So We'll Go No More A-Roving, for Fear of Furry Monsters

[newsmanfan]

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Ludicrous speed?? Oh no... They've gone into PLAID!

And you inspired the deep cover investigation with your suggestion for that fedora!

Er...why are we talking about plaid? *scowl* This isn't another one of those "insult my taste in clothing" threads is it?

Rhonda: No, Seventiessofacushion, not at all! Go eat some cake.

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[The Count]

Glad to know I could be of help. Now then, what other deviltry can we think up of?

Also, I like how you portrayed Pembroke Tomkins. His mannerisms, at least the knowing glint in his icy blues and the way he commanded his own workplace remind me of how Shere Khan was used in Talespin.
Oh, and Pembroke... Haven't heard that name in years, not since that old show with Scott Baio.
Bai-o, baaaaaai-o, baylight come and we gotta go home.
*Screams, no!, not one of the Gamera movies!

 

[Ruahnna]

Wow--I'm behind! So much has happened and there's more yet to come.

I am dismayed that Newsie cannot remember the momentous event of finding out where Snookie is. Mehopes his memory comes back in time to run to the rescue.

I loved the melodrama bit with Piggy, although I did feel a bit sorry for Wanda. Poor thing, stuck with Wayne and always second-fiddle to Piggy. Of course, everybody is second-fiddle to Piggy....

I was mildly repulsed (as intended, I assume) by Gonzo eating mouse-tail anything as he is good friends and sometimes roomies with a rat. Still finding the monster eating habits officially and terminally disgusting, and sorry to see the degree of back-stabbing and underhanded dealing that goes on amongst our muppet monsters. They are, after all, muppets, and one wants to like them--at least a little.

Glad Newsie is getting a little TLC but thinks everybody needs to stop working against his journalistic instincts and let him investigate below the city. I know this must all be working toward a phenomenal showdown of some sort, but I am anxious for him to get Snookie out of there. Gonzo, I'm not so worried about. He'd ride an alligator like a surfboard through any sewer rapids without so much as blinking, so I'm sure he'll come out of the coming Armageddon with nothing but a few permanent scars.

I'm sending chickie-hugs to Camilla--it must be as much of a trial to be married to a dare-devil as it is at times for Piggy to be married to such a boy scout. Er, frog scout. Here's hoping that he learned his lesson, comes back home and decides to seek the audience approval of those who already love him best.

Speaking of--if we're voting, I'm with those that think Rhonda is not-so-much Mom material. But what a wardrobe, eh?

Keep writing, chicka--I'm gonna keep reading!

 

[newsmanfan]

(Author's Note: the views of all monsters expressed within this story, including dietary preferences, are purely the monsters'. Newsmanfan accepts no responsibility for these views and is only presenting them as commentary. Concerning diet, which previously had been an issue for some readers, may we remind the public that on at least one occasion, Gorgon Heap devoured Wayne Butkus. There is no accounting for taste.)

Part Twenty-Three

“Hey, it’s my turn!”

“It’s my turn! You know, you remind me of a jack o’lantern!”

The jowly gent with dark gray hair on the sides of his head but nothing on top scowled at his longtime companion. “Eh? How’s that?”

The rotund elderly Muppet with a frizz of white hair chuckled as he delivered his punchline: “Because you’ve got a big mouth and nothing at all in your head!”

“Is that the best you could come up with?” Statler huffed as he moved his knight to set up a check. “You remind me of a spiderweb!”

“Oh? Why’s that?” Waldorf studied the board a moment, then calmly moved his king out of harm’s way.

“Because your logic is all sticky and blows away with the wind!” To illustrate, Statler tried to blow the thin toupee off the top of Waldorf’s skull, only to wind up wheezing and coughing. Waldorf laughed gleefully. Their usual parley was interrupted by a blue, balding Whatnot in a dull navy blue suit.

“Pardon me, gentlemen, for disturbing you on such a fine day. I wonder if you’ve sent in your donations this year for the Muppet Anti-Discrimination League charity drive?”

Waldorf peered closely at the newcomer. “Have we sexed a door station for who?”

“You need a new hearing aid,” Statler grumped. “He’s talking about Muppets!”

“Muffins? Sure I’d like a muffin! How much are they?”

“Gentlemen, no doubt you’ve heard of our organization,” Bland (or perhaps Blander) continued, undaunted. “With the help of generous citizens such as yourself, we’ve been able to pressure companies to hire more Muppets, and to enable job-seeking, upstanding folk with felt to pursue any career they wish! I should mention we’re hosting a catered dinner and award presentation for Muppets who’ve done the most good for their fellow-felted next weekend, at a local theatre, wherein anyone who’s donated more than five hundred dollars will receive a beautiful certificate, suitable for framing…”

“Hootable raisins? He’s not listening,” Waldorf complained to Statler. “Tell him I don’t like bran!”

Irritated, the long-jawed Muppet shook his head. To the lawyer he said, “Ignore him, he forgot to put his brain in this morning. So you’re telling me you support Muppets?”

“That’s right,” Blander (unless it was actually Bland) agreed. “Our charity needs your support as well, in order to continue the work we set out to accomplish years ago: to see to it that every Muppet, every Whatnot, every Anything, is able to work and live in an environment free of prejudice from the non-felted! We donate our time to the legal cases against discrimination in the workplace, but continuing to lobby for equal feltrights in the legislature requires more than my associates and I can—“

“Why is he going on about belted muffins?” Waldorf demanded. Frustrated, Statler smacked him on the side of his skull; a small ear of decorative Indian corn popped out of the Muppet’s ear. Waldorf looked at it in surprise. “So that’s where that went to! Astoria always insists I help with the decorating, and then complains I do it all wrong…”

“So how much would you gentlemen care to donate this year?” the lawyer asked, trying to keep his pitch from being upstaged.

“Donate? I already gave at the office,” Waldorf said.

“What office? You’ve been retired longer than most of the work force has been alive!” Statler pointed out indignantly.

“The DMV office! I gave ‘em my drivers’ license!” Waldorf chortled.

“You old coot! You haven’t even owned a car since that Stutz Bearcat back in…in…”

“That’s not the point! They thanked me – even gave me a certificate of appreciation for staying off the road!”

“Gentlemen!” the Whatnot shouted, startling the codgers into momentary attention. “Please…this is a very serious issue! Hundreds of Muppets in this very city face discrimination and ridicule every day from the ignorant and the uneducated! We don’t just act in the workplace; we also have a bill before the state senate to introduce Muppet Studies into the core curriculum of the public school system. If we are to eliminate discrimination against all Muppets, we must—“

“End discrimination against ‘em?” Statler exclaimed, incredulous. “Heck no!”

“We’ve been trying for decades to encourage people to heckle ‘em!” Waldorf agreed emphatically. “Doh, ho ho ho!”

“You…you want people to ridicule your felted brethren?” the lawyer asked, startled.

“My miniscule melted Excedrin?” Waldorf frowned. “Statler, this fellow isn’t making any sense!”

“Let’s get back to the game,” Statler suggested. “My move.”

“It is not!” Waldorf growled, and picking up a pawn, jumped it over all the remaining pieces to land finally on the opposite side of the board. “Ha! King me!”

“That’s checkers, you idiot!”

“Why are we talking about Dick Nixon now?” The white-haired geezer scowled. “Has the world gone mad today? None of you are making any sense!”

As the disappointed lawyer moved off into the park, looking for more likely prospects, Statler yelled at his heckling partner, “Take the corn out of your other ear, you old fool!”

-----------------------
Dr Van Neuter carefully added a few drops of warmed giant spider venom to the Pyrex container clamped over a low flame. The spider, none too happy about having been milked, grumped, “Are we done here?”

Van Neuter waved a backward hand absently at the arachnid. “Well I’m not, but you go spin your web or whatever it is you do, Muriel.”

“The name’s Warren,” the spider snarled, jumped onto the ceiling, and scuttled away.

“Whatever,” Van Neuter muttered, focused on the exact temperature of the solution. Just as it came to a bubbling boil, he grabbed it with heavy-duty pliers, removed it from the burner stand, and poured it into a gigantic syringe. Capping it off quickly, he brushed a hand across his forehead in relief. “Well! All ready! Roll up your sleeve, please!” He chuckled as the show host gave him a steely stare. “Whoops, silly me, you don’t have sleeves anymore! Just sit still then.”

Fauxworthy, chained to a heavy lab table, offered no comment. Van Neuter stuck the sharp end of the syringe under the bright yellow-spotted purple fur on the altered Whatnot’s arm, and depressed the plunger all the way…which took a good minute and a half. Fauxworthy winced, but held his tongue; it tended to drag the ground now if he didn’t. “Wonderful! Oh, you’re such a good patient! Thatch, give this good boy a lollipop!” Pausing, Van Neuter realized that might be inappropriate now. “Uh…or would you rather have a critter cookie?”

Thatch McGurk ambled over, a ceramic cookie jar in the shape of a famous blue googly-eyed monster in one hand and an oversized lolly in the other. “Ahfrazza blah?”

Fauxworthy, feeling the serum burning its way through his veins, turned his head away, stoically refusing to give in to a groan. In the past few days, he’d suffered crows’ feet, fur over his upper torso, a rubbery tongue and a beak where his nose used to be. He gripped the table with still vaguely-Muppet hands, bracing for the inevitable change, while Van Neuter and his monstrous assistant watched eagerly. “Oh for crying out loud, you should be bursting into spikes by now!” Van Neuter complained. He whirled on the elder McGurk. “Did you get me the centipede teeth like I asked? Those better not have been millipede fangs, you lazy fluffball!”

“Bahrazza sebbipeeza mah gugga!” McGurk protested. A series of quick popping noises made both swing back to see Fauxworthy burst out in…enormous pink butterfly wings. Muppet and monster blinked and stared.

“Oh bloody frog,” Fauxworthy muttered. “Incompetent mad scientists, yet!”

“Who’re you calling mad? I am positively ecstatic about that!” Van Neuter crowed. “Look at that, Thatch! Flight! The dream of men and Muppets alike, ever since the first experimental flight of the kittyhawk!”

“The locale was Kitty Hawk, you myopic crank,” the host grumbled, test-flapping the new appendages with a sour look on his beaky, mustached face. “Clearly, that elongated cranium of yours is due to the air bubbles in your brain.” His feet didn’t leave the ground one inch, and Van Neuter’s expression fell.

“Oh, drat! And I put in three milliliters of kittyhawk extract, too!” He turned to a nearby cage, where a tiny brown-tabby kitten with huge batwings placidly lapped at a saucer of milk. “Hm. Perhaps the beast needs to be a grown adult instead of a fledgling kitten…”

“Kah hazzah no goobah?” Thatch wondered, hungrily eyeballing the tiny caged beast, but when he reached a hand toward the cage latch, a fast, vicious swat of a clawed paw made him jerk back with a yelp.

“Stop annoying the test material,” Van Neuter scolded the monster, though he didn’t look up from the formula printout on his clipboard. “Oh, well. Every setback is a kind of progress, as the captain of the Hindenburg said…Thatch, fetch me the muzzle. We have to get Geoff here back to his cell in time for his next show taping.” He smiled pleasantly at Fauxworthy as Thatch, sulkily sucking his injured fingers, trudged off to find the beak-shaped safety muzzle. “So, which is it today – Drainpipe or whatsit, that other one with the four-by-fours…”

“Truck Monsters,” Fauxworthy grumbled. “Paragons of culture both. Does it really matter? The target audience is interchangeable.”

“Interchangeable! That’s it!” Van Neuter exclaimed. “Oh! Oh! I’m such a sillyfoam! The answer was right in front of me!” He whirled around to find himself face-to-face with a confused purple-feathered monster with three eyes. “Thatch! Hold it right there!”

“Uh?” the monster wondered, when abruptly the vet stuck a needle right between all three eyes. “Ugga!”

“I said hold still!” Van Neuter complained. He held up a few precious drops of green fluid in a tiny syringe. “Of course! Feathered monster blood!”

“Ungha,” Thatch groaned, then slumped to the floor.

Oblivious, the vet turned back around and jabbed the needle into the same vein he’d suffused earlier on Fauxworthy. “I say, old jabberwocky, that’s hardly sanitary!” the host protested.

“Oh, no worries, the centipede fang venom will destroy any lingering Hep Z. Now…how does that feel?” Van Neuter asked, examining his subject closely. Fauxworthy began shivering, and shaking, and threw back his head for a loud caw. Suddenly his eyes changed, almost disappearing under heavy blue lids, and the butterfly wings flumphed out into huge pink webbed wings instead. Glumly, Fauxworthy peered over his shoulder at them, and flapped once; the chains creaked as the Muppet-monster hybrid rose into the air and then resettled. “Thatch! I did it! I did it! Hooray for me!” Van Neuter cried, doing a little happy dance in place.

McGurk raised a woozy horned head, his tongue sticking out more than usual. “Gazza?”

“Yes! Yes! Just look at those wings! Oh, tell me, and remember, this is for posterity, so please be honest: how do you feel?” he asked Fauxworthy.

“Like I may be ill at any moment,” the former Whatnot groaned, turning away as much as he could.

