Andrew's Big Race
Author: trinfaneb (trinfaneb at yahoo dot com)
Disclaimer: I don't own anything--Joss Whedon and many, many others own all.
Note: Contains random spoilers for all of "Buffy" and "Malcolm in the Middle" plus small parts of many other tv shows and movies. There's a "BtVS"-"MitM" crossover story lurking here somewhere, but mostly this was an excuse for me to have fun and name-check a bunch of my favorite tv shows and movies. See how many you can recognize-the notes at the end of the story will help you out with that.
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The Fictional Character Sports Park, Time Indeterminate
Andrew Wells and Malcolm Wilkerson passionately argued about something as they walked past the football field where the Ampipe Bulldogs had just fumbled the ball in their own end zone and gotten beat by the Central High Wildcats in the last seconds of the game. But most of the football fans were watching and betting on the 4077th vs Mean Machine game on the adjoining football field. The pair was still arguing as they passed the outdoor basketball court where the Carver High team was having a surprisingly tough time with Ben Meechum and the Beaufort High hoops squad with guest power forward Ripley #8. On the adjoining baseball diamond, the Bingo Long Traveling Allstars were making short work of the Durham Bulls. On the dilapidated dodgeball court, the Average Joes were getting whaled on by the Pack and a couple of bullies from McKinley High.
As they continued walking past the nearby moto-cross track, Virgil "The Cooler King" Hilts and Max barcode# 332960073452 were riding neck and neck towards the finish line as they avoided the crashed figures of the LA Clippers post-apocalyptic motorcycle youth gang who had all managed to wipe out to the great amusement of Mike Nelson, Joel Robinson, Tom Servo, old and new Crow T. Robot, Gypsy, Cambot and Joe Bob Briggs who were jeering from the infield. The "Uncle Bob" T-101 on its Harley and the T-1000 on its police bike had started the race, but dropped out on the second lap after crashing into each other and getting into a massive fight. On the adjoining quarter-mile dirt track, Max Rockatansky in the last of the V-8s was half a car length in front of the Bo and Luke Duke in the General Lee. Several laps behind, Ellen Ripley and Newt were sorely tempted to put a heat seeking missile up someone's tailpipe as they lumbered along in their Colonial Marines issue APC.
Andrew let up from his arguing just long enough to sneeze as they walked past the chlorinated pool where Christopher Guest and Martin Short were performing a synchronized swimming routine, Thornton Melon was doing a triple lindy off the high dive, and Captain Jonathan Archer and coach Terry Tingloff were unsuccessfully trying to entice some of the bikini clad Playboy Bunnies or Bond girls join them for some water polo. The girls didn't want to risk getting goosed by the transformed members of the Sunnydale High swim team, Mark Harris, the Mariner, Bud Brigman or Catfish De Vries. Andrew stopped in his tracks and started staring at Captain Archer and Malcolm had to drag him along the walking path beside the giant wave pool where Mike Hynson, Robert August, and Gerry Lopez were catching some mellow waves.
In the distance they heard the gut-wrenching sounds of the Charlestown Chiefs and the Hanson Brothers taking apart the grown up version of the Mighty Ducks with new addition Francis Wilkerson in the dome covered hockey arena as bicycle helmet clad Dewey Wilkerson was playing "Charge!" on the pipe organ. Even more sickening sounds were heard as the Houston Energy rollerball team and the Kansas City Bomber's roller derby team joined with King Billy's Knightriders were literally killing each other in the nearby roller rink. Hal Wilkerson was supposed to be skating with the Bombers, but had slipped and fell on a wet towel in the locker room and knocked himself unconscious. In spite of this, the Dallas Cowboy's cheerleaders, with new member Lois Wilkerson, were there to cheer on the Bombers-Knights. Sounds of heavy gunfire was coming from the distant walled off gun range as the original SWAT Team and James Bond took cover after Reese Wilkerson found the m60 machine gun John Rambo had left behind in his haste to battle Conan in the finals of the nearby Ultimate Fighting Tournament after having beat Walker Smith in the previous round. On the adjoining golf green the team of Jack O'Neill and Teal'c were facing off against the teams of Dave Lister and Bob Barker and Ty Webb and Judge Elihu Smails with caddy Carl Spackler.
