Part Thirty-Six (I)
“Plaicezz, people! Whair ees mah caffeh!”
“So I says to him, ‘You sure got nice teeth –‘”
“T-try swallowing m-me tonight, you wretch! Hah! S-spiked armor!”
“Well, that’s cool, meeting a celebrity...but did you ever hear about the time a songwriter tried to mail me to Pittsburgh?”
Snookie wove through the crowd of monsters milling around onstage, all chatting loudly but apparently barely listening to one another. Ignoring them all, and giving the director’s flailing cane a wide berth, he arrived at the tech table and stood reasonably still to be miked and to have some makeup dabbed on his nose and under his eyes. He drew the line at the hairstylist, shoving the goblin with a greasy comb away and smoothing down his mop himself with one hand. The audience already half-filled the bleachers, and it was still fifteen minutes to air-time. He hated these live shows. Anything could go wrong... He glanced down into the performer’s corral, where behind the chain-link fence, Gonzo and his pink assistant, the muscular and angry-looking John Lamb, and the slithering horror with a thousand psuedopods all eagerly awaited their turn in the limelight. Snookie shook his head. With THESE guys, anything WILL go wrong.
He used the back-fin of a large, shimmery scaled thing working one of the boom mics to check his appearance and straighten his tie. The last one had finally become so grimy that even Pew noticed, and Snookie had been grudgingly presented with a very bland gray-and-brown tie even duller than his last one. He wondered briefly who they’d taken it from, then banished all speculation from his mind. Better not to know. Don’t get involved. Suddenly he thought of the tough-acting Whatnot girl, and wondered what atrocity she was being forced to suffer tonight. I...could ask around, he thought, then grimaced. There’s nothing you can do, no matter what it is! Don’t even ask! But immediately his brain cycled through the list of shows which he knew either taped or went live tonight in the underground studios. I really hope it’s not that ‘I Married a Monster’ drek. Forced dating for reality TV has to be the lowest point since that Grouch show ‘Treasures to Trash’... Pew yelled again, close by, and Snookie forced himself to focus on his surroundings.
“Host! Whair ees mah host!” Pew cried, grabbing one of the stagefrackles by his beaky nose. “Ah hah! Thair you arrr! Wait – why are you not dressed yet?”
“That’s your assistant stage manager,” Snookie told him. “I’m over here.” He didn’t pull away in time before Pew shoved the Frackle aside, causing the unfortunate creature to reel into a chair and go down in a heap; Pew’s clutching hands found Snookie’s nose instead.
“Ah hah! Thair you arrr!”
“I’m dressed, I’m miked, I’m ready,” Snookie protested, trying to pry the strong fingers from his soft, large nose. “C’mon, lay off! Save the grabby routine for your concubine!”
“Mah what?” Pew released him, startled, and Snookie quickly backed out of reach. The director chuckled. “Aw haw haw! Ah theenk mah mic-zhockay ees having a bit of zee zhealousy, no?”
“In a pig’s eye,” Snookie scoffed. Pew’s expression briefly turned dreamy.
“Ah yes! Zee lovelay duet-colaired peeg, she is vairy sexy, no?” Pew sighed. “Ah theenk ah will give her a bottle of branday after ze show tonight!”
“Duet-colored...” Horrified at the realization of whom Pew meant, Snookie argued, “She’s not a pig! She’s just a girl!”
Pew waggled a finger at a nearby stage lamp, leering. “Ha hah! She tried to tell me ze same zing, but ah know what I saw! You cannot pull ze fur ovair mah eyes!” He peered through the thick curtain of matted fur covering the top half of his face. “But first, we haff a show to put on! Caffeh! Whair in ze name of ze grate Beel Zhatner is mah caffeh!” Muttering, he wandered off, bumping into a support pole and cursing it out roundly for a full minute. Shaken, Snookie stared after him.
He wants to date Constanza? –NO! No, I can’t let that... In despair, he realized there was nothing he could do about it, short of either trying to shove Pew down a stairwell or somehow sneaking the young Whatnot girl into a different cell block...now there was a possibility. What if he bribed one of the monsters to switch the girl with one of the actual pigs? Then again, he wasn’t sure there were any pigs left... Brooding, Snookie paced the small backstage area behind the garishly-lit arches forming the set for tonight.
In the pit, Gonzo counted under his breath as he lined up several dozen fiendishly sharp rakes, shovels, hoes, and assorted other pointy garden tools. “Thirty-eight...forty! Excellent!” He turned to Rosie, who was performing a similar tally on egg cartons. “You didn’t break any of ‘em already, did you? Okay, good, good.” Gonzo fretted as McGurk completed his count of the eggs. Although he’d been sure to tell the monsters to bring him only common, unfertilized eggs, he still wanted to catch them all tonight; the whole point of the act, after all, was to demonstrate to Camilla how responsible he could be. “Assuming she’s even watching,” Gonzo sighed.
Rosie patted his shoulder. “Ahshabba shoo wabba,” he promised.
Gonzo shook his head lightly. “Yeah...I hope so, pal; I hope so.” Winning the competition would still be great, of course, but it had ceased to be his priority. Hoping that his chickie-love was paying attention tonight was foremost on the daredevil’s mind. He forced his thoughts to focus. “Um, okay. Did you sharpen the rakes?”
“Shappa!” Rosie said, showing off the host of bandages on his fingers.
“Good, good...did you polish the shovels so they’ll sparkle?”
“Passha!” McGurk showed the black stains the polish had left on his furry palms.
“Great, excellent...um...is there anything I’m forgetting?”
McGurk grinned, and held out a long purple cape to him. Shaking his head, Gonzo fastened it around his neck. “Sheesh. Thanks. I gotta get more focused if I wanna do this without a hitch.”
“Hissha?” Rosie asked, scratching his head. He’d brought plenty of tools, but Gonzo hadn’t previously said he also wanted gate hardware...
“Oh, it’s a figure of speech. Uh...if I want to do this without making a scrambled mess all over the stage, with Whatever sausages on the side,” Gonzo explained, and McGurk nodded.
“Cagabba feena wugga boo,” Rosie said, pointing out the phone bank: since the first call-in-vote show, the public response had grown so immense that now two two-headed monsters and one triple-header were seating themselves at a long table, tally sheets before them, ready for the night. “Essa weeba!”
Gonzo shrugged. “Eh...yeah, that’d be cool to win, but y’know, Rosie, right now I can’t get my chickie out of my head! I just hope she calls in after she sees what I’m gonna do.”
Rosie nodded, three eyes blinking in sympathy. “Deddibabba, boo.”
Gonzo stood up taller. “Darn right I’m dedicated...and tonight she’s gonna see it! I just...” he sighed. “I just hope I haven’t woken up too late.”
Rosie nodded again, thinking it was a shame Gonzo wasn’t going to wake up to the fact that it really didn’t matter if he won or not...his chickie was likely never going to see him again. Swallowing back a sour taste at that idea, the monster threw himself into the preparations once more. Under the rumble and clamor of the growing crowd as showtime neared, a whispering growl caught his attention: the stage manager goblin (the third such one since the show first aired, reflecting the mysteriously high replacement-crew numbers) informed Rosie that Gonzo would be up first tonight. As the goblin hurried off, muttering gibberish into its headset, Rosie gave the oblivious Gonzo a sad look. The daredevil’s fate might well be decided in just a few minutes, and Rosie would just have to let it happen...if he didn’t want to wind up impaled on a rake himself. Wasn’t there anything he could do for the short, blue ragged creature? Some little nudge toward fame, some subtle maneuver which would better both of their fortunes?
Nothing came to mind. Then again, the bustle of the small below-platform area at five minutes to air wasn’t the best location for deep planning. With a shake of his feathery mane, Rosie tromped over to inform Gonzo he would be starting off the show. “Wonderful!” Gonzo crowed, eyes alight. “Hey, you layabouts! Help me set all these pointy things up! Rosie, those other losers will be eating their leotards when they realize they’ll have to follow my act! Ha ha ha ha ha!”
McGurk started to point out that only Gonzo had shown up in a felt-tight sparkly red leotard, then shut his mouth and began lugging bladed shovels onstage.
------------------
The nearly-dark corridors in the lowest level of the warren, dug by mighty claws from the very bedrock of Manhattan, were almost empty; every monster who wasn’t working on something had crowded into the studio where Break a Leg! was filming. In the stillness, a faint breeze stirred, and two floppy-bodied creatures with trailing tentacles like furry jellyfish slowly materialized, humming.
“Wobba-wobba-wobba-wobba. Urk. Eep.”
