him, Joel felt sorry for Dr.
Forrester. But if he did, it didn't show on the surface. "You didn't answer
my question."
Forrester snapped out of his self-pitying. "Why, Joel, haven't you
figured it out yet? I'm sending you back to the satellite!"
Joel stared in disbelief at the image of the mad doctor.
"I finally came to the conclusion," Forrester continued, "that this
was the best way to have my revenge against you -- to shoot you back into
space and keep you locked up in the satellite, experimenting on you for all
eternity. Since we were all out of ships, I'm just glad we had our
experimental Star Glider tucked away!"
"But... but..." Joel stuttered.
"Oh, you're probably wondering about that guy who's already up
there," Forrester guessed wrongly. "There's five seats in the theater, and
two of them are empty. Just enough for you and your robot pal!"
Joel didn't say anything.
"Oh, and if you have any thoughts of escaping me again, you'll find
that the controls are completely locked out. There's no way to steer the
ship without activating them from here in Deep 13. The ship is pre-
programmed to dock with the Satellite of Love, and then self-destruct."
Forrester smiled. "And on that note, I'll leave you to simmer in your
juices for a while. See you next movie sign, Joelene!"
Forrester's image disappeared and was replaced by the darkness of
space.
"I can't do it," Joel muttered. "I can't go back there. I just got
over leaving, for crying out loud."
Beeper was silent. He wasn't sure what to say to Joel to make him
feel better.
They both watched as the bone-shaped object in the viewscreen
slowly get bigger as they got closer. Joel had named it the "Satellite of
Love" when he had been first trapped there. Right now, though, it seemed
like a poor choice of words. Sure, it would be nice to see Crow, Tom, and
Gypsy again... but it would cost him his freedom.
The worst part was that there was absolutely nothing he could do.
After his little chat with Dr. Forrester, Joel had attempted in vain to regain
the ship's controls. Three tries later, he came to the conclusion that it was
no use. Unless there was some sort of divine intervention, Joel and Beeper
would be trapped forever on the Satellite of Love.
A familiar red light flashed on the control panel. There was
another message coming in.
"What, is Forrester back to rub our noses in it some more?" Joel
asked glumly.
He activated the comm system, and a face appeared on the
viewscreen. It was not one of the Mads, Joel saw, but instead was the odd,
jutting face of Torgo.
"Torgo! What the heck..." Joel said, surprised.
"Hi, JoeL," Torgo stuttered. "NeEd soME hELp?"
"As a matter of fact, yes!" Joel said. "But how --"
"I saW yOU On tHe rOof," Torgo said. "I alSO sAw yoU GEt
cApTuRed. I foLLoWed You iNtO DeEp 13."
"Torgo," Joel said quickly. "Can you give us control of the ship
from there? Do you know how to do that?"
"I DoN't kNOw," Torgo said. He scanned the control panel he had
used to contact Joel. He looked confused, then pushed a few buttons.
"ThiS iS iNteRestiNg..."
"What, Torgo, did you find the right keys?"
"No, bUT I fOunD tHe CapPuCinO MaKEr," Torgo replied.
"YumMy."
"Hurry, Torgo, before you're discovered!" Joel pleaded.
Torgo pressed a few buttons and flipped a few levers, randomly.
Then suddenly, a computer voice stated, "Autopilot deactivated. Manual
controls restored."
Joel experimentally punched in a few coordinates. The ship
responded, veering away from its course to the satellite and heading off in
a new direction.
"Torgo! You've done it!" Joel exclaimed happily. "I owe you one,
buddy!"
Torgo smiled, then looked confused. "OnE wHaT?"
"Never mind," Joel said. "We're going to have to get out of
communication range in a hurry. Look, if I'm ever on Earth again, I'll look
you up, okay?"
"OkAy," Torgo replied. "ByE."
Torgo disappeared and was replaced by a star field.
"Why aren't we going back to Earth, Joel?" Beeper asked.
"Because," Joel answered, "the Mads can regain control of this
ship if we're still in range. We need get out of Earth orbit, as fast as we
possibly can. Besides, whenever I go back there, I seem to get hit on the
head a lot. It's not very pleasant."
"What about the Satellite?" Beeper said. "Maybe we can help
those guys still there!"
Joel shook his head. "As much as I'd like to, I can't risk it. It's still
in range. We can still get trapped there." He thought for a moment.
"Maybe someday, we'll go back... but not right now."
Beeper fell silent. "So where are we going? What course should
we set?"
Joel smiled. He smiled like a man who had suddenly been granted
his freedom after an eternity of incarceration. "Second star to the right,"
he said, "and straight on til morning!"
Beeper stared at him. "What the hell kind of ending line is that?!"
Joel just looked back at his robot pal. "Sorry. I seem to have
trouble with those."
The Star Glider sped on into the black cosmos.
Epilogue
Forrester barely controlled his fury. "What do you mean...
'escaped?'"
Frank grinned nervously. "I mean... they somehow shut off our
override... and they just... left..."
Forrester just stared at his feet, saying nothing.
"Steve?" Frank asked cautiously.
There was a long silence. "Well," Forrester finally said. "We still
have one experiment left. What movie have you picked out for our newbie?"
Frank sighed. Maybe he wouldn't suffer, after all. "It's called The
Brain That Wouldn't Die. And boy, is it bad. We can go for the jugular
right out of the gate with this movie."
Forrester nodded. "Go ahead and set it up, Frank," he said.
Frank headed out of the room. He was almost through the door
when Forrester's voice stopped him.
"Oh, and Frank..." he began.
"Yes, your Evilness?" Frank replied.
"Someone WILL pay for this."
Frank swallowed. "Yes, sir," he said, just before leaving the room.
Forrester was left to console himself. No great loss, he told
himself. There will always be other prisoners. There will always be a
guinea pig. This new one named Mike, he looked like an easy one to
crack. A few Corman films, some Bert I. Gordons, and he'd be a vegetable.
Forrester smiled a little. Revenge was lost, but perhaps things
would not be so bad after all.
The End
Author's Notes:
Mystery Science Theater 3000 and all its characters, etc., are
copyrights of Best Brains, Inc. It would be highly illegal to demand
payment. Therefore, this work of fiction is to be distributed freely, as long
as no changes are made to the story itself.
This version of the "3000: A Space Oddity" is text and is readable
using the DOS edit utility, or whatever else. There is also an MS-Works 2.0
version avaliable, complete with nifty italics and stuff.
Dedicated MSTies will note that "Beeper" was the original name of
Tom Servo in the very first pilot episode of MST3000.
Special Thanks to:
- Veronica "Vern3000" Hogan, for ideas and proofreading. In fact,
she was the one who originally came up with the Fictional-Character-
Creating Machine of Death.
- Best Brains, for obvious reasons.
- All the people who like this fanfic. And to all those who don't --
bite me!
The author, Mike Barklage, can be contacted through the Internet
at the address barklage@ucsu.colorado.edu.
Mike Barklage
May to August 1994