Finally the pair got to the track and field stadium where Steve Prefontaine had just won a middle distance race against the 1924 English Olympic team and Larry "Rain" Murphy. In one side of the infield, Connor McLeod and Inigo Montoya were squaring off in the finals of the epee fencing competition while runner-ups D'Artagnan and Aragon looked on. On the other side Legolas was defeating Lewis Medlock, Subotai, and Robin Hood in the archery competition. On the track, the participants for the mile race rolled into their starting blocks. They were Dan "Lifeguard" Burroughs, Logan Cale, Norton Drake, Barbara Gordon, Professor Charles Xavier, Robert Ironside, Sebastian Haff, Dr. Strangelove, "Vincent Van Bro" and Stevie Kenarban.
"I officially give up," Malcolm said as he did a final safety check of his friend Stevie's wheelchair. "If Andrew can't learn from what happened to me when I tried to help you out with that wheelchair basketball tournament, Stevie, then there's no hope for him."
"Well...its....not....like.....we didn't......warn......him," Stevie said after he took off a plastic face mask and turned off the oxygen feed that he had been using to prepare for the race.
"Don't let them discourage you, Andrew," Anya said from her nearby seat in the front row of the stands. "Its important to do what you think is right."
"You should join me," Andrew said as he strapped himself into his tricked out, neon red, Union Jack decorated, wheelchair. "That scene we did together in the hospital entitles us to enter the race. "
"Sorry, my tennis elbow is acting up again from that last vampire I beheaded," Anya said weakly.
Malcolm and Stevie just shared a sad look as Stephen Hawking's motorized chair fired the starter's pistol and Andrew shot out of the start block with a hearty "tally ho!" as the other participants hung back for five seconds and then caught up with Andrew after Professor Xavier overturned the young man's wheelchair with the power of his mind. Each racer made sure they left a tread mark on Andrew for each lap they completed. Logan Cale won the race, but Professor Xavier called for a blood test and got Cale disqualified due to the trace presence of stem cells in the young man's system.
After Paramedics John Gage and Roy DeSoto scraped Andrew off the field and rolled him to the ambulance where EMT Frank Pierce was waiting to drive him to the Sacred Heart Hospital where Doctors John "J.D." Dorian, Elliot Axelrod, and John Carter were standing by, the Janitor cleaned up the greasy spot Andrew had left behind on the track. Then David, the Jam Pony crew, the Cutters, Jack Casey, and Pee Wee Herman rode on the track for the twenty mile bike race. Forrest Gump, Thomas "Babe" Babington Levy and the other marathoners would be running into the stadium shortly after the bike race was scheduled to finish.
"Why didn't you try to stop him. I thought he was your friend?" Malcolm asked Anya as they walked beside Stevie and made their way to the boxing arena where Rocky Balboa was fighting Jack Johnson later that night. They could hear James Brown warming up to sing "Living in America" and Jimi Hendrix jamming out "The Star-Spangled Banner." They would arrive just in time to see Fast Eddie Felson and Vincent finish facing off in the finals of the pool tournament. They made a detour around the pool so Anya wouldn't have to see the Playboy Bunnies.
"He's a nice enough guy, especially for a reformed evil genius, but he can't watch your back worth shit," Anya said as she stretched and rubbed her spine for the umpteenth time.
The End
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Notes
--Malcolm Wilkerson along with his brothers Dewey, Reese, and Francis, dad Hal, mom Lois, and friend Stevie Kenarban are from the "Malcolm in the Middle" tv show. Officially the family name has never been revealed, but Wilkerson was used in the pilot script and oldest brother Francis did have it written on his military school uniform in the pilot.
-The Ampipe Bulldogs were Tom Cruise's high school football team in "All the Right Moves" and the Central High Wildcats were coached by Goldie Hawn in "Wildcats."
-In the original movie version of "MASH," the 4077th played football against another army unit. The Mean Machine convict football team is from the Burt Reynolds "The Longest Yard" movie.
-"The White Shadow" tv show focused on the Carver High basketball team while Ben Meechum and the Beaufort High School hoops squad was in the "Great Santini" book and movie. Ripley #8 is the superhuman clone of Ellen Ripley in "Alien Resurrection" (which was written by Joss).
-"The Bingo Long Travelling Allstars" were featured in the movie of the same name while the Durham Bulls are from the Kevin Costner "Bull Durham" movie.
-The Average Joes are from the "Dodgeball" movie while Xander's Hyena Pack is from the BtVS episode "The Pack" and the dodgeball playing bullies from McKinley High are in the "Freaks and Geeks" tv show.
