This Space For Lease
By AberrantBlade (Baz4§hort)
This is an original story. It was written for a Pokémon fanfiction mailing list and never completed. It is only nominally a Pokémon fanfic. You will not find any crazed Pokémon running amok. I don't really like Pokémon anymore. Don't mail me with complaints about the lack of Pokémon and Pokémon references. Also, some of the gags may be a bit dated by now, it's been awhile since this has seen the light of day…
Disclaimer: I don't own the main & secondary characters in Pokémon. Game Freak, Creatures Inc. & Nintendo do. I do, however, own the original characters that are mine. I can't say that I own anyone else's OCs. The tumbleweed is the property, copyright, trademark, whatever of Darth David & Mooman, who let me use their tumbleweed with their permission. Just 'cause I can use it doesn't mean you can: Ask the owners of original characters if you can use their characters. In short, anything in this story that isn't someone else's is mine, OK? If you have any MP3s that you want to send me, SHUT UP AND SEND THEM ALREADY!!! ...sorry. I'll start the story now.
Cast
Tom (First Kid)
Dick (Second Kid)
Harry (Third Kid)
Reginald (The Butler)
Amos (Cannon Fodder 1)
Bernie (C/F 2)
Carl (C/F 3)
Drew (C/F 4)
Ed (C/F 5)
Fred (C/F 6)
Mr. Grumpy Old Man (Grampa)
Darth David & Mooman's Tumbleweed (BIG THANKS FOR THIS FAVOR!)
Dr. Dr. Prof. Spangle (Bad Man 1)
Prof. Killemall (Bad Man 2)
Dr. Guntohead (Bad Man 3)
The Stapler (Bad Man 4)
The Really Big Bureaucratic Pizza Co. Ltd. Corp. Representative (Bad Man 5)
Big Evil Scary Man (Bad Man 6)
Boggy B's Body (Bad Man 7)
Xab21 (Bad Man 8)
(9 naM daB) yoB sdrawkcaB
Various Artists
Batteries Not Included
Some Assembly Required
30-Day Warranty
[BeeAichEcks logo clip: The audience is stoned.]
[Baz4§hort Productions logo clip]
[dramatic music]
[fade into shot of a big mansion. Dark night, thunder, clouds, the usual murder mystery opening scene. Pan slowly to the right to a smaller mansion in sunlight with butterflies and bees flitting around, shortly followed by title screen on signpost from right side of screen: THIS SPACE FOR LEASE]
Day One
Seven Bed, Five Bath, Zero Sanity
[pan down slightly to show three kids walking up the scarily straight path to the frighteningly friendly-looking house. {EASTER EGG: A small sign almost below camera level reads: 'If you think there's sarcasm in this screenplay, you win thirty thousand pairs of scissors.'} Opening credits unroll: Executive Producer: Jim Smith, Director: Joe Doe, Ano Nimous as the Hopping Woman, etc. Cut to front door where first kid rings the doorbell. {EASTER EGG: The mailbox next to the door has a note tacked to it reading 'f u cn rd ths u cnt spl'} A tall butler with bloodstains on his suit and a medieval battleaxe behind his back opens the door.]
Harry (Third Kid): I KNEW IT! THE BUTLER DID IT!
Dick (Second Kid): Jumping the gun a little, maybe?
Reginald (Butler): Whatever do you mean? I was merely near the door, polishing Sir Andrew's suit of armor and weapons when you came knocking. Forgive the blood, I was helping in the slaughterhouse earlier. Do come in, and...watch out for the bat doo-doo.
Harry: What bat doo-doo? [squelching sound] [looks down] Oh...that...bat...doo-doo. {EASTER EGG: The bat doo-doo is made from top-quality Kitum Cave [see The Hot Zone] bat guano. Several workers died of the Marburg/Ebola filovirus while gathering the doo-doo. No bats were harmed during the making of this screenplay.}
Tom (First Kid): Ewwww. You stepped in it.
Harry: Naaah, you think? [tries in vain to get it off his shoe]
Dick: Ya know...you can eat guano.
Harry: Eewwwwww! You're disgusting!
Tom: I heard it tastes like fruit paste.
Harry: For all you know, it could taste like toothpaste!
Tom: Ewwwwww...Anyway, we're here about the room.
Reginald: The floors creak, the windows leak, the walls were painted wrong, but if you really want it, we'll take a dance and a song.
Dick: [dances around skillfully] 'Ohhhh, I wish I was in the land of cotton-'
[Harry hands Dick a classic cartoon black bomb with the fuse lit; Dick screams and runs off]
Harry: It's a figure of speech, dingus. Okay, stale-fish, how much...and no rhymes, please.
[Kaboom]
Reginald: It's 70 dollars a week, including meals. You'll have the Slapstick Suite, if that means anything to you.
Dick [back and carbonized from the explosion]: The Slapstick Suite? The one decorated with snapshots of the greatest comedy teams in history that has been published in so many magazines it's not even funny anymore?
Reginald: You know of it?
Dick: [long pause in which the tumbleweed, taking a brief respite from Darth David and Mooman's 'Grenades Are For Throwing, Not Eating', a fine and respectable Scottish Pokémon fanfic (snort, laugh), slowly rolls on by to the delight of audiences around the world] No, I took a guess.
[Another long pause in which Reginald silently considers the meaning of life and hums Prokofiev's "Romeo & Juliet" to himself. The tumbleweed would have rolled past again, but it and Baz4§hort were busy brawling it out on Jerry Springer (Topic: My Producer Doesn't Give Me Top Billing). And now for something completely the same: a butler and three kids asking about a room.]
Tom: Okay. We have enough for two months at that rate. You have a deal.
Reginald: There's one major event you might have a problem with...the Annual International Butler Convention is being held here six days from now.
[music not too unlike the shower music from 'Psycho' plays]
Harry: AHHH! ARMAGEDDON HAS COME UPON US!!!! HELP! GET THE SWAT TEAM! GET THE SHOTGUNS AND TASERS! SET THE PHASERS ON KILL! DARN THE TORPEDOES AND LOCK 'N LOAD![dashes off screaming nonsense to anyone and everyone within a three-mile radius.]
Reginald: Is your friend all right...up here?[taps the side of his head]
Dick: He's watched too many murder mysteries.
Tom: But we're in one right now.
Dick: No we're not. We're in this mansion with a crackpot and a stalefish and Lord knows who else. The floor is coated with guano and I can't breathe. Get me to this Slapstick Suite before I turn blue and become a vegetarian zombie.