A long, toothy snout sidled around the doorframe of the lab. The doglizard stared at the half-monster chained to the table. “Why have you ressstrained thisss…” He stopped, and looked more closely; Fauxworthy peered sullenly back. “Isss thiss the ssshow hossst?”

“Yes! You thought it was a real monster, didn’t you!” Van Neuter crowed, pointing a rubber-gloved finger joyously at the boss’ flunky.

“It iss indeed impressssive progresss,” Eustace admitted, edging around the freak to draw the tall veterinarian aside for a private chat. “Hisss dark-and-murkinessss is impatient to advanssse this project quickly! Have you readied hisss transssformative ssserum yet?”

Van Neuter threw his hands in the air, this time in exasperation rather than jubilance. “Rush, rush, rush! What’s the hurry? Obviously I’m making progress; just take another look at that wonderful hybrid!”

Eustace grimaced. He personally didn’t approve of mixing pureblood monsters and this…creature Van Neuter was in the process of gleefully remodeling to his own whim. If such half-things were permitted to blend into the underground, what would become of the glorious monster race? Bad enough those Frackles had been welcomed in, he thought; of course he would never express such distaste aloud. It might get back to the underlord, and the underlord’s wishes were not to be questioned… To the mad vet, the doglizard said merely, “I sssaw it. I will inform his ssslitherinesss of it. However, he isss anxiousss to prossseed with the Grand Assscenssion.”

Van Neuter blew out a breath so long it was in danger of sounding close to a raspberry. “Well, fine! Then you tell him I need better test subjects! I mean, working with Muppets is fun, I’ll grant you, any day of the week – but if your boss wants me to make him—“

“Sssshhhh!” Eustace growled, raising a claw to strike the foolish doctor, then thinking better of it. His sliminess would have Eustace’s tail for a coach-whip if anything happened to the vet which set back this secret project. He vastly resented the fact that Van Neuter had been permitted a private audience with the underlord, at which, rumor had it, the vet had actually been permitted to gaze upon the unutterable horror of the dark leader’s person without concealment! And yet, after such an indescribable honor, one which had reportedly driven lesser Frackles mad, this idiot of a Muppet was treating his sacred contract with the underlord as…as something frivolous! Angry, Eustace lashed his long tail. A few feet away, Thatch yelped in protest, then went to find a Band-aid, grumbling.

“Hey, I’m the only one allowed to maim my assistants!” Van Neuter complained. “It’s in my contract!”

“Jussst remember whom that contract isss with, you flighty fool,” the doglizard snarled.

“Flighty! Oh that’s a good one!” Van Neuter giggled. He bounded over to the mostly-changed Whatnot, stroking a wing. “Do you like the pink? I think Thatch must have a recessive gene; I was expecting purple!”

“I will inform hisss horridnesss that you require different sssubjectsss,” Eustace spat out, disgusted with the entire business. “Get thisss…creature back to his ssssell. It isss almosst time for hisss next performansse.”

“Thatch! Where is that muzzle! Thatch!” Van Neuter sighed, frustrated, not noticing the doglizard’s exit. “Honestly! I think Mulch was actually faster and better-trained!” When repeated yells failed to produce his assistant, the vet unhooked the chain from the table and tugged at Fauxworthy’s collar. “Well, come on, then, let’s get you back down to--- waaauuugh!” The half-monster beat his new wings, lifting himself and Van Neuter about a foot off the floor, then crashing down on top of the skinny vet. “Oh my! Well…that was very…very well done…good boy…” Van Neuter puffed, trying to extricate himself from beneath the birdlike feet. He looked up into the very sharp beak and angry furrowed brows of the maligned host crouching over him. “Ummm…”

A camerafrackle plunked down a tripod and began setting up his equipment. “Ready ta shoot in a sec,” it said.

“You were supposed to be here an hour ago!” Van Neuter protested. “I can’t film now, I have to get Geoffy here back to his…er, his…” He blinked up in growing awareness of just how sharp he’d made that beak, and how unhappy with his scientifically groundbreaking status the Whatnot seemed to be. “Why are you looking at me like that? Uh…nice birdie! Good boy –waaaaaahhh!”

The Frackle shook his head, annoyed. Why couldn’t they ever wait until he was fully set up? Sighing, he went ahead and turned on the camera, focusing on-the-fly while the half-monster expressed his displeasure at what had been done to him…although the ferocity with which that beak nipped and ripped suggested perhaps a monsterish nature was surfacing in the formerly blasé show host. The soundfrackle showed up, and exclaimed at the scene: “Oh come on! I didn’t bring the fuzzy mike – no one told me there’d be screaming today!”

The orange-furred one manning the camera shrugged. “Professionalism is a dying animal, George. Do whatcha can.”

“I swear to ya, Pete, no more vet gigs! No more! Ya hear me? I’m tired of this! Last one!” the long-nosed dark blue monster grumbled as he tried to capture the highest squeaks in Van Neuter’s shrieking voice.

Pete peered around the eyepiece a moment. “Ya may get your wish on that, George.”

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Rhonda found her reporter sitting coatless and tieless and frowning at a sheet of paper. “Were you thinking of doing your segment more casually tonight? That’s actually a good look for you,” the rat commented, appraising the Newsman from the doorway of his dressing-room.

Embarrassed, he hastily went to the coatrack and picked out one of his brown plaid standbys and a brown-and-red striped tie. “No. I…er…had to drop my jacket at the cleaner’s on the way in…I walked all the way from the Bowery, and there was a puddle of standing liquid at a curb, and a taxicab…”

“Gotcha,” Rhonda said, shaking her head. “Good thing you keep a supply of plaid on hand for just such situations.”

“Foresight is the journalist’s best friend,” Newsie responded seriously.

“Does Gina know you still wear those? Never mind. Why were you in the Bowery?”

He filled her in on his adventure earlier at Nofrisko. “I’m positive it was that…that big green thing that hangs around the theatre sometimes! There has to be a secret entrance to the tunnels in that office!”

Rhonda quirked her ears sideways. “Wait…are you talking about that bigmouthed black-lagoony thing that danced with Alice Cooper, back in the day? Newsie, that thing couldn’t fit down the ConEd tunnels! And why would a snack company be in league with suspicious monsters?”

“Nofrisko owns MMN,” Newsie pointed out, tapping off each item on his fingertips: “MMN shows a lot of monster-oriented programming! They also own the production studio which makes those same monsterish shows – and it was someone at that studio who was claiming to be me – and there have been monsters all over the asylum where my aunt lives, not the least of which are those two freakish chenille things that put her in the hospital in the first place!” Seeing Rhonda about to object, he added, “And I smelled that same wet, dirty fur stench, in the Nofrisko office, right before I caught a glimpse of the monster! Rhonda – do you – um…” Looking sheepish, he whispered gruffly, “Do you have any rat friends who know how to break into places?”

The rat’s eyes were wide. She stood stock-still a long moment, then slowly shook her head. “I never. Ever. Thought you would ask for something like that!”

Dropping to a crouch to look her in the eyes, Newsie grasped her paw in both his hands, gently. “Rhonda, I don’t know what else to do! I have to get in there and find out what the frog is going on! It’s…there’s so many leads to this, so many angles, it’s driving me up the wall! I know it’s all connected, all of it!”

“You start pinning notes to the wall and connecting them with string, and so help me, I will call your aunt’s loony bin myself and ask if you two can share a room!” Rhonda took her paw back, and nervously fluffed out her hair. “Look, not even Woodward and Bernstein ever broke in anyplace – they just talked to the guy who knew the guys who broke inta places! That kinda stuff is for the cops, Newsie. Why don’t you go find your friend on the force and –“

“He’s on administrative leave, remember?” Frustrated, he realized he still hadn’t put on his tie or a fresh jacket, and tossed the tie angrily around his neck, tucking it under his shirtcollar. “Rhonda, no one else is going to follow any of these leads, and they all seem to be pointing to something big and nasty happening underground! We need to find a way in and get proof enough to expose it for anyone else to take it seriously! We should—“

Rhonda leaped up, grabbed one end of the knot he was tying, and yanked on it with just enough strength to pull a startled Newsie down until his nose bumped hers. “We do not have to do anything, you brown plaid foamhead! Will you look at what this obsession is doing to you? You’ve already made yourself sick once, and you just impersonated a health inspector, and now you’re talking about breaking and entering! What is wrong with you!”

Regaining his presence of mind, though still bent over and half-choked by his exasperated producer, the Newsman yelled at her, “I am a newsman! I follow the story, and frog it, rat, this is the story! What the hey is wrong with you that you’re not?!”

His bellow had blown Rhonda’s hair all over; glaring, she released his tie to smooth it out again. He straightened his back, returning the glare. Neither of them said anything for a few seconds. With a huff, Newsie turned away from her and used the long mirror over the makeup counter to fix his tie. He pulled on his jacket and adjusted his cuffs properly, brain aswirl in a sea of facts and hunches, feeling deeply hurt. When Rhonda climbed onto the counter, he glanced at her, then back at his own reflection, stonily silent.

“Okay,” Rhonda said quietly. They looked at each other in the mirror. Rhonda sighed, and her voice was much more gentle. “But Goldie…what if you’re wrong? What if you get arrested? You’ll lose your job, Gina will wonder if you just sustained one too many head injuries, and…and…well, you’ll feel like a total idiot.”

Newsie took a deep breath, gazing unfocused at his hands. He’d considered all of that; worried about it, gone over and over the events, the coincidences, and the undisputable facts during his walk uptown this afternoon. “I feel like that most of the time anyway,” he muttered. He raised his eyes once more, and met Rhonda’s gaze in the mirror.

His expression was so open, so earnest, that for an instant Rhonda understood what Gina saw in the misfit journalist. Then she noticed the spot of street gunk on the underside of his jaw, and snickered. He shot her a very hurt look, and the rat sighed and grabbed a tissue to wipe the spot off his felt. “You’re an idiot.”

He grimaced at her, but the anger dissipated. “Are you in or out?” he growled.

She took out a compact and powdered her nose lightly, although she knew perfectly well she’d have to do so again before six o’clock rolled around. “I gotta nephew that can pick any lock, and I mean any. I don’t usually deal with him or his father ‘cept to say hiya at family dinners, and this is not something I want to ever hear from anyone else’s lips around here, but…yeah. You could say I’m connected.”

Newsie, surprised, started to smile. “Rhonda…your family is…Family?”

“What did I just say about lips and certain terms? What did you just hear me say?”

“So when can you…”

“Let’s wait ‘til after the party tomorrow. I say middle of the day Sunday.”

“What? T-try to break in, in broad daylight?”

“Trust me, sunshine. Get one of Beau’s coveralls and caps; you guys are almost the same height, should fit ya all right. People sneaking inta a place middle of the night, people notice…painters coming on a weekend to do a little work, nobody cares.”

“Painters…Rhonda, that’s genius.”

“Gawd, I cannot believe I am agreeing to call ‘Fredo,” the rat sighed. “Are you one hundred per cent sure you saw a monster hand?”

“Saw it, smelled it.” He scowled briefly. “I keep wondering why you don’t smell these things! I thought rat noses were pretty keen!”

“Uh, well…sad to admit, but certain odors we just kinda…don’t notice. This is more attuned to fine cuisine. And finely crafted French perfumes that sell for hundreds and up per ounce, of course.” Rhonda twitched her delicate whiskers at him; he wondered if she might actually be blushing.

“Of course,” he agreed at once, grinning. “Um…I’ll keep going through the emailed leads. There may yet be something useful in all that garbage. And I want to show this to Dr Honeydew tonight…” He retrieved the paper the Nofrisko product tester had given him, with the ingredients for Shamrockies. “I want to know why a snack cake company is supporting a pro-monster network.”

Rhonda shivered. “Iccch. You don’t think they’re putting weird stuff in the Fwinkies, do you? ‘Cause I’ve—I mean, my nieces and nephews have, uh, eaten that stuff a time or two…”

Newsie shrugged. “I can’t tell what half of this stuff even is! I’m hoping the scientists can shed some light on it.”

“Or enlighten us about the shedding,” Rhonda said, reading over the list. “Muppalepus snarlodontus 3x? What is this, homeopathic fur use? Newsie, that was the name of the extinct monster rabbit that attacked Kermit at the Museum this summer!”

Embarrassed at not having caught that, Newsie took the paper back and studied it. “I wanted to learn Latin, but Mother said she didn’t want me to be a pansy bookworm…” he muttered.

“Okay, look, how about this,” Rhonda said, tiny brows scrunched. “You keep at those possible leads from our darling viewers. I’ll research more on MMN; I wanna know what’s so compelling about their game show thing that has people watching it instead of the news on Saturday nights. At the very least, what the hey, we’ll find some way to scoop the ratings competitors, right? We keep our noses clean around here –“ She gave the Newsman an annoyed glare when he checked the underside of his nose for any more stains from his unfortunate puddle encounter. “—and Sunday we’ll go check out the Coat Closet of Doom, okay?” She sighed. “Does this mean you’ve given up on exploring the subway tunnels?”