“Mmmmm numma numma numma numma. Awwawww. Mn.” The pink thing swung its googly eyes from side to side, antennae alertly twitching down one tunnel direction; his blue partner did the same in the opposite. When both swung around, they startled and gulped their lower jaws over their heads a second before realizing they were seeing the other one. Pink thwapped Blue with a couple of tentacles. “Aww! No scare!”
“You no scare!” Blue snapped in response. Quieting, they peered around once more, seeing no movement at all; even the glow-worms seemed to have taken the night off. “Mn. Dark. Dark. Yip yip yip.”
“Dark, aaawww,” agreed Pink. He mulled the issue over a moment, then suddenly grabbed Blue’s bobbing antennae-tips and rubbed them together fiercely, ignoring his companion’s protests.
“What? what do?” Blue demanded. In reply, Pink shoved the charged little tips into Blue’s own tentacles. A spark arced through them, briefly making the ropy limbs all stick straight out, and the flash of light showed them their immediate surroundings: a rocky corridor close to the control hub. Some thoughtful denizen of the deep had made a crude sign on a tattered piece of sheet metal: an octopoid-like skull and crossbones spraypainted in bright orange, with an arrow pointing toward the room where the underlord spent all his time.
“Ow ow ow,” grumbled Blue. Pink began shuffle-jumping along the corridor. Unwilling to be left behind in the darkness, Blue hurried after him. When they reached a cross-tunnel, Pink stopped, but before he could reach for Blue, Blue poked his still-charged antennae into Pink’s tentacles, lighting them up and making the startled monster squeak. “Mm. Aww. There. Yip yip yip. There.”
Disgruntled, Pink jerked ahead of his comrade. More or less together they cruised through a widening cavern, full of piles of crumbled stalactites, shuffling and hopping down the sloping floor to a large movie screen at the back wall. Just as they were proceeding toward the tunnel behind the screen, scraping, shuffling noises sounded up ahead. Pink drew back behind a stalagmite, grabbing his friend when the oblivious Blue tried to continue. “Shh!” he hissed.
The sound, like something enormous dragging itself along a rough rock floor, drew closer and closer. The raggedy monsters exchanged a worried look. Coming down here with righteous intentions was one thing...actually confronting the boss another. “What do, awww?” Blue muttered. “What what what?”
Pink worked his jaw nervously. It was too dark in here to see anything more than a few inches ahead, in the residual glow from his shocked tentacles... He jerked up straight. “Rub!” he urged, grabbing Blue’s antennae-tips and rubbing them together, then releasing them to charge his own frantically. Grasping the idea, Blue fiercely rubbed his own antennae until they faintly glowed with potential energy. The dragging sound was now accompanied by a slow wheeze. “Ulp!” Pink swallowed dryly, rubbing the little nubs so hard smoke began to drift up from them. With a grunt, a massive figure came through the entrance to the secret tunnel, a whiskery thing swinging before it.
“Zap! Aww! Zap!” Pink yelled, and together the Martians swung their antennae right at the dark figure. An astounding amount of voltage coursed through them, making both jitter and yelp, but that was nothing to the shock which the monster emerging into the amphitheatre received.
“Waaaaagghhh!” it screamed. Stunned, Pink and Blue reeled aside. Blue looked up groggily and saw the dark, misshapen thing staggering and flailing large clawed paws. It was still alive! Blue grabbed his partner, shaking him out of the daze, and yanked him back through the cavern as fast as wildly skittering tentacles could travel.
“Go! Yip! Go! Yip yip yip yip uh-huh!”
Eustace dropped the sack of scrap metal he’d been dragging laboriously backwards; much of it was now glowing and fused together. It had been a heavy sack of wreckage to begin with, the remains of several monitors and one of the server racks which had fallen victim to one of the boss’ angry fits, but now it was so hot he couldn’t budge it. He flopped to the ground, shaking, wondering dazedly what the heck had just hit him. Stunned, he sat there, slowly prying his teeth apart; his molar fillings seemed to be humming after the shock. With a hiss and crackle, the burlap sack abruptly caught fire. He watched it, unable to move, as within seconds the flammable sack crisped to nothing. The pile of metal rubble smoked for a while, creaking and cracking as it settled to an immovable heap, blocking the tunnel leading to the control hub.
Eustace stared at that in mounting despair. Now not only was he in trouble for the strike team’s reluctance to go after monster enemy number one, but access to the control tunnel was nearly impossible, and there must be some kind of short in the cable from the projection screen which his sack of junk had scraped, and the pile was too heavy too lift himself...and too hot to even consider trying.