-Virgil "The Cooler King" Hilts was Steve McQueen's motorcycle riding character in "The Great Escape" and Max barcode# 332960073452 is from "Dark Angel." The Clippers are an inept motorcycle gang from the marvelously crappy movie "City Limits" which was riffed on by Joel and the bots in the fourth season of "Mystery Science Theater 3000." Joe Bob Briggs is a B-movie commentator extradordinaire and sometime actor. The "Uncle Bob" T-101 and the T-1000 were (im)mortal enemies in "Terminator 2: Judgement Day."
-- "Mad" Max Rockatansky is from the "Mad Max/Road Warrior" movies and the Duke brothers and General Lee are from the "Dukes of Hazzard" tv show. Ellen Ripley and Newt are from "Aliens."
--Christopher Guest and Martin Short did a hilarious "Saturday Night Live" short in the mid 80's about two guys trying to get synchronized swimming declared an Olympic sport. Rodney Dangerfield played ex-stunt diver Thornton Melon in "Back to School."
-Former water polo player Jonathan Archer is from Star Trek "Enterprise" and Terry Tingloff is the former water polo player turned women's track coach (huh?) from the movie "Personal Best." Everyone knows the Playboy Bunnies and the girls from the James Bond movies and the Sunnydale High swim team/fish creatures are from the BtVS episode "Go Fish." Mark Harris was the title character of the "The Man from Atlantis"tv show, the Mariner is from "Waterworld," and Bud Brigman and Catfish De Vries are from "The Abyss." Mike Hynson and Robert August were the two main surfers in the wonderful "Endless Summer" documentary while surfer Gerry Lopez was in "Endless Summer 2" as well as "Conan the Barbarian."
-The Charlestown Chiefs and their enforcers, the Hanson brothers, are from the Paul Newman "Slap Shot" movie and the Mighty Ducks are from the Disney movies with the same name. The Chief's organist started wearing a helmet after getting hit in the head by an errant slap shot and Dewey constructed his own pipe organ out of everyday household items while Francis played hockey in an episode of "MITM."
-The Houstan Energy team is from the James Caan movie "Rollerball" while the Kansas City Bomber's roller derby team is from the Raquel Welch movie of the same name. King Billy's Knightriders are from the George Romero-Ed Harris "Knightriders" movie about a group of motorcycle riding Knights of the Round table re-enactors. Hal Wilkerson has mad skillz as a roller skater, but is terminally clumsy and Lois Wilkerson was a cheerleader in college. The Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders have been immortalized in at least in one tv movie and in "Debbie Does Dallas."
-In the original "SWAT" tv series, the police officers compete on a gun range as does James Bond in one or two of his movies. Reese Wilkerson went hunting in a fifth season episode of "MITM" with disastrous results for all the wildlife. John Rambo is from the "Rambo" book and movies and Conan is from the "Conan" movies, stories, and comics while Walker Smith is from the "Babylon 5" episode "TKO."
--Jack O'Neill and Teal'c played golf in an episode of "SG-1" as did Dave Lister on "Red Dwarf." Bob Barker played himself as a golfer in the movie "Happy Gilmore" while Ty Webb, Judge Elihu Smails, and Carl Spackler were played by Chevy Chase, Ted Knight, and Bill Murray in the movie "Caddyshack"
-Track star Steve Prefontaine was played by Billy Crudip in "Without Limits" while the 1924 English Olympic track team was featured in the movie "Chariots of Fire." Larry "Rain" Murphy was a convict turned track star played by Peter Strauss in the 1979 "Jericho Mile" tv movie. --Connor McLeod is from the "Highlander" movies, Inigo Montoya is from "The Princess Bride," D'Artagnan was played by Michael York in "The Three Muskeeters" and Robin Hood is from many movies, most notably the one starring Errol Flynn. Aragon and Legolas are from "Lord of the Rings" while Lewis Medlock was played by Burt Reynolds in the movie "Deliverance." Subotai was Gerry Lopez' character in "Conan the Barbarian."
-The wheelchair racers are: Dan "Lifeguard" Burroughs from the tv series "Wiseguy", Logan Cale from "Dark Angel" (who has stem cells in his blood from transfusions from his bio-engineered, transgenic friend Max), Norton Drake from the "War of the Worlds" tv series, Barbara "Oracle"Gordon aka Batgirl from the Batman comics and "Birds of Prey" tv series , Professor Charles Xavier from the "X-Men" comics and movies, Robert Ironside from the "Ironside" tv series, Dr. Strangelove from the Stanley Kubrick movie of the same name, "Vincent Van Bro" the wheelchair bound painter/informant sometimes seen on "The Shield" tv series and Stevie Kenarban from "Malcolm in the Middle