“No. But Gina had a good suggestion: take Sweetums with us.”

Rhonda stared at him. “He’s a troll.”

“I know that!” He couldn’t meet her eyes. “I, uh, was informed I may have been a little unfair to him…Gina trusts him.”

“You are a tightly-wound yellow fuzzy heap of contradictions, ya know that?” Rhonda shrugged. “Fine. Anything else got your newsie-sense tingling?”

“What?”

“Nothing. Look, Blanke’s been patrolling the halls acting all jumpy the past hour; let’s get down to brass tacks on tonight’s stories, okay? Best not to provoke him right now.”

“Why is he jumpy? Has…has there been some other trouble with a sponsor?” Newsie wondered.

Before Rhonda could even speculate, the dressing-room door slammed open and a very agitated Harlan Grosse Point Blanke strode in. “You! Do you have any idea how much trouble you’re in?” Blanke roared.

“Er – uh –“ Newsie gulped. “…No?”

“What did I tell you about no more special reports?” Blanke shouted. “And I find out that today, not even twenty-four hours after I reined you and your big nose in, you’ve been harassing our parent company, poking around over some trumped-up health violation! Well I have had it with you Muppets!”

Newsie’s jaw dropped; even Rhonda looked frightened. “Our…parent company? Nofrisko? Our parent company?”

“Danged right Nofrisko! They own fifty-two percent of our stock! Just what the hey did you think you were doing? They have you on tape impersonating a health inspector and interrogating the CEO at his office this afternoon! Nofrisko has nothing to do with those blasted hamsterburgers! What possible reason did you have for going over there?” Blanke continued to yell, turning beet-red down past his collar.

“Uh, you might wanna loosen your tie,” Rhonda piped up uncertainly.

“And I warned you to keep him in line!” Blanke turned on her angrily.

“But – but – since when has Nofrisko owned this station?” Newsie sputtered, stunned. Oh frog! That means there could be a connection to all this right here in the building! I never thought to check the drains here!

“Why were you over there?” Blanke demanded, still apoplectic. “Just what sort of cloak-and-dagger B.S. do you think you’re playing at, Muppet? You read the news! That’s it! And you know what? That’s it is right! I hired you to avoid that silly lawsuit by the ACLU and MADL, not because I wanted you to play industrial spy! Your special reports are ridiculous, your on-air segments are a joke, and your weekend anchor spot was only supposed to be temporary until I could find someone else willing to work that cheap! Muppet, you are fired!” He thrust a shaking finger at Rhonda. “And you are demoted, as of this instant, to coffee rat!”

“I didn’t do anything wrong!” Newsie cried, recovering from his shock just as Blanke was turning to leave the room. “There is a story involving Nofrisko, whether they own us or not! And – and you can’t fire me for actually practicing investigative journalism! I’ll go right to those MADL people and tell them how – how prejudiced you are! See how your wonderful parent company likes you being cause for a very public lawsuit!”

“And I do not fetch coffee for anyone!” Rhonda yelled, planted in a fighting stance atop the makeup counter. “You’re nothing but a slave in a suit! How dare you threaten a reporter doing his job, or a rat doing hers!”

Blanke looked about to boil. Yanking down his tie, gulping for breath, he stared at the two outraged journalists with wide, crazed eyes. “I –I – then – then you’re both suspended! The FCC and the FBI and – and everyone else I can think of will review your personnel files and this latest act of insubordination and then you’ll be fired, and lawsuits be d—d!” He gasped, looking on the verge of spontaneous combustion. “Now get out of this studio, both of you! I don’t want to see either of you back here until you’re standing in front of a review board! Out! Out!”

Blanke stormed down the hall. Rhonda heard a soft murmur starting up out there, as people wondered what had just taken place. The Newsman grabbed loosely at the back of his chair, and sat down hard. “He…he can’t…he can’t…”

“Good reporters have been fired for messing with the corporate masters before,” Rhonda muttered darkly. “You know what? Now I believe there’s more to this story, Goldie.”

People glanced into the room as they passed by. Humiliated, the Newsman rose and slammed the door. To be degraded like that in front of everyone! Gulping, fierce tears wanting to escape from his eyes, Newsie gasped, “My…my reports are not ridiculous! They’re not!” He fell into his chair once more, shaking. Suddenly he thought of the Tarot card showing the bully, and Gina’s prediction about a cruel humiliation. “Oh…oh frog…he can’t…he can’t…” Desperately he looked over at Rhonda, still standing tall on the counter.

She shook her head. “We’ll fight it, hon, but ya know, money talks louder than the truth too often. Geez, I still can’t believe you posed as a health inspector. That’s more like Scribbler than you, Newsie! They might actually nail you on that one.”

Choking up, he buried his face in both hands. Rhonda pulled out her cell phone and texted one of the contacts she kept in memory. “Get your stuff together,” she said to the distraught Muppet. “Security’ll be in here to toss us any second.”

He rose shakily and pulled his spare coats off their hangers. “Who…who are you calling?”

“Your girl. Tellin’ her to meet us at the Muppet Theatre. You should be among friends right now…plus I’m sure alla them will want to know there actually is anti-Muppet discrimination going on. I’ll get the MADL people’s number next.”

“This is complete bull,” Newsie spat, pulling the strap for his laptop case securely over his left shoulder.

“You called?” rumbled the security guard. Hard hands grabbed Newsie’s elbow and tossed him roughly into the hallway. “Your clearance is revoked. Get out.”

“Philistine,” Rhonda sniffed, scurrying out of the bull’s reach. “Touch me and pull back a bloody hoof, buddy!”

Being Muppethandled wasn’t the worst part, though Newsie was sure a bruise would show on his arm; seeing Blanke turning away and shutting the door to his office, on the phone – no doubt with the station’s lawyers – wasn’t the worst. Having to walk out of the building with every single employee, from the weathergirl to the techs to the receptionist, staring curiously at him every step of the way…that was the worst. He climbed into the cab Rhonda flagged down and turned away from her, wiping the moisture from his eyes. Did the rest of them think the same as Blanke? Was he just a joke to them all? He kept his eyes closed the entire ride to the theatre, holding everything in as best he could.

He wished he’d never asked for a card reading. He wished he’d never conceived the idea of bluffing his way into the Nofrisko office. He wished there really was no such thing as monsters. And more than anything, he wished he could curl up in his beloved’s arms and pretend it was all better.

She was waiting for him in the green room, and while Rhonda gathered everyone else around to explain why the normally-sturdy Newsman appeared so upset, Gina took him up into the lighting bay for some privacy, and simply held him, and for a little while he was able to pretend. For a little while.

------------------------
Constanza la Whatnot, huddled tightly into her new leather jacket with the bejeweled outline of a stinkbomb on the back, darted across the darkened plaza to the port-a-potties. Every one she knocked on turned out to be occupied. “Oh come on,” she muttered after several minutes’ wait. “Hey, I’m as legitimately in need here as any of you unfelted people! You can’t deny me a restroom because of my felt!”

A taller girl in line behind her sighed, also shivering and bundled in a heavy coat against the chill night. “Nobody’s denying anything. That chili was a bad idea.” The formerly-blue Whatnot turned a grim scowl up to the girl, daring her to say anything about the neon-pink splotches decorating her cheeks, but the girl had facial tattoos and multiple piercings and wasn’t likely to judge. She gave the little Muppet a wan smile, and nodded across the street. “I heard they set up more toilets over in the alley. You could see if any of those are free, if you don’t want to wait.”

“That’s, like, a long run,” Stinkbomb argued, but when the line didn’t move one step after another couple of minutes, she blew out an impatient breath and dashed between the tents covering the plaza. A few people still lingered around the food stations, and the cops hadn’t yet done anything about the trash-fire in an empty garbage can, so food and getting warm might still be possibilities tonight before she crawled into a cold sleeping bag in her own pup tent; but right now, her most immediate need was that empty sanitation stall, oh good, it was empty! Brightening considerably, Stinkbomb headed right for the port-a-potty.

When she trotted in front of the open manhole, an enormous pair of green, furry hands grabbed her. Her squeak was immediately stifled, and then the only sound in the alley was the scrape of metal on stone as the manhole cover resettled. The group of young men ten feet away arguing over which bank to picket in the morning never saw or heard a thing, never noticed the small blue girl never re-emerged from the alley, and when Bland checked on her tent Saturday morning, he only sighed in discouraged acceptance.

These young people, so undependable, he thought, leaving the few belongings as he found them. Well, joining the Occupiers had been a bit of a long shot anyway… The lawyer checked his phone, seeing he’d missed a few calls, and chided himself for leaving it silenced all night…but then again, a Muppet needed his sleep, didn’t he? Forthright Bland called his voicemail and wandered off down Wall Street, passing by the alley where another disappearance had occurred, never thinking to even turn his head.
----------------------

 

[newsmanfan]

Part Twenty-Four (I)

Emily Bear fluffed out the sheaves of cornstalks she’d just tied to the porch posts, smiling as the sound of a sputtering engine hove around the last bend in the gravel drive. Turning, she dusted her hands on her cheery pumpkin-design apron and watched the old Chevy truck screech to an ungainly halt uncomfortably close to the tractor. Her son clambered down from the passenger side with a distinct air of relief at having survived the trip. The grayish, large-nosed creature behind the wheel turned to yell at the bevy of pigs all clinging to the rails in the back: “We’re here!”

“Ma! We made it!” Fozzie announced, eagerly running up for a hug.

“I’m so glad you all could come!” Emily laughed, and swiped Fozzie’s hat off to tousle his fur. Embarrassed, he grabbed it and jammed it back on his head. “Well! I hope all of you came ready to work! There’s a lot to be done before the other guests arrive!”

One of the pigs snorted as he looked around: the tractor barn and grain silo painted a traditional red, the white farmhouse with its cheery red-and-yellow check curtains, and the young ornamental maples in the front yard seemed to elicit more contempt than pleasure. “Thought I went to the city to get off the farm,” he muttered. However, the other pigs all snorked and sniffed the fresh air scented with turning leaves and grunted their approval.

“Ma, this is Beauregard, I dunno if you remember –“

“Of course! Hardest worker at the Muppet Theatre!” Emily beamed, and Beau blushed and took off his cap politely. “Nice to see you porkers as well! Now, we have all these decorations to get up, and solar lights to set up in the corn maze, and the games will need to be organized and I expect you all to referee them,” the elderly bear proclaimed. The pigs looked resigned, nodding, so Emily smiled and added, “There’s a mess of corn pancakes and stewed apples that’ll be waiting as your breakfast just as soon as you—“

The yard cleared instantly, and within seconds there were pigs on the porch roof tacking up swags of fall leaves, setting jack-o’lanterns in every window, and hustling armfuls of solar globes on stakes into the nearby cornfield. Emily grinned. “Works every time.”

“Uh, what can I do, ma’am?” Beau asked.

“Well Mr Beauregard, I have a special job just for you,” Emily said. “I need you to take that wheelbarrow there into the woods and gather up the biggest logs you can carry for the bonfire tonight! We’ll set it up right over there.” She pointed to a flat, cleared area down near the cow-pond, perhaps fifty yards from the outbuildings. “There’s a chainsaw in the barn. Do you know how to use one?”

“Oh, sure!” Beau replied, eyes alight with the joy of responsibility. “I’ll build you the biggest, bestest bonfire you’ve ever seen!”

“Ma, I don’t know dat Beau is the best person for the job,” Fozzie whispered, but the janitor was already sliding the barn door wide and rummaging loudly through the tool area.

“Pish posh, son. Come on now; here’s a list of the games we came up with for people to play. Some are for daytime and some are for night-time; I want you to gather supplies and put them down here by the porch for the pigs to set up, all righty?” Smiling at the bustle all around, Emily went inside to the kitchen to fix the promised breakfast, humming Van Morrison’s “Moondance” as she set about her task. Fozzie sighed, reading over the list. Most of the games he was familiar with: pumpkin bowling, pumpkin relay race, apple bobbing…he followed his mother inside, puzzled.

“Ma? What’s dis one?”

She glanced at the paper. “The Goblin City? Oh, that’s just a fun name for the candy hunt. That one’ll be in the cellar. You just need to set up those cutouts and hide the candy.” Emily nodded over at a stack of cardboard goblins painted in various hideous poses.

“Oh, okay,” Fozzie sighed. “For a minute dere I was worried dis was gonna be something scary!”

Emily cackled. “Oh no, if you want scary, wait ‘til you see the corn maze! That’ll be a real challenge for your friends!”

Fozzie groaned softly, but decided he probably didn’t want to know. He was about to go back to his assignment when another question hit him. “Uh, Ma? What do you mean, games that we came up with? I don’t remember helping with this list!”

“No, son. That would be myself and Dora.”

“Dora? Dora Bruin?”

“Did you forget she was coming tonight?”

“I was kinda hoping she had to cancel,” Fozzie sighed.

Emily shot him a wry smile as she stirred the batter. “Tsk, tsk! She was very insistent about it! I had to promise her you’d be here!”

“You what? Oh, Maaaaa! Last time I saw her, I…I…dere was all dat stuff with the Wormwood Soames story, and…and…oh I’m so ashamed,” Fozzie moaned.