On top of all that, it took his tail and his muzzle whiskers ten minutes to relax from the straight-out-stiff position...which really, really hurt.
------------------
Camilla clucked fiercely at the efforts of Black Bart the rooster to budge her from her perch atop the comfiest sofa in the green room, close to the small, fuzzy-screened TV. She told him in no uncertain terms that he could offer her the lead female role in the spooky “March to the Scaffold” dance routine tonight, he could offer her candy corn, he could offer the frogging moon as far as she was concerned and she wasn’t about to leave her post! With a dissatisfied shrug, the rooster left, flouncing his scraggly tailfeathers. Camilla resettled her wings, clutching the remote in one claw and a cup of herbal tea in the other. She was really trying to stay calm...but the show host had just welcomed the audience, and reminded everyone that the judges had required garden tools be used somehow in tonight’s acts, and now, oh, now, he was announcing the contestants! She edged forward anxiously.
“First up tonight, for your puréed enjoyment, is that wild Whatever, that insouciantly insane, that ultimately uninsurable – the Great Gonzo!” the yellow-felted host shouted, flourishing a large umbrella at center stage, where dim green lights picked up the outlines of numerous sharp rakes, shovels, hoes, and edgers...all with their business ends turned toward the ceiling. As a whiff of fog spilled over the edge of the stage from somewhere in the midst of the tools, the host opened his umbrella and hurried out of the way.
“Tonight, poetry lovers, I give you – ‘Gonzo, Nestlings!’” Gonzo shrieked, his voice echoing in the dark studio as two harsh spotlights pinned him atop a thin high-wire. “A cuddlesome compendium of defenseless eggs, extra-sharp garden implements, and no net!...in verse.”
Camilla stared, frozen in horror, as soft piano music tinkled in the background, eggs flew into the air in five different spots over the wicked tools, and her darling daredevil ran along the bouncing wire to catch them.
--------------------
As he easily caught the first couple of eggs in his hands, the high-wire swaying only moderately beneath his bare feet, Gonzo took a deep breath, reminded himself to project since the sound crew had adamantly refused to sacrifice a wireless mic for him, and began his paraphrase of the poet laureate’s work. “It is possible,” he recited loudly...
“...to be struck by a meteor
or a single-shot cannonball
while sitting on a roost at home.
Safes drop from ceilings
and flatten the odd performance artist
mostly within the confines of the theatre,
so typically, we call it art;
likewise the flash of gunpowder,
the chickens toppling gracefully,
feathers on the stage.”
He waved a hand down at Rosie, who grimly packed eggs into a modified t-shirt cannon and shot them high. Gonzo danced wildly on the wire, jumping from foot to foot, frantically snatching the plummeting ovoid projectiles and tucking them all into rapidly bulging side pockets. Silence filled the studio; the judges watched in fascination, occasionally glancing at the spikes sparkling in the green lights below. Snookie kept his umbrella up in case of egg or performer hazard, peering worriedly up around its edge. Gonzo’s voice sounded somewhat strained as he continued:
“And we know the warning
can be delivered from within.
The spleen, no happy camper,
decides to spew out bile after a snack,
the smell driving all away like a banshee,
or a tiny fuzzy follicle ingrows
into the creases of the skull’s canyons,
the brain a prospector,
oblivious in the mines.
This is what I think about
when I gather twigs
into an attractive pile,
and when I pluck a feather from my own head,
then press into muck
the sweet down of a sexy chickie—“
Gonzo scrambled to and fro, falling once and grabbing the wire by his nose, catching eggs in between splayed toes, then finally hauling himself back aloft just in time to prevent another sort of scrambling with the next launch of eggs. He was panting now, and struggled to recall the rest of his masterpiece poem.
“The...the exciting hand of Death
always ready to grab me by the neck
and shake me like a dirty dustmop full of stage grime!”
Big finish! he thought, and hoped Rosie wouldn’t miss his cue. Now this should really get Camilla’s attention! He felt only an instant of relief when the fireworks went off as planned, Roman candles exploding right beside him in the air to illuminate dramatically his egg-saving swoops, as the wild gyrations of the wire threatened to dump him onto a waiting coal-shovel below. Gonzo yelled over the screaming explosions:
“Then the nest is full of marvels!
bits of twigs are like Chinese writing,
soft white underfeathers, a mattress waiting
for the consummation of our love!