Emily patted his shoulder. “Yes, you made a total fool of yourself. Luckily she still thinks you’re cute! Better get started on those games, son. Lots of work to do!” Calmly she shooed him out of the kitchen, singing happily: “Oh, with the moon and the stars up above, it’s a marvelous night for a romance…”

Wishing he’d suddenly come down with cluckitis or something equally unrecognizable, Fozzie trudged outside, staring at the dashing, jumping, hammering, snorting pigs, completely unable now to share their enthusiasm. Why on earth did Dora want to see him again? Unhappily certain he’d manage to make an even bigger fool of himself with the costume he’d chosen, he sighed and tried to make sense of the jumble of party supplies.

-----------------
Gina found her Newsman sitting glumly on the bed. “Sweetie? You’re not dressed to go? We need to get moving; we said we’d meet at the rental car place at eleven-thirty.”

He shook his head. “I’m sorry. I just…I can’t…” he sighed. “I’m not really feeling up for a party.”

Gina knelt at the bedside to stroke his cheek. “Look. You need to get out and have some fun. Trust me on this; a party is exactly the right move.”

He raised his eyes to meet hers, frowning. “How can I be expected to enjoy anything right now? I’m on suspension, my station is a pawn of that creepy snack company, there are monsters below the city planning something horrible, my aunt is on life support, I still have no clue where my cousin is…”

Gina drew him into her embrace, and whispered in his ear: “Which is exactly why you need to just step away from it all for a little while. Do you know what Gypsies do when there’s a death or a disaster?” He looked at her uncertainly, and she explained, “They have a celebration.”

“Because things are bad? Seems like a form of denial!”

“Because they’re still alive, and they have one another,” Gina corrected softly. She kissed the tip of his nose and caressed his unhappily set jaw. “And you have your friends, and you have that lawyer who’s going to help with the idiots at your station, and you have me.”

Feeling guilty, Newsie gave in to a kiss. “You really think this will help?”

“You’re wound up so tight right now I’m surprised breakfast didn’t bounce back out of your mouth,” Gina teased gently. He frowned again, and she continued to stroke his chin and cheeks. “Aloysius…please trust me. Taking a day off from all this crap will be useful. Then tomorrow you’ll be refreshed and ready to head into the storm again.”

“I thought the forecast for tomorrow was clear skies,” Newsie argued, puzzled.

Gina sighed. “Do you know I adore you?”

He nodded, giving in, hugging her in return. “I love you…okay. If you really think this is the right thing to do…”

“You. Need. A day. Off,” Gina insisted, kissing him for emphasis with every word. Blushing, he wriggled out of her arms before their schedule was thrown off any more, looking around for his comb. She smiled. “Wanna wear your costume up, or change once we get there?”

“I’ll wait,” he said immediately, and she laughed.

“Suit yourself. I’m going all out!” She pulled her tattered, wispy gray gown off its hanger, shrugging it on over the full silk slip which would protect her from the chill. Though the air felt mild outside, Bear Corners was supposed to be cooler than the city today and tonight. “I hope that Blander guy remembers to get a costume.”

After their meeting with the lawyer early this morning here at the apartment, Gina had felt obligated to invite the dull Whatnot along with them; he’d looked so wistful at the mention of an actual party. Newsie grimaced, pulling on a dark red sweater over his dress shirt. “I hope he doesn’t hit up everyone there for donations.”

Gina laughed. Newsie looked up at her, always entranced by that sound: how could she keep such a light heart in the face of all these woes? She saw his expression, and gave him a deep kiss. Smiling again at the way her Muppet melted for such demonstrations of affection, Gina tossed out her hair, settled the torn, ethereal veil atop her head and struck a melodramatic pose of anguish. “Lost! So lost and alone, woe, woe, tragedy…”

“Not alone,” Newsie muttered, enjoying her antics a little despite his anxiety.

“That’s right,” Gina said, suddenly hoisting him by the arms onto the bed so he could reach her lips, and pulling him close. “You’re not.” She kissed him until she finally coaxed a smile from him, and grinned back. “Come on, Gloomy Journalist. Move that cute skinny fuzzy butt!”

“Gina,” he protested, but gathered up his costume in a paper sack and pulled his shoes on. He volunteered to carry the two-tiered container of mini cupcakes along with his overnight bag; Gina hefted the pack with their bedroll and her own things, disregarding the incongruity of it over her dress. They received a few odd looks on the street and on the airport shuttle bus, which Gina cheerfully grinned at and Newsie did his best to ignore. Once at the rental car counter, Gina took care of the paperwork. A large rat snorted his annoyance:

“’Bout time you got here! I’m getting’ hungry and I need road trip snacks!”

Newsie stared at him. “Rizzo? What are you doing here?”

“I figured someone needed a party date,” the rat smirked just as Rhonda emerged from the ladies’ room.

She noted Newsie’s incredulous look and shook her head. “Trust me, it was not my idea! He claims he read something that made him decide he’d been ‘neglecting’ me too long.”

“Hey, I’m a rat, you’re a rat, dere’s gonna be food,” Rizzo said. “Sounds like da perfect date ta me!”

“Okay, I has the travel musics already,” a loud shrimp said, marching up to the counter. He plunked down a duffel bag bearing a designer label. “Are we ready?”

“Newsie? How many people did you invite?” Gina wondered.

“Just Rhonda!” he protested. “You asked that Bland guy; I certainly don’t recall either of us asking a crustacean along.” He glared at Pepe.

“Well, maybe that’s because jou has taken too many direct hits to jour pointy head okay,” the prawn cackled. “Of course I am riding with jou! Jou needs a little party atmospherics with this group, trust me.”

“Animal tried to eat him when he got on da Mayhem’s bus,” Rizzo snickered.

“I’m sure there’s room enough in the backseat for you both to sit way on the other side. Far from me,” Rhonda grumbled.

“Oh, wonderful, you’re on time,” the blue Whatnot lawyer said, ambling over. He already had on his costume: a large orange beak was attached over his nose, a cap with blue feathers stuck jauntily up in stark contrast to his bored expression, and a short cape covered in blue feathers lay over his suit-coat as though it wasn’t sure what it was doing there. He regarded the rats and the prawn dubiously.

“Jou gots to be kidding, okay,” Pepe said. “He’s coming with us?”

Rizzo shook his head. “I call shotgun!”

Gina frowned at him. “No. Newsie has shotgun. He’s navigating. I’m sure all of you can make do in the back seat.”

Rizzo sighed. “Please tell me ya didn’t get a compact.”

Pepe gestured at them all impatiently. “Can we just get this trip moving, okay? I made a special mix CD just for jous! Party times, okay!” As the group headed for the car lot to find their reservation, the prawn sang happily and not quietly enough: “There is a monster in my pants, okay, and he does a scary dance; when he comes into the room, all the womens start to swoons…”

“Can we listen to NPR instead?” Newsie grumbled.

“Shotgun gets to call radio as well,” Gina assured him, and did her best to block out the questionable tune Pepe persisted in cheerfully singing.

------------------------
“Kermieeeee! Are you dressed yet?” Piggy sang out. Kermit sighed, eyeing his faux-bronze armor breastplate and leather skirt unhappily.

“Well, I guess,” he grumbled. Piggy popped her head out of the bathroom-area curtains.

“Whaddaya mean, you guess?” Then she saw Kermit had indeed put on his entire costume, and squealed with appreciation. “Oh Kermie! Vous are so very…dashing!”

“I feel ridiculous,” the frog muttered. “And these sandals are really hard on the flippers, Piggy!”

“But Kermie, surely vous appreciate my homage to the late, great, exquisite Elizabeth Taylor?” Piggy made a minor adjustment to her gown and stepped into the main room of their bedroom suite, lifting one hand as though expecting him to bow and kiss it. Her gown, not only pure white but of actual papyrus linen, draped wonderfully over her full frame. The elaborate headdress may have had real lapis lazuli and gold; Kermit gulped, deciding he didn’t want to know. Piggy batted her heavily-made-up eyes at him, and Kermit gulped again.

“Er, Piggy, are you…are you wearing anything under…”

“Kermit! One does not ask these things of an actress!” the pig huffed.

Kermit felt his cheeks warming. “Uh, no, uh, I only ask because, well, it might be cold up there, and –“

“Then you’ll just have to stay…very…close,” Piggy purred, sidling up to the froggy Roman soldier and stroking the purple sash he wore over the light armor. “Burton was never handsomer, my prince.” She favored him with a teasing kiss.

“Aw,” Kermit murmured, all objections forgotten momentarily. “Piggy…”

From the grand staircase just outside the master suite, Scooter called, “Hey, are you guys ready to go? I’ve got the car warmed up right out front, but the traffic warden isn’t going to be happy if we take much longer!”

Piggy glanced in the mirror, turned herself this way and that, and decided she looked properly queenly. “Well?” Kermit asked, itching to get on with the road trip…or maybe just itching in all that hard-cured leather.

His wife smiled at him, and lowered her lashes to give him a very suggestive stare just like the great Liz would’ve done. “Lead on, my bold conqueror,” she said, her voice husky.

“Aw, geez, Piggy,” Kermit groaned, taking her hand in one of his and grabbing his overnight satchel in the other. “Uh, you remember how small Fozzie’s mother’s place is, right? We’re not going to have any privacy!”

She smiled wickedly at him, sashaying down the stairs of the townhouse. “Oh. What a shame. I guess that means you’re just going to have to admire my…costume…without ever knowing what I have on under it!” She wiggled her rear deliberately, murmuring over her shoulder, “Trick…or treat!” As Kermit stifled a groan and hurried after her, she changed tone completely to yell downstairs: “Hey Scooter! Make sure ya get all the bags this time! I need both hairdryers and the curler!”

We’re only going to be there one night, Kermit thought, but then brightened a bit, and smiled at the saucy pig. ONLY one night. Trick or treat, huh? We’ll see about that!

On the street in front of their building, he smiled at the girl helping Scooter load all of Piggy’s accoutrements into the trunk of a luxury sedan. “Ha ha! You look great, Sara!”

The redhead brushed her tangle of frizzed, curly hair out of her gleaming green eyes to grin at the frog. “Like it? Took me forever to get it to curl right!”

“Hmm. That’s not a bad look for you, dear,” Piggy judged. Then she saw Scooter, and chuckled. “Oh I see! Giving us some competition for the couples costume, hm?”

Scooter grinned; his hair had been temporarily dyed dark brown, and he wore a traditional school robe which matched Sara’s. “Hey, Miss Piggy, wanna see my wand?”

Piggy stared at him. Scooter produced a twiggy-looking stick and waved it at the pile of luggage. “Wingardium leviosa!”

Sara gave him a cute scowl. “I keep telling you, it’s not leviosa, it’s levio-sahh!” The pair giggled, and as Piggy settled herself and her priceless costume in the back seat, Sara continued under her breath, “And I wish it did work…”

“Go climb in; I’ll get the rest,” Scooter muttered back, still smiling.

Shaking his head tolerantly, Kermit hopped into the backseat, noting his pig was still being terribly coy. So she thought this party was an excuse to toy with him, did she? He hummed softly, considering the possibilities for tricks if she was going to taunt him with an unattainable treat…

Scooter pulled the car into the slow flow north toward the Washington Bridge. “Hey, chief. Did you hear anything else yet about that anti-discrimination thing?”

Rousing reluctantly from his devious green plotting, the frog leaned forward to talk with his second-in-command. “No, but I know that law firm was meeting with the Newsman this morning.”

“It seems weird that anyone would dump on you guys for being Muppets,” Sara mused.

Scooter nodded. “Tell me about it! I guess those lawyers were right. Glad we’re doing the charity walk after all, at that rate.”

Piggy sniffed. “No one has ever discriminated against moi… They wouldn’t dare!”

Kermit chuckled wryly. “No, I’m sure they wouldn’t.”

Sara wriggled half-around to address Kermit directly. “So it’s true, then? That news station really did try to fire the Newsman over nothing?”

Kermit shrugged. “I only heard about it third-hand. I was with your hubby, remember?” The frog and his assistant had stepped wearily off a small plane late last night; Clifford had personally been there to hand the keys to the theatre back to the former gofer and lie about how much fun he’d had being in command.

“Kermie, you never did say where you found us a cabin to film,” Piggy said.

The frog nervously adjusted the tunic under his breastplate. “Geez, is this thing wool? It’s awfully scratchy…”

“Well, uh, it’s not so much a cabin,” Scooter jumped in.

“Oh,” Piggy said, mystified. “But…are we changing the script? I thought the whole point of the setting was to give the tagline some meaning? The, what was it…”

“’Ham in a Cabin’?” Sara piped up. Before Piggy’s startled look could transform into something more dangerous, she explained, “A famous horror-movie critic called the original haunted-shack-in-the-woods film ‘Spam in a cabin,’ but, um, obviously, you’re not –“

“Not going to stoop to that level,” Kermit took up the slack quickly.

“Oh. But of course,” Piggy agreed. “So, ah, what did you two find after roaming all over the great white north?”

Kermit sighed, sinking back into the plush cushions. “Well, we found a porch at one place, and a great barn at another…”

Piggy raised herself up to stare at him. “Are you saying we’re going to film the exterior shots all over the place? Kermie! That will mean I’ll have to have a driver full-time if we keep moving my trailer from location to location! Can we afford that?”

Kermit scrunched his face. “Uh, Piggy…I don’t think we’ll be lugging along your trailer everywhere, no.”

“Ohhh,” she said, smiling. “So we’ll be sharing a trailer? How cozy!”

Though married, Kermit had long ago learned the expediency and opportunities to actually get work done that allowing his wife her own private trailer on-set afforded. “Er, well, not exactly, Piggy; the studio wouldn’t okay an expense like that…”

Piggy, nonplussed, tried again. “Ah…hotel rooms? Please tell me you found something at least four-star within driving distance…”

“Try tents,” Scooter said. Silence fell inside the car.

“Tents?” Piggy asked finally.

Sara looked at her husband. “What say a little traveling music?”

“What say,” Scooter muttered. The indie radio station almost drowned out the sounds of outrage from the back seat.

---------------------
Gina knocked on the door of the bedroom they’d be sharing with the frog and pig, the gofer and his lady, and Floyd and Janice, Mrs Bear having prudently put all the steady couples in one room while everyone else spread all over the farmhouse and into the barn. “Newsie…”

“I look ridiculous,” came the muffled response.

“So does everyone else; it wouldn’t be Halloween if you couldn’t be silly. Come on, get out here! The games are starting!”

“I look ridiculous.”

Sighing, Gina opened the door. A large raven of black velvet and real, glossy black feathers stood unhappily next to a small vanity, looking at himself in the mirror. Only a little golden-yellow felt showed beneath the costume. Gina tucked his sleeves into the gauntlet-like gloves, fluffed out his feathery tunic, and tweaked the beaked mask on his face. “It would look less silly if you took the glasses off,” she pointed out.

“Then I won’t be able to see four inches past my nose!”

Gina thought that was a generous estimate, but didn’t say so. “My love…I won’t let you walk into anything. This is supposed to be a couples costume, remember?”

Newsie sighed, relinquishing his specs, nervously watching his now-blurry beloved tuck them safely into a blurry case by the blurry bedside. “Remind me what we’re doing?”

“Well, your role is fairly easy. Just say ‘Nevermore’ a lot, and perch over people if you get the chance.” She giggled at his scowl, obvious even under the mask from the way it scrunched. “Mine’s a little harder. I have to be tragic and lost.”

“I never understood that about that poem,” Newsie complained. “If the narrator lost this Lenore person, why didn’t he just go looking for her instead of sitting around moping with his bust of Pallas?”

Gina hugged him; he returned it, confused. “That’s my practical Muppet… Come on, handsome, let’s get out there and have some fun!”

Abashedly, his fingers fumbled into her hand. “Don’t let go.”

“I won’t. Don’t you either, except to flap now and then!”

Their entrance on the front lawn was greeted with cheers and laughter. Gina curtsied, then rushed over to Scooter. “Lost! Woe, woe, I am flitting endlessly on the night’s Plutonian shore…”

“Nevermore!” Newsie muttered, which provoked laughs all around.

“Who says my Newsie doesn’t get comic timing?” Gina whispered to him, smiling. Feeling relieved as he understood no one was actually mocking him, Newsie peered around.

“Looks like a lot of people were able to attend,” he remarked, recognizing a small green frog hopping by with a microphone and a fedora and trenchcoat five sizes too large. “Kermit! Nice to see you in the old frog-on-the-scene outfit!”

“Oh, hi, Newsman,” a thin voice peeped in reply. “Wow, you thought I was Uncle Kermit? Terrific! I am so gonna win the ‘Completely Unrecognizable’ costume category!” Robin bounced over to the side of the house, where a bowling lane of sorts had been constructed from haybales, with long gourds standing up at the far end to serve as the pins. “Fozzie! Hey Fozzie! Guess who I am!”

There were quite a lot of people, as the reporter had put it, milling around the grounds. A wild jam winding down with thumping drums and a screeching guitar announced the arrival of the decrepit but somehow still mobile bus bringing the Electric Mayhem, along with Nigel and Rowlf. As they disembarked, Newsie tugged Gina’s ragged dress sleeve. “Uh…I know that’s the band, but are they all right? They seem to be moving a little, er, under the influence…”

Gina snickered. “Nope. They’re just dead.”

“What?” He realized it was some sort of costume, and relaxed. “Oh.”

“More like no longer pushin’ the pedals or the daisies,” Dr Teeth cackled as he shambled past. “Friends, I am indubitably in need of cranial refreshment!”

“Braaaiiinnns,” Animal growled, getting a little too into his part. The entire Mayhem sported pale felt, torn clothing, and fake wounds; Floyd set aside his bass and tucked one arm inside his costume to better display the bony hand dangling loosely out of his jacket sleeve. Janice shuffled beside him, her head cocked over at an angle, dead leaves and realistic dirt matting her normally shiny hair.

“Dratted walking dead,” Nigel drawled, hot on their trail with a bright pink water assault rifle, his sheriff’s get-up making the group costume’s theme current.

Zoot shambled behind them all, still carrying his sax. “Wuh-huh-huh! Hey Zoot! What kinda zombie are you?” Lew Zealand asked.

The saxman paused to look blankly at him from behind his customary shades. “Zombie? I don’t do mixed drinks, man. Too heavy!”

Rowlf, looking comfortable in a long khaki coat and rumpled tie, scratched his ear in puzzlement at the fish-thrower. “Uh, Lew? Sorry, man, but I don’t get your costume. What’s the joke?”

“Oh, uh, it’s not a costume!” Lew grinned, equally warm in all-over footie pajamas in a fishie print, with fat plush sharks cushioning his feet. “I was told this was a sleepover!”

“Bogey?” Gina guessed, looking at the dog’s simple, if slept-in-looking clothing.

“Hardly,” Rowlf said, slipping into a passable imitation of another famous detective. “I had my suspicions about that fish-flingin’ guy. Never trust the guy in the room who looks too comfortable. Oh,” he said, turning back to Lew, “just one more thing…”

Gina laughed, and Newsie caught the reference. “He was a good man,” he told Rowlf seriously, and the dog nodded.

“That he was. Did you catch the other homage over there?” He tilted his nose in the direction of the Egyptian queen and her Roman lover.

“Holy cow. She does one heck of a Liz,” Gina said. “Who did the costume?”

“Dunno, but I bet it cost as much as ol’ King Tut’s bedroom! Hey, Clifford, gonna bust some spooks for us?”

Newsie squinted at the odd coverall and some sort of pack on the purple Muppet’s straight back. “Uh…are you supposed to be an exterminator?”

Clifford laughed. “Yeah, man. Somebody saw a cockroach up on twelve!”

“Funny,” snorted a tiny bug, trotting past in a Ziggy Stardust costume.

Newsie walked along with Gina toward Cleopigtra and Frog Antony. “I don’t get it,” he muttered at her, but she shushed him.

“Miss Piggy, that costume is amazing,” Gina said, and Piggy gave a queenly nod. “And Kermit! Uh…that skirt really shows off your legs!”

Kermit scrunched his nose. “So I’ve been told about twenty times already. Thanks. Uh, Newsman, any progress on your complaint? Will there be a formal hearing of some sort? You know I or anyone here would be willing to speak up for you, if you need us.”

Newsie thanked him. “Mr Blander says I definitely have a case. He’s going to serve my boss and the KRAK management with a notice of intent on Monday.” He sighed. “I really hope that fixes things without having to go through civil court.”

A detailed discussion of the whole debacle for the benefit of Kermit and Scooter began, and after a minute, Gina squeezed Newsie’s arm. “Cutie, you go ahead and talk shop; I’m going to find us something to snack on, okay? I promise I’ll be right back.”

“Me too,” Sara said, brushing a kiss over Scooter’s mouth, and after a second Piggy strolled after them.

“Moi thought this was supposed to be a party,” she sniffed. “Why do they always have to drag business into things?”

“Well, it is pretty serious,” Gina pointed out. “I’m hoping that idiot station manager realizes what a bad move it would be to fire Newsie. Honestly, I wish Newsie would go to some other station! One not run by corporate cretins!”

They browsed the long table set near the back stoop leading to the kitchen. Every conceivable fall-themed treat seemed to be represented on the groaning board: toffee-coated apples, pumpkin cupcakes, candy-corn parfaits, fresh grapes and figs and sharp cheeses jostled for space with marshmallow ghosts, little hot dog mummies, chocolate bat cookies and spidery candies. Gina shook her head in amazement as she picked over the offerings. “Nice! Looks like the great hall at Hogwarts!”

Sara smiled at her, and said, “It’s nice to meet someone else who stands by their Muppet.”

“Oh, you’re Scooter’s wife, right?” They exchanged pleasantries a moment, then Gina sighed deeply. “Do you ever have to deal with people giving you grief about being with a Muppet?”

Sara considered it. “Not really, but I know not everyone understood Scooter choosing me.”

Gina’s gaze swept once over the young woman only slightly shorter than her, then looked back at the Muppets in deep conversation on the leaf-littered lawn. “Because of the height thing?”

Sara giggled. “Uh…no. Because I’m more outgoing than he is.”

They laughed together. “Same here.” Gina watched her Newsman gesturing broadly at a perturbed Kermit; in his costume, the resemblance to a raven attacking some smaller competitor for the same prey was undeniable…and unintentionally comic. She shook her head. “Why is it, do you think, they all seem younger than they are?”

“It’s the felt,” Sara asserted. “No wrinkles.”

“Trust me, it’s even worse with the frog,” Piggy assured them both.

Curious, Gina tentatively asked, “Have you and Kermit ever taken any flak for being a couple?”

“Well, I can’t say we haven’t raised a few eyebrows…except on his side of the family…” Piggy mused, loading up a plate with the least outré of the spooky-themed foods.

“Frogs are more tolerant?”

“No eyebrows,” Piggy snickered, and all three of the girls burst into loud laughter.

Newsie looked over at the sound, wondering what had caused such merriment. “It’s good to see everyone getting along,” Scooter said.

“That’s right,” Kermit agreed. “We’re all friends here. Just try to set aside your problems for the night and enjoy the party,” he advised Newsie.

“All friends except maybe that guy,” Scooter mumbled, shaking his head at the sight of the blue Whatnot cornering Sam the Eagle; the bird, for once, seemed very discomfited to be on the other side of a lecture. “I know he’s representing you and all, Newsie, but he’s really very…bland…”

Kermit stared at Sam’s costume. “Why is Sam dressed as a lizard with an American flag?”

“I’m not going to ask,” Scooter said.

A rat in a gold lamé dress with platinum straight hair appeared on the voting table nearby, sipping from an orange martini glass, her enormous shades balanced by her spiraling earrings. “I did ask. The eagle is apparently under the misconception that one of the presidential candidates is an amphibian. I laughed, and he didn’t see why it was funny.”

Newsie knew that voice. “Rhonda? Er…who are you, some sort of spacegirl?”

The rat struck a pose worthy of the pig. “Honey, I was born this way! ‘Scuse me. I heard there was a contest; I’m gonna vote for the zombies for Best Group Costume.” She filled out a slip of paper and stuffed it in the appropriate ballot box.

Scooter nudged Newsie. “That reminds me – go find Fozzie! Or Mrs Bear; they mentioned they wanted you to announce the results later tonight after everyone’s voted on all the costumes!”

“M-me? Er…all right,” Newsie agreed, surprised. “Has anyone seen either of the Bears?”

---------------------
Emily Bear was in the kitchen at that moment, looking down cheerfully at the blue chicken in the funny white hat and skirt. “My goodness! How adorable! Is that Camilla?”

The chicken clucked agreeably. The smell of baking apples had drawn her into the bright, old-fashioned farmhouse. “And who are you supposed to be, dear?” Emily continued; Camilla clucked again. “Oh…I’m afraid I never watched it, but I know Fozzie has an old videotape of his favorite Smurf episodes somewhere still! It’s so nice to see you again! Now where’s your…your…whatever he is?” The matronly bear chuckled at her own awkwardness. “I never know what you young people call that sort of thing these days; I know you’re not married, but ‘boyfriend’ seems too casual…” The chicken offered a suggestion, and the bear nodded. “Significant ‘Other’! That sounds perfect. So isn’t he with you?”

Camilla explained in a few short squawks the basics of the situation. Emily frowned. “My, my! Well of course you can use the television in the front room…I’ll just have that nice Beauregard carry it out to the coop for you. There’s an outlet outside; we’ll just unplug some of the Halloween lights so you can use it while your honey’s show is on.” Camilla thanked her. Emily yanked on a rope dangling from the ceiling; although it didn’t appear to be hooked to anything, a train whistle screamed, and within seconds Beau popped into the back door, dressed in blue-and-white-ticked overalls with a matching cap.

“You called?”

“Oh, Conductor Beau! Would you take the TV out to the chicken coop and plug it in for this young lady? She shouldn’t have to miss her daredevil performing tonight,” Emily said, and Beau nodded, tried to salute, looked confused, then yanked on the train whistle with a smile.