Then her wattles are a redder red,
my nose a bluer blue,
and all I see is the beauty of her round bosom
over an ellipsoidal egg,
the angels clucking
with lifted beaks, and the roar
of the cannon
as art and life explode into love!”
Triumphantly, Gonzo balanced on one toe, arms uplifted, yelling the final line, and one last egg sailed up and over him. With a flourish, he leaped to catch it – and his cape snagged on the wire momentarily, throwing him even more off-balance with his leotard stuffed so full of rescued eggs he could barely breathe. The egg fell. Gonzo followed it, shrieking. The audience gasped. Snookie cringed under his umbrella, wishing he could just leave the stage without being spattered with Whatever goo. Rosie choked back a groan, staring up in horror. Beautiful Day leaned forward, eager to see some disaster around here; Behemoth’s belly rumbled in anticipation of the omelette surely only seconds away; Shakey Sanchez trembled so hard his armor rattled in Hem’s throat, irritating the bloated monster.
Gonzo tucked his arms and legs into a straight line, shooting down headfirst, desperate to catch the lone egg. He snapped at it, mouth open, an instant before he crashed into the rows of sharp pointy things. The impact shuddered the stage, the rakes and shovels wobbling; a few toppled. Rosie yelped, slapping a paw over two eyes, but the third remained fixed on the center of the pointy pile...where, incredibly, a blue furry hand now shakily raised. A spotlight swung down to fix in a harsh glare the crooked nose which lifted above the spikes. Gonzo removed the egg from his mouth with shaking fingers and held it up for all to see: unbroken! The crowd cheered, hooted, stomped on the floor wildly. Hem slapped the table in disgust. B.D. blinked, astonished. Snookie recovered his senses enough to offer commentary: “Wow! Uh...it looks like...it looks like he recovered every single egg, folks! What an amazingly sacrificial and utterly pointless act to accompany one of the strangest poems I’ve ever heard...well! It appears the Great Gonzo has survived yet another round!”
Gonzo grinned weakly at the cameras, then collapsed, sinking slowly among the spikes. “...Or not,” Snookie continued. “While the judges deliberate and the clean-up crew tries to get the stain out of the floor, we’ll take a break. Stick around for more of Break a Leg! I’m sure Gonzo will...one way or another.”
------------------
Mitzi Clucker found Camilla beak-down on the floor, wings akimbo. She squawked at the top of her lungs for someone to fetch the smelling salts.
------------------
Snookie paced anxiously just offstage. Whatever his newfound acquaintance was going through right now, she shouldn’t have to deal with the smarmy director’s attentions on top of it. How could he possibly prevent the date from Smuggler’s Cove? His gaze wandered into the audience; in the front row, he spotted Carl, who sported face paint in black and red. When he saw Snookie, Carl grinned widely and waved a large foam hand with a finger pointing up; “SHEEP YO’ MOUTH!” was printed in white across the palm, and the finger wasn’t the usual digit Snookie associated with the gesture for “number one.” Snookie cast a look back at the director. Pew was deeply engrossed in instructing the nearest camerafrackle: “You must put in ze duex shots of ze ‘azelnut flavour, not un!”
That guy is the most coffee-obsessed lunatic I’ve seen outside of a Moldyers Crystals ad, Snookie thought, scowling. Making up his mind immediately, he strode across the stage and knelt at its edge in front of Carl the Big Mean Fan. “Hi!” Carl growled cheerfully. “When do we get to the bloodshed, Snookums? I’m hungry!”
“Uh...Lamb’s up next,” Snookie said, stifling a shudder. “Carl, I – I need a favor.”
“Huh?” The gray-green monster jerked his massive head back, then wriggled a claw in one earhole. “You said flavor, right? Almost misheard ya there...”
“No, no, you heard right,” Snookie said, steeling himself for a deal he really didn’t relish...oh, bad word choice; an arrangement he couldn’t savor... Shaking his head sharply to clear the food language away, the host grimaced and blurted out: “I need you to swap out that girl with the two-color felt for something that won’t mind a date with Pew!”
“You who huh?” Carl stammered. He glanced around; the other fans were arguing over who was paying for the barking hot dogs making their way down the aisle. Carl leaned closer to Snookie, who gulped but didn’t flinch away. “You’re asking me?”
“Yes. I...I don’t know anyone else, really...I’ll make you a deal. You can...you can use the barbeque rub. Once. And no separating limbs!” He stared unhappily at Carl; the monster considered it. From the stage, Pew began yelling for places; the commercial break was ending. “Please!” Snookie added.