“Comin’ right up! Next stop, happy coopers!”

Link Hogthrob sauntered in, led by his deeply sniffing snout. “What is that wonderful smell? Oh, hello, Mrs Bear! Wanna go for a spin?” Grinning, the leather-clad boar leaned against the kitchen table, cocking his biker hat low over his brow – then lost his balance and landed ungracefully on his generous rear.

“Well, if it isn’t the Rebel Without a Clue,” Emily laughed, helping him up. “James Dean, am I right?”

“Well, yes, but for you, it’s ‘Jimmy,’” Link murmured, suavely puffing up his shoulders in the traditional studded jacket.

“Link sweetie, I don’t think you really want people to call you Jimmy Dean,” the bear advised, turning back to her cooking.

“Why not?”

“Ach, again vit the pork jokes,” Dr Strangepork huffed, trotting into the kitchen, Annie Sue in tow. “Vat do you tink of our get-up, Frau Bear? I tink ve are sure to vin!” The white lab coat and his usual round spectacles didn’t immediately clue Emily in, but then she saw the tall black bouffant with streaks of white on the young sow, and started laughing.

“Dr Frankenswine, I presume?” Emily asked, and Strangepork kissed the back of her hand. “Well! Such nice manners!”

“Such nice cinnamon spices!” Strangepork returned, licking his lips. “I love a woman who gets her hands dirty in the kitchen!”

“Hey, I didn’t get to lick her hands,” Link complained, trying to do so. Emily swatted his fingers with the back of a wooden spoon.

“If you have to be in here, make yourselves useful! Frankenswine, stir this; Link, please fetch me another jug of cider from the cellar; Annie dear, would you help me make these popovers?”

“I just love home cooking!” Annie Sue exclaimed, tying on an apron over her ragged gown.

Link pouted. “The cellar? But…but…what if it’s dark? What if there are…spiders?”

“I’ll feed you to them if you don’t hurry up!” Emily teased, but Link fled, wailing about dark scary cellar spiders. The bear sighed as the other two pigs snorted with amusement. “Honestly…Beau! I need you, dear!” She yanked the train whistle again, and plunged into her cooking with a smile. A bustling kitchen and a home full of Muppets, though a lot of work, was so contagiously cheerful; she certainly wasn’t going to let one cowardly pig spoil the fun…or the mulled cider.
----------------------

 

[newsmanfan]

Part Twenty-Four (II)

“Okay, girls, okay, everybody gets a turn,” Fozzie chided, and the chickens stopped clucking at one another and drew straws to determine who would bowl first. Fozzie checked the basket of small candy pouches behind him; he was supposed to hand them out to anyone who bowled a strike, but he was wary of the rats he’d seen lurking around trying to gobble them up before that happened. One of the chickens clucked something about his scarf, and he frowned at her. “Hey, come on, this is classic! I mean, if you’re gonna talk costumes, what da heck are you all supposed to be anyway?” He gestured at the flockful of colorful-spandex-jumpsuit-clad chickens, all wearing ponytails and lots of sparkly jewelry.

“Bawwwk. James Bawwk,” a brown rooster announced, stepping up to the throw line.

“No, I’m Bawwk,” a black rooster argued.

“Wait, wait, I get it,” Fozzie said. He pointed at the brown one. “You’re, lemme see, Cawjer Moore?” The rooster nodded, puffing out his chestfeathers past the confines of the tuxedo. “So you must be –“

“Sean Cawnnery,” Blackie said, leaning coolly on a haybale.

“Oh,” Fozzie muttered. “I woulda thought Daniel Crawg… So, so who are the girls?”

The chickens clucked, each striking a daring pose. Fozzie’s jaw dropped. “Poultry Galore…? Guys, come on! Dis is a family party!”

“Cute outfit, Fozzie,” a sultry voice behind him made the bear whirl around, nearly stumbling over the nine-foot-long scarf. “I didn’t know you were a Whovian.”

Fozzie stared at the other bear; she really had grown up a lot since she’d been the cub next door…and the low-cut, Gothic fairy costume with its short skirt and playful butterfly-wings didn’t help him pull his jaw off the ground. “Wha…ha…who?”

“It’s Dora, silly,” the girlish bear giggled. She wrapped a long brown curl around one delicate claw, smiling at him. “Don’t you recognize me?”

“Wha—of course! Dora! Hi!” The chickens clucked loudly; the brown rooster had just bowled a perfect strike – perfect, anyway, if one discounted the pins knocking into one another, wobbling around wildly, bouncing the bowling-ball-pumpkin into the air and then finally falling over at the same instant as Blackie when the pumpkin crashed onto his head. Distractedly Fozzie awarded the brown rooster a bag of gummi pumpkins. “I, uh, it, it’s really great to see you again!” Fozzie finally stammered. Dora stepped closer, flipping up the ends of the scarf.

“Very cute. So which was your favorite monster, the Daleks or the Cybermen?” she asked. Fozzie, trying to formulate a sentence of some kind in his short-circuited brain, was interrupted by the rooster tugging at his coat-hem. He swapped out the gummi pumpkins for a bag of candy corn, and the contented rooster moved back to watch the jumpsuited chickens struggle with the ball as a pig at the end of the lane reset the gourd pins.

“Uh…wha…uh…honestly, I thought both of them were too scary,” Fozzie admitted. “I liked K-9.”

Dora laughed. “Yeah, have to go with the robot dog. Do you like my costume?”

“It’s great,” Fozzie said immediately. “Uh…is it…a fairy?”

“The color doesn’t give it away?” Dora asked, turning so he could see the extremely close-fitting dark blue minidress from all angles, which didn’t ease Fozzie’s nerves at all. Seeing he didn’t understand, Dora smiled and leaned close to him. “From Pinocchio! I’m the Blue Fairy. Want me to make you a real boy?” Grinning, she tapped him lightly on the nose with her star-tipped wand.

“Wah…aaaaaahhhhhave you met everyone else? I don’t think you really had the chance to last time,” Fozzie gulped, retreating to the front yard, a grinning fairy bear following fast on his tucked tail.

At the bowling contest, the chickens looked after the departing bears, then at one another. Shrugging, a chicken clutched the pumpkin stem in her beak, ran to the line and released it: it knocked down four pins. The rooster crowed, and awarded her a little bag of Smarties. The next chicken forgot to let go of the stem, and scored a strike, feathers poufing everywhere, to the loud enjoyment of the others, and the rooster started tossing candy bags at everyone; the pig pin-setter grunted a complaint until a bag was tossed his way. “Mini Reeses! Sweet!”

------------------
Newsie flapped his arms at a couple of rats dressed in overalls. “Nevermore!” he rasped.

“Agh! M-m-m-mario!” the rat in green overalls cried, clutching at the rat in red overalls.

“Oh knock it off, willya? Dere’s no way we’re winnin’. Let’s go raid da buffet,” the other rat suggested.

“You’re getting into the spirit of it,” Gina praised her Muppet, offering him another cup of hot mulled cider. Nodding thanks, he downed the drink, grateful for its warmth; the day, though clear, had turned chilly, and a light breeze seemed to find every tiny chink in his feathered armor. “Your friends are definitely performers; I’ve never seen so many great costumes at one party, even the last one the Sosilly guys threw!”

“I wonder where Rizzo and Pepe went,” Newsie said. “For all that bragging about who was going to win Best Costume, I’ve yet to see either of them.”

“Speak of the devil,” Gina giggled. Newsie turned to see the Swedish Chef yelling and throwing random kitchen implements around; everyone nearby ducked. A meat tenderizer nearly missed Newsie’s beak. Red horns and a pointy tail stuck out of their appropriate places, but otherwise the Chef looked as he always did. “Wow…never seen him so angry,” Gina mused.

Hearing her, the Chef stopped, leaning up to murmur conspiratorially: “Nooo, em nut ongry! Em der Gurdun Ramseyseysey, sey, sey!” He waved a pitchfork at the rats on the outdoor food spread. “Hey! Nooo habben der crème broolee mit unfer du bloogen-torchen!” Grabbing a small blowtorch, he flamed the dessert stand. A crisped rat blinked astonished at him as the Chef, still in character, continued his rant: “Whereun yoo no der lernun cooken-frooken!”

“Got it,” Gina giggled.

“I don’t get it,” Newsie muttered. “And now the popovers are all fried-overs…”

“Check it out. Dueling Jacks,” Gina said, pointing out Rizzo and Pepe glaring at one another on the top step of the porch.

“Oh jou has got to be kidding,” Pepe groaned. “Jou doesn’t even have a bottle okay!”

“You call those dreadlocks?” Rizzo demanded. “Come on! And my mascara is much better dan yours!” The rat and the shrimp both sported black dreads poking out of brown bandanas, eye makeup, and garish pirate outfits. Rizzo waved his cutlass at Pepe. “Dis was my idea foist!”

“It so was not, okay! Jou know that story about escaping the desert island riding on the backs of two sea turtles?” Pepe smirked at the rat. “That was not in the original script! Where do jou thinks Johnny Depp got the idea already my friend?”

“You so did not ride sea turtles off a desert island!”

“Well, okay, so it was only one sea turtle; his name was Jorge. The point is I am a much better Captain Jack than jou!”

“On guard!” Rizzo growled, and a swordfight ensued, the tiny combatants running up the sheaves of corn, swooping from swags of tied leaves, and finally trying to keep their balance on a large pumpkin as it rolled down the steps and off across the yard, aluminum swords clashing repeatedly.

“Drama queens,” Rhonda snorted. “Hey, check it out! The new kid made it!”

A beautiful Auburn roadster pulled serenely into the drive, blocking the path from the party to the porch. A short Muppet waved enthusiastically from the back seat; a purple tuxedo clothed him and a bluish-gray, curved nose stuck out from the hat tied to his head. “Wow! I’m really here! Everyone’s here! Oh wow!”

Seeing the new arrival, Kermit tried to get everyone’s attention. “Hey everybody, look who’s here! It’s Wa—“

“I know, I know, settle down now,” Wayne said, stepping out of the driver’s seat and sticking out his meager chest. The long black wig, fake mustache, and love beads dangling around his neck looked as incongruous on the singer as the bell bottoms and Indian blouse. “That’s right, I am here at last! You may now begin the celebration!”

“Cripes, Wayne, he didn’t mean you,” Wanda sighed, shaking her extra-long, straight wig out of her face. Her slit-thigh, slinky dress fluttered in the breeze as she helped the kid down from the back seat. “Come on, kiddo. This’ll be fun.”

“Oh you bet it will!” Walter yelled, and at the sight of Kermit he trilled a happy whistle. Kermit laughed, applauding; Wayne, hearing the sound, instinctively turned and bowed. Walter bowled him over running past. “Kermit! Fozzie! Chef! Dr Teeth! Wow, this is great! What amazing costumes!”

“I like yours,” Kermit responded, grinning at the sleepy-looking eyes glued to the hat. “Will you be shooting yourself out of a cannon tonight?”

“Only if the real Gonzo shows me how!” Walter laughed, then looked around quickly. “Uh, where is Gonzo?”

“He couldn’t make it,” Emily said, reaching down to shake hands with the newest member of the troupe. “Nice to meet you, young man! Fozzie says very nice things about you.”

Both the bear and the young Muppet blushed. Walter saw Dora, and immediately shook her hand as well. “Thanks – hey, you must be Dora, the bear Fozzie always had a crush on as a kid, only he couldn’t tell you because he was too embear*****, get it? Ha ha ha! Wow! Hi everyone!”

“He’s cute,” Gina observed, as Fozzie suddenly remembered a chore left undone in the corn maze and scurried off to do it.

“He’ll learn,” Rhonda said, and wandered over to the cider cauldron where another rat had leaned in too far and was now swimming and shouting for help. “Gawd, Ricky, didja at least shower today?”

Walter stopped his excited dashing in front of Newsie and Gina a moment. “Hi! Wait, wait, lemme guess…you’re…Sam?”

“Nevermore!” Newsie protested, and Gina giggled.

“Close. The eagle is taller,” she hinted.

“Hey!” Newsie turned on her, and Walter chuckled.

“Oho! I recognize you now! Newsman, right?” When Newsie nodded, Walter smiled up at Gina. “That’s a really pretty dress! Are you a ghost?”

“Thank you. Well, sort of. I’m lost.” She clasped lace-draped hands together. “Ripped from my love before my time, as he mourns in the bleak December, in his violet study with the lamp-light gloating o’er…”

“’But whose velvet-violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o‘er, she shall press, ah, nevermore!’” Walter recited, and at Gina’s surprised expression, he confessed bashfully, “I had to memorize the whole thing in sixth grade. Oh! Oh! There’s Rizzo! ‘Scuse me!” He raced off again, the fake Gonzo-nose bouncing atop his head.

Gina shook her head. “He is cute.”

Newsie cleared his throat unhappily, and suddenly found himself caught up in a strong hug from his beloved. “No, not as cute as you, my adorably pointy-nosed journalist! Stop fussing!”