Carl’s eyes narrowed, but he gave a nod. “You’re talking about the not-a-pig girl? You want her moved?”
“Moved – not eaten!” Snookie snapped. “Deal?”
“Move the girl away from old batty grabby-hands, roast you in cayenne pepper and paprika?”
“Yes. Deal or not?” At Pew’s snarl, closer behind him, Snookie called, “One sec!” He stared earnestly at Carl, wondering if this was a stupid mistake; after all, what if Carl reported him to someone higher up the food chain? Finally, Carl stuck out a huge furry paw. Relieved, Snookie took it gingerly, and nearly bit his tongue when the monster shook him violently up and down. When Snookie pried his fingers out of the paw, Carl roared with laughter.
Angrily, Snookie staggered backwards, bumping into Pew. “You! Get back to your camera, you ingrateh, you wresh of an operator! You call yourself a technisshhian, hmf! Host! Whair is mah host!” Pew yelled, slinging Snookie by the arm towards one of the support posts just offstage; Snookie managed to stop himself from crashing. “Ag! We arrre live! Go! Go!” Pew howled, and in trying to leave the stage, tripped and fell into the audience. “You idiots! Get back in your cages!” he berated them.
Snookie righted himself, smoothing back his hair, smiling as the spotlight hit him. “Welcome back, debutantes of demolition and cravers of carnage! Gonzo the Great just wowed the crowd with an egg-ceptional—“ He stopped, frowning, and tossed away his cue cards. “I’m not reading that imbecilic drabble. Folks, despite being impaled on what looked like at least a dozen garden tools that could’ve been used as ninja swords by scarecrows, Gonzo seems to have lived to die again another day. Let’s find out what the judges thought of his attempt at verse.” He walked quickly to the judges’ table. “B.D? Your thoughts?”
B.D. scowled, flipping one tassel of his Peruvian hat up and down. “Well, I’m always in favor of tall sharp objects, naturally...but I really didn’t get the poem. He should’ve played a flute or somethin’ if he was going for artistic.”
“Hem?”
The shaggy brown thing cocked his head to one side, thinking. “Well...how should I put this...I love free verse, but I was really disappointed that he caught all the eggs! I could really use more protein.” His stomach rumbled, and he smacked his belly hard; Shakey popped out of his mouth. Tiny purple hands in chain mail grabbed the edge of Hem’s jaw and clung for dear life. “Hey!” Hem mumbled.
“Er...Shakey?”
Trembling fingers lifted the visor of the crested helmet. “W-well, Snookie, I r-really liked the poem! What a t-touching ode to t-true love!” Nervous eyes rolled around, hands clamped over Hem’s lower lip as the monster tried unsuccessfully to chew Shakey; the armor cladding the small creature clanked and creaked. “And I’m g-glad he didn’t t-turn into w-weirdo-on-a-stick.”
Behemoth growled and with one hand shoved Shakey back down his throat, draining the water pitcher on the table after him. “Don’t the spikes on that hurt?” Snookie wondered.
“Only when he c-crunches them inside-out,” a faint voice echoed from the black maw.
Shaking his head, Snookie addressed the table as a whole. “So, judges! Should Gonzo move on to the final round? Your votes?”
“Claws up!” Hem proclaimed. He smiled toothily. “Maybe he’ll finally become pat for his final act! I’ll give him a shot at it.”
“C-claws up,” the foggy voice from Hem’s open mouth drifted up.
Hem smacked his belly again. “Hey, move more to the right. My aorta’s got a itch...ooh. Oh, yeah, right there...”
B.D. snorted, crossing his arms. “Poems? Really? Borrrrrring. I vote claws down.”
Hem sniffed. “Like you would know art if it crawled up under your stupid girly hat and swatted your fat nose!”
“Hey!” B.D. growled. “This hat was claw-knitted by underprivileged mountain-tribe goat-demons! It’s for a good cause!” He grabbed Snookie by the tie, yanking him closer. “You – don’t you think this is a great hat?”
“Er,” Snookie choked out, “It’s...it’s a hat for a brave monster. A monster skulks down the sewers in a hat like that, everyone sees he’s not afraid of anything.”
“Darn tootin’,” B.D. muttered, releasing him.