“Ahem,” he mumbled, blushing under the mask. Seeing a couple of black suits approaching, he whispered, “Did the rest of Bland’s law firm attend too?”

Gina checked where he was looking, and laughed. “Uh…no. Good afternoon, gentlemen!”

In turning to see who’d addressed them, Bunsen and Beaker bumped the edge of the apple-bobbing tub, and Honeydew teetered on the edge a full second before splashing down. As Beaker touched a concerned hand to his mouth, the other holding the tiny derby hat on his fiery hair, the scientist spluttered and tried to wring out his tie, then checked to make certain his small mustache hadn’t become ungummed from his upper lip. “Pfft…well…now this is another fine mess you’ve gotten us into!”

“Is that Dr Honeydew?” Newsie asked. Gina gave Bunsen a hand out of the tub. “Have you had the opportunity yet to decipher that ingredient list?”

Beaker nodded, raising a finger. “Oh, yes,” Bunsen said. “Most curious! Can you tell me what ailment that particular remedy was supposed to be treating? I’m wondering what studies the formula was based on, or if this is some irresponsible test of the ingredients…”

“Ailment? That was the ingredient list for a snack cake!” Newsie argued.

“Oh. Oh, dear. Well…”

“Is the formula dangerous?”

Beaker nodded worriedly. Honeydew frowned. “Well, no, not as such…but if consumed in large quantities, the active ingredients could very well have some adverse affects!”

“Such as?”

“Oh…it’s hard to say…”

“Doctor, if you have any idea what that stuff will do –“

“No, I mean it’s very hard to say: omniamonstruophobiitis!”

“What the heck is that?” Gina asked in chorus with her Newsman.

“Well, it’s…it’s similar to the symptoms you yourself suffer from, Newsman, but much more deeply ingrained: a severe monsterphobia!”

“Mee mo mobia!”

Newsie started. “The…the snack cakes could cause monsterphobia? Why on earth would they…” He frowned. “That makes no sense!”

Bunsen shook his head; Beaker shrugged. “As I said, the foodstuff would have to be ingested in vast quantities! Of course, given the high sugar content in the formula, anyone with a sweet tooth would be likely to overconsume such cakes…or anyone misled by the claim of omega-3 in it; there isn’t enough fish oil per serving to equal what you’d find in one itty, bitty, fin of a teensy, weensy sardine!” Beaker nodded agreement, holding his fingertips together to show just how teensy the sardine would have to be.

Newsie looked at Gina. “Why would a monster-friendly company make cakes that cause fear of monsters?”

“Well, there you have it!” Bunsen chirped. “Oh, there’s the band! Come on, Beakie, ready to do that number we rehearsed?”

“Meep!”

“Those two are singing with the band?” Gina wondered.

“It doesn’t make sense,” Newsie growled, still musing over the snack cake issue.

“Since when does anything they do make sense?” Gina sighed. She stroked the feathery top of his head. “Sweetie, Robin’s waving at me. I think the fortunetelling table is set up. Want to sit with me, or go play a game?”

“I…I should probably go over my case some more with Blander,” Newsie said, but Gina crouched to look him in the eye. Though blurry, he could tell she was frowning.

“Newsie, don’t you dare. This is a party, and you are supposed to be taking the day off, remember?” She kissed the black beak covering his nose. “Why don’t you try the apple bobbing? I bet you’re good at that. Win some candy.” Every contest had little bags of various sweets as prizes for those who succeeded at them, from the bowling to the pumpkin relay to pin-the-tail-on-the-monster. Clusters of Muppets were gathered at every station ranged around the lawn, laughing and cheering one another on. “Come on…just cut loose for a while, okay? You’re welcome to sit in with me if you’d rather.”

Newsie thought about it; although he was curious about the cards, sitting still right now didn’t appeal to him, restless as he felt. “Uh…all right, I’ll try the apple bobbing. I’ll win you something,” he offered, and Gina kissed him.

“That’s the spirit! See that table over by the barn?” Squinting, he could just make out a blurry black blob near the big blurry red blob. “That’s where I’ll be until the group events later. Come find me whenever you want…” She grinned. “And I’ll send someone to find you every half-hour if I don’t see you!”

“Not necessary,” he mumbled, embarrassed. Blurry or not, he could certainly handle himself for a while! After all, this was a quaint family farm, far from the scary tunnels of the city, and he was surrounded by friends… Sighing, he realized both she and Kermit were right. He ought to take advantage of the company and the surroundings and just try to relax. “Okay. Go do your readings. I’ll see you soon.”

“I love you,” she murmured, kissing him once more before gliding across the lawn. Squaring his shoulders and setting his jaw determinedly, the Newsman headed for the apple tub. Five minutes later, Scooter steered him back in the right direction.

----------------------
“All ready?” Dr Teeth asked; everyone nodded.

“Braaaaiiins?” Animal asked.

The good Doctor chuckled. “Well all riiight!” His hands swooped wildly down the keyboard, and the Mayhem kicked into a neglected New Wave classic. As Muppets continued to gather at the front of the makeshift stage (the flat bed of the haywagon), Bunsen flourished a smoking flask, standing in front of the wagon on a haybale platform.

In his reedy voice, Honeydew sang, and began to dance:
“Doctor Heckle works late at the laboratory,
where things are not as they seem!
Doctor Heckle wishes nothing more desperately,
than to fulfill all his dreams!
Letting loose with a scream in the dead of night
as he’s breaking new ground –
Trying his best to unlock all the secrets but
he’s not sure what he’s found!
Dr Heckle is his own little guineapig
‘cause they all think he’s mad;
sets his sights on the search of a lifetime and
he’s never never sad!”

The band joined in one line: “Oh whoaa-ohh!”

“It’s off to work he goes,
in the name of Science
and all its wonders!” Bunsen sang, and downed the contents of the flask. A smoke bomb went off, and waving it clear, Beaker stepped out where Bunsen had just stood, resplendent in a Travolta-style disco suit.

Everyone chorused: “This is the story
of Dr Heckle and Mr Jive!
They are a person
who feels good to be alive!
This is the story
of Dr Heckle and Mr Jive!
Believes the underdog
will eventually survive!”

Beaker danced maniacally, meeping along. As the music took over once more, Teeth’s keyboard prominent, Beaker ducked under the wagon and Bunsen took the platform once again as Dr Heckle. People laughed, clapped, and those old enough to remember when the song was a hit sang along to parts of the second verse and the repeated chorus. Bunsen and Beaker shoved one another offstage repeatedly to hog the glory of being frontman, much to the amusement of the audience. When the band wound the tune down at last, a couple of other heckles could be heard over the applause:

“If they had to pick something from the ‘eighties, why couldn’t it be Thomas Dolby instead?”

“Oh? Why’s that?”

“Then at least we’d be too blinded by science to see any of this!”

“Oh, ho ho ho ho!”

Waldorf poked his comrade-in-costume with a straw-stuffed glove. “Come on. Let’s go scare some crows.”

“You might want to take off the costume then,” Statler jibed. “You’ll scare more of ‘em that way!”

--------------------
Gina smiled at the smug hog seated on a large pumpkin before the card table. She smoothed out the festive, sparkly black cloth and laid three cards precisely upon it. “Well…here’s what I see,” she offered, looking over the reversed Knight of Bats, the Seven of Ghosts, and another reverse for the Three of Pumpkins. “This says a lot about your approach to life…I see a lot of daydreaming, a lot of artistic laziness, and a lot of self-love. You could be doing creative work, but your own brashness in forging after silly, self-involved goals is preventing you from reaching anything deeper in life.”

“Boy,” Link said, nodding at Clifford. “She’s really good at this!”

The purple Muppet shook his head as the satisfied hog sauntered off. “You always get that positive a reaction from complete foamheads?” Clifford asked.

“Ask me again after I do yours,” Gina quipped, grinning, and Cliff chuckled.

“Now, baby, don’t do me like that! Come on. Ask your pretty cards if there’s a lady somewhere just waiting for me to sweep her off her feet!”

“Love for the soul brother,” Gina mused, handing him the deck. “Let’s have a look. Focus on that question, and shuffle these until you feel ready. Then we’ll lay down three cards and see what fate has in store for you.”

“No such thing as fate,” Clifford objected, but did as he was instructed, and watched intently as Gina turned over the top three and studied them. “I see some happy-lookin’ spooks there…but what is that vampire all about? Uh, I’m not into that whole duskfall thing or whatever it is…”

Gina giggled. “No…this is very good.” She indicated the first card, the Lovers, in this deck depicted by a young woman reading a staid love letter in bed surprised by a vampire as dapper as the Count leaping through her open window; symbols of temptation swirled in the background. “You need to decide whether you’re looking for something fast and exciting, or something that might last longer than a fling. You’re being pulled in two different directions, trying to balance loneliness with a hunger for something truly fulfilling.” Next she tapped the Strength card, with a gentle lion-tamer comforting an uneasy big cat. “This card is all about inner strengths; about having courage enough in yourself to overcome your fears. You need to give yourself more credit as a desirable guy, Clifford, and get past your doubts.” Last were the spooks Cliff had noted, the Two of Ghosts, a happy couple holding hands. “If you can get past the thoughts of Miss Right-Now, and just be comfortable being you, you’ll find the real Miss Right…and she’ll feel the same for you.”

“For real? Those really say that?” When Gina nodded, smiling, Clifford chuckled uncertainly. “Don’t tell me you stacked the deck.”

“The deck says what the deck says,” Gina argued, still smiling. “It’s only bringing out what you yourself put into it. You know what you need to do, deep down. This is only a reflection of that knowledge.”

“Thanks…” Clifford said. He sat there a moment longer, staring at the cards, then thanked her again and walked off, lost in thought until Rowlf hailed him and steered him toward the cider cauldron. Gina swept the cards into the deck once more, pleased. The prohibitive necklace she always wore, which regrettably prevented her from any foreknowledge about her Newsie’s mishaps, at least didn’t interfere with other people handling the cards, and she’d been a reader for so long that interpreting for others was easy. She held her blowing veil away from her eyes, looking around for her Muppet.

Aha. Oh, for crying out… With a sigh, she gathered up her cards into their pouch, tying it to her dress sash before breaking up the lecture that boring lawyer was giving the Newsman, having cornered him next to the almost-empty food table. With the day’s light beginning to fade, the jack-o’lanterns in every window and on every table had been lit, and twinkling orange lights switched on in cheerful swags between the trees and along the porch eaves. Gina interrupted Bland as the bluebird of boringness droned on: “Never been to many parties, naturally; too much work to do! Now, if you’d like, may I return the favor of this invitation by asking you and your lady-friend to our little shindig next weekend…there’ll be a chicken cordon bleu, of course, and an awards ceremony…”

“Sounds nice, but I think we have plans,” Gina said, and Newsie shot her a grateful look. “Hey, I think they’re about to start the gory story! Come on, let’s go grab a seat.” Taking Newsie by the hand, she tugged him inside to the living room, where chairs, sofas, and pillows on the floor were rapidly being covered with Muppets, everyone chattering and feeling the excitement that sundown near Halloween is wont to bring. Pumpkin-spice scented candles flickered around the interior, filling the room strongly with their joyful odor.

“Everyone settled?” Emily Bear asked, beaming at the crowd all squeezed into the large but still overstuffed room. “Well then! Time for some spooky fun! Son, get the lights; Mr Deadly, would you begin handing the bowls around?” Fozzie dimmed the lamps, so that only dark shapes which giggled and whispered and nudged one another could be seen by anyone else.

“For tonight, madam, it is not Deadly, but He Who Must Not Be Blamed,” the spectral dragon intoned, settling his black cloak and taking his place next to a mysterious tray full of covered bowls. “Quiet, all of you, for I have a tale most horrible…”

“I thought the head was worse than the tail,” Waldorf muttered loudly, but others shushed him.

“Silence!” Deadly boomed, and everyone stilled. Satisfied, with a gleaming eye, the dragon handed the first bowl to Kermit. “Earlier this evening, a body was found buried beneath the root cellar! No one knows how it came to be there, but its condition was most terrible…the poor dead Muppet had been stabbed, strangled, and then…completely ripped to pieces!” With a gloating laugh, Deadly peered around the circle of nervous Muppets. “John Whatnot is dead, and this is his hair…”

“It’s not real, right, Uncle Kermit?” Robin whispered. His uncle shook his head, patting the little frog on the shoulder, and with relief Robin accepted the first bowl from Kermit and reached a tentative flipper in to feel the furry, coarse strips. He passed it to Piggy, who merely brushed her fingers over the stuff before passing it along.

“John Whatnot was murdered, and this is his foam,” Deadly said mournfully, starting the next bowl around the circle.

Newsie put his hand into the first bowl only reluctantly. Gina nudged him. “It’s okay, Newsie…it’s not real. This is an old party game.”

He nodded, but kept glancing over at Deadly, those glowing blue eyes eerie in the dark room. He’d always felt anxious around the dragon, but tonight was even less pleased to see the spook in attendance. Trying to shake it off as the effect of the atmosphere in here, he touched the furry stuff in the bowl briefly and passed it to Gina. He jumped when she grasped his left hand, then edged closer to her on the chair they shared.