“And speaking of fearless...here’s the master of wooly whomping, the sensei of skullcracking, the one and only...John Lamb!” Snookie shouted, hastening as far from the judges’ table as he could get without running into a disgruntled director, who was just now clambering back onto the stage platform from the side.
If Lamb was still hurting from his sprain last time, he showed no sign of it as he walked onstage. The show band played a soft, lilting tune with Japanese flutes and sitar, and Lamb, with a long-handled hoe, began pretending to garden the stage floor. A floppy hat covered his face, and a monk’s red shift hung to his knobby hooves. Suddenly the music shifted, a trill of danger sounding; two goblins crept onstage. They picked up a shovel and a rake and tiptoed toward the apparently unsuspecting gardener. Right as one of the goblins swung his weapon at the gardener’s head, Lamb ducked, rolled, and with a swipe of his hoe knocked the goblin’s feet from under him. The second one attacked, and Lamb gave the creature a savage kick and jammed his hat over the smaller thing’s head, blinding it temporarily. As it fumbled, the first goblin was back on its feet; Lamb thwacked it smartly across its midsection with the handle of his hoe, twirled it, and whirled himself to face the trio of toothy monsters who now leapt into the fight. A drum pounded out a frantic beat and the flutes and sitar shrieked in terror, but Lamb remained cool, stick-fighting the challengers one after another, dodging, spinning, blocking and striking.
B.D. was reaching for a squirming shi tzu on a bun when Lamb suddenly took the fight to a new level: as more monsters crowded the front of the stage, each armed with some kind of bladed garden tool, and there seemed nowhere left to go, a scrim behind the action suddenly rose, revealing a score of shovels jammed into a wide bed of dirt inset in the platform. Lamb’s muscular legs bunched and flexed, and he sprang straight up, landing with his feet atop two of the shovel poles. With cackles and screeches, the goblins and other assorted fiends followed, jumping, climbing, or slithering up the poles, and the battle continued as an aerial stunt. B.D. sat slack-jawed, staring up at the nimble ram leaping lightly from pole-tip to pole-tip and continuing to twirl and swing his hoe with deadly accuracy. Forgotten, the hot dog tried to escape by running along the table; five audience members lurched to their feet in anticipation, but Hem caught the dog and stuffed it down his throat. When B.D. looked over sharply at the muffled barking sounds, Hem appeared entranced with the stage act.
Lamb knocked his attackers away into the shadows of the studio in twos and threes until only one remained, a nasty-beaked birdlike thing with green fluffy fur and a pair of whiplike tails which it used to snap at Lamb, trying to throw him off-balance while it jabbed a pair of pruning shears at him. The drums pounded in time with Lamb’s jumps, the percussion of his hooves striking the pole-tops precisely matched by the beat, erratic and driving. Carl and many other monsters cheered loudly, enjoying the martial-arts homage. When the tail-whip bird tried to use both of its appendages to strike Lamb at once, he suddenly dropped his hoe, grabbed the tail-ends, and yanked the startled monster off its uncertain perch. He swung it over his head three times, gaining momentum, then released it; it sailed out into an appreciative audience, burying three fans under the bleachers when it crashed down. “LAMB!” roared the spectators: “Lamb! Lamb! Lamb!”
The band played a final, haunting note, and Lamb, panting, bowed to the audience and the cameras...and one of the shovels under his hooves wobbled and fell. The ram tried to leap to another pole, but wasn’t quite fast enough; he landed badly on his back, bearing a ragged, hunched figure to the floor. Every single pole toppled in a chain reaction, thumping on top of the unfortunate sheep. A gasp swept through the crowd.
“Arrrgh! Get ahff meh, you woolleh bush of a bushido!” a familiar voice yelled. “Why arr all these trees by ze caffeh table? You made me spill mah latte!” A crumpled tin cup rose above the wreck, borne by a spindly hand with dirty claws. “Go to ze commersiall...and somebodeh bring me un towelll!”
Snookie faced the camera as the stage crew hesitantly waded into the mess, avoiding the cane Pew swung above his head, to try and pry Lamb from the tangle of wood. “A brilliant martial-arts performance marred only by absolute failure to avoid a coffee-crazed mindless maurader! Will the sheep rise after his fall? Or should the judges send for mint sauce? We’ll be right back!”
-------------
Welcome to the Muppet Central Forum!
Sesame Street Season 55
Jim Henson Idea Man
Back to the Rock Season 2
Bear arrives on Disney+
Sam and Friends Book
We'll take cash.
Credit cards.