“John Whatnot was buried in the cellar, and these are his eyes, which saw the horrible Thing that killed him…the last thing, in fact, he ever viewed!” Chuckling evilly, Deadly handed a bowl with a couple of peeled grapes to Kermit, who seemed a bit discomfited. Piggy didn’t bother dirtying her pristine gloves, handing it down the line.

“Icchh,” Newsie muttered when the ‘eyeballs’ reached him. “Who thought this up?”

Gina gave his hand a squeeze. Farther along the circle, Miss Mousey squeaked in disgust at the sponge-cake serving as the deceased’s ‘foam’. Giggles and groans and noises of amusement or revulsion were spreading through the room regularly now. “John Whatnot was ripped limb from limb – and this is his arm!” Deadly chortled, passing a slime-coated doggie bone over to the frog. “John Whatnot was still alive when the Thing tore out his insides – and these are his intestines!” Cold, oily spaghetti followed the ‘arm’.

“I don’t think I like this game,” Newsie whispered, quickly passing the bone to Gina when his fingers touched it.

“Newsie…it’s okay, I promise.” He felt her wrap an arm around his shoulders, and felt ashamed of his fear. It wasn’t even as much the silly game, he realized, as it was the clear enjoyment Uncle Deadly took in repulsing the players, each reiteration of the storyline sounding more and more grotesque…and those glowing eyes… He shuddered.

“We can drop out if you want,” Gina suggested, but he shook his head. It was just a foolish game, after all; no reason to be upset; no monsters here…well, though, what about Deadly? ‘He Who Must Not Be Blamed,’ what a ridiculous choice of character…blamed… Newsie frowned, something tugging at the back of his thoughts. Blame. But the dragon was to blame, for something, wasn’t he?

He felt another squeeze of his fingers, and squeezed back, trying to think, while the deep, intimidating voice kept adding to the feeling of menace: “John Whatnot was brutally slain, and here, dear friends, here is his brain!”

“Hey,” someone complained near the far edge of the circle. “I don’t get it – there’s nothing in this bowl?”

“Hm?” Deadly looked over, scowling. “Of course there is!”

“No, this is supposed to be his guts, and I got nothin’,” the stagepig grunted, holding up an empty bowl.

“What?” Vastly annoyed, Deadly strode over to examine it…and then heard chewing, slurping sounds. “Oh, for crying out…turn on the lights!”

Everyone looked at Rizzo as the lamps brightened. He froze, then slucked the last inch of spaghetti between his lips. “What?” Seeing everyone’s reactions, he glared around. “What? It’s only noodles – and I was hungry!”

The game broke up in hoots and groans. Disgusted, Deadly stalked off to see if the spiders in the cellar would rather trade stories instead. Relieved to be able to see at least somewhat better in the warm lights, Newsie exchanged a kiss with a smiling Gina. “All right, why don’t we have dinner, then?” Emily Bear offered, and cheers went up. “Boys, help me bring it all out!” Numerous volunteers scrambled into the kitchen, and shortly a multitude of platters and bowls and dishes of roasted ears of corn, mashed potatoes with three kinds of gravy, bowls of barley soup and pumpkin bisque and all sorts of cooked veggies covered the dining room table, and every Muppet got in line with a plate or bowl to sample the feast.

Standing with his beloved, Newsie noticed a small bowl of suspect substance among the chicken-and-pig-sensitive buffet. “Er…don’t eat any of that,” he warned Gina.

“Are those…”

“Maple-coated bees!” Kermit exclaimed.

“Gotcha,” Gina murmured.

Newsie touched her arm gently. “Um…thanks for…holding my hand back there.”

She smiled. “I won’t let you get lost, sweetie. Want me to help fill your plate?”

“Thank you,” he agreed, but then corrected, “Uh…I meant…during the spooky story just now.”

Gina paused, then frowned lightly. “Newsie…I had my arm around you, but I wasn’t holding your hand.”

“What?” Startled, he looked back into the living room, but couldn’t make out any details. “Then…then who…”

“It was probably Fozzie; he was sitting just below you,” Gina assured him. “Don’t say anything; he’d probably be mortified!”

“Oh,” Newsie said, his unfocused gaze finding a brown blur among the jostling, happy crowd around the table. “No, of course.” He didn’t see the blue dragon anywhere, which was just as well…something unhappy kept nudging the edge of his consciousness, something he couldn’t quite coalesce into a real thought. Uneasy, he stayed very close to Gina as they joined in the dinner.

The short, scrawny creature with long fangs slunk onto the porch unnoticed by the crowd and met up with its comrades, a fat hulk of a goblin and a black-furred wolf-thing. Together they peered in the windows at the oblivious people. “Everyone, eat up but don’t overstuff yourselves!” Mrs Bear ordered, pointing with her spoon at the field past the barn, where small globes of light marked the entry to the corn maze. “After dinner, we’ll light the bonfire, and then whoever feels brave enough to try and win the Great Pumpkin can enter…the maze!”

Camilla turned her gaze toward the enormous pile of logs Beau had assembled, wishing someone dear was here to cuddle her by the generous flames and share a cup of mulled wine. With a sigh, she pecked at her dish of barley and apple bits, checking the clock on the living room wall. It was almost time for his show. Finishing quickly, she clucked at the other chickens, who wished Gonzo luck for her, and then she headed out for the coop. Fortunately Mrs Bear’s cable provider carried MMN. Camilla settled onto a shelf with fresh straw and wrapped a tiny quilt over her costume, steeling herself for whatever awfulness her absent love might attempt tonight.

The monsters on the porch conferred quietly a moment. “Remember,” the scrawny one hissed, “He looks like a bird! Try to get him alone before you grab him!” The monsters hurried out to the cornfield and burrowed in among the stalks, a shadow and a rustle the only trail they left behind.

---------------------
At Blucher Memorial, Bobo the bear snuffled and shifted around uncomfortably on his camp stool at the door to Newsie’s aunt’s room. He’d really wanted to go to the party, but when Sam had exhorted the pleasures of a good political rally Bobo had decided it didn’t sound like the right kind of party. Sam had promised to bring him back some informative campaign literature, but Bobo didn’t mind filling in tonight for free.

“Poor old girl,” the bear muttered, peeking into the room a moment at the still, tiny figure in the cold-looking, white-sheeted bed. These kinds of things were so sad. Trying not to get emotionally involved, he shut the door again, sighing. “Poor Newsguy.” He wasn’t really sure what he was supposed to be guarding against; maybe the old lady had been a mob wife or something. “You can never really leave the Family,” Bobo mused aloud, then perked. “Hey…wonder if that means Newsie’s a Goodfella? Huh. I wonder if he knows anyone in the waste disposal business? I could really use a steady, nine-to-five kinda job…with bonuses, yeah, those are good…and health insurance… Does the mob have insurance? Well, I know I mean they offer it, but I don’t know if it’s as good as Moo Cross…”

Two tentacled, soft-bodied creatures materialized on either side of the bed. For once, they said not a word, and the only sound inside the room was the hiss and puff of the felt lung machine.

The night darkened. The monsters waited.
--------------------

 

[newsmanfan]

-----------------
And for those of you born too late:

Note: extra special brownie points for anyone who knows which movie is being referred to during the in-car conversation between Scooter, Sara, Kermit & Piggy...and if you can not only name the movie, but ALSO know what critic publicized the "Spam in a cabin" quote AND what writer originally said it -- I will mail you a scary Halloween chocolate!
---------------------

 

[The Count]

Okay, this is what I jotted down during reading, which is why it took so long.

1 Goblin City for the basement candy grabbing game, cute reference.
2 Is Gina meant to be Lygia or Lenore.
3 Kermit and Piggy as Anthony and Cleopatra, nods approval.
But where's Cleopigtra's asp crown?
4 a. Cheers at seeing Sara included.
b. at Scooter's comment, remembering a different yet similar one once.
c. Wait, Sara's Hermoine and Scooter's Ron? Then shouldn't he have left his red hair alone?
Thought that and freckles were the distinguishing marks of the Weezly clan.
d. Wingardiam leviosa? To make suitcases fly into the trunk? Me thinks the spell you'd want is "Locomotor" followed by the name of the object intended to be moved on its own under the caster's will by having Scooter point his wand at the luggage, as seen when Professor Trelawney was sacked by Professor Umbridge in Order of the Phoenix. *Is such a Potter nerd.
5 Reads on past Piggy's peak at the filming location not being pinned down.
6 Oh, it's Lenore after all. It is Lenore?
Yes, it's Lenore and the eponomous Raven. For a moment I thought you'd been inspired by the Poe and Annabel Lee LDD set.
7 Cute having Robin as his uncle in his famous reporter role.
Perhaps referencing what happened when Kermit ate the "Eat Me" cupcake after interviewing a certain blonde girl?
8 Showing off Kermit's legs? Careful Hopper doesn't show up at the party.
9 Was Rowlf supposed to be Columbo? Cause for some reason I got an Eddie Valiant vibe from his lines.
10 Mmm, mummy onion-wrapped hotdogs and chocolate bats.
11 If it were the Great Hall, you'd have the kitchen directly beneath the tables so that food and clean plates can be transported easier. Think of it as a house/color-coded elevator. The Hogwarts house elves load up the meals onto the red Griffindor table in the kitchen and it then gets sent straight up to the red Griffindor Great Hall table directly above.
12 "No eyebrows". Nope, only nictatating membranes instead. *Read Prawny's trilogy for the reference.
13 Sam's costume... *Reads on to hear Rhonda say she got an explanation. Ha, it is what I first thought.
You know, they parodied that particular candidate as a Muppet character, even related to Kermit as depicted in an appearance on the Larry King Show.
14 * even more at the thought of Rhonda as Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta, makes me feel better about my choice as for what to add her as to the monster roster.
15 Is thoroughly repulsed by 's costume choice. It's not you, it's my own personal hatred of that which'll go unmentioned from here on out.
16 Conductor Beau? *Feels like there was a missed opportunity for a better costume fright there.
17 *Chuckles at the pork joke at Link's expense.
18 Whatever Poultry wants...
19 Whovian? You mean from Grinch's Whoville?
Oh, it's a reference to the myriads of Dr. Whos.
20 Dora as the Blue Fairy... Cute, woulda thought, er, no, I didn't know what other thing to think since you mentioned it first as something gothic lowcut but yeah, it makes sense now.
21 *Awards points for the rat plumber siblings.
22 *Awards more points for 's appearance.
23 Walter as Gonzo, to quote the dog... Classic.
24 Who are Wayne and Wanda supposed to be?
25 Rat overboard! Quick, get your best apple-bobber. *Hopes noone has to give mouth-to-mouse resucitation.
26 O-o! Dies in a good way from hearing Dr. Hekyll. *Got it in my rock&roll folder, will play it later.
27 *LOL at Uncle D as Lord V, or Tom Marvolo Riddle. *See note above about my fandom.
28 Miss Mousey? Points for the cameo.
29 Aw thanks a lot There's always someone who ruins it for the rest of us.
You're supposed to wait until they get to the brain of the big ninth grader, John Whatnot.
Then, surprised, you ask what they used for the brain.
And when they reply that they couldn't find anything, they just used a real brain, then you quip...
Oh, I just love brains. *Crunch.
Aaaaaaah! ! !
30 *Notices the extra guests outside on the porch.
31 Er... All I can think of is perhaps Gene Shallit, as that was parodied with a charicature Muppet reviewing Piggy's first movie role in Return to Beneath the Planet of the Pigs?

*Is definitely satisfied with the mondo update. *Departs with a sigh of good-natured reviewing/remembering over the highlights.

 

[newsmanfan]

---------------
You are SO a Potternerd! Scooter is Harry -- thought Ron would be too obvious, and besides, the glasses are perfect!

I'm not saying who Wayne and Wanda came as. Points for anyone who gets it. Hint: they had a tv variety show. One went on to a solo singing career and one turned hyperconservative and got into politics and then died.

Rowlf is Columbo, yes. I wanted to pay a small tribute to the celebs who died this past year in his and Piggy's costumes. I had more train jokes for Beau but space is limited... And sorry Camilla's choice made you gag. I'm not a fan either -- just thought it would be cute and current for the chickiebabe.

Hm, no takers for the Spam-in-a-cabin ref? No fair using IMDB. C'mon, there have to be one or two horror buffs around here who've seen old issues of 'Fangoria' or read the reviews of a certain drive-in movie critic! Trust me. Classic. Launched at least two film careers...

More soon! Still welcoming reviews or comments from other readers...I know you're out there, and soon I will set the Frackles upon you.
----------------------

 

[The Count]

Then don't throw the red herring of clueing who Scooter and Sara went as by using dialogue that took place between Hermoine and Ron. Harry is Jinny's senior by one class year.

Okay, now I know who Wayne and Wanda are. Did she show up with full black curly hairdo wig?

Sorry, never read the mag. And unless you're talking about Joe Bob Briggs, I'm still coming up blank.

*Wonders if will be able to get those extra overalls to infiltrate the Nafrisco broom closet on Sunday.
*Plunks a few more quarters into the can to get to the next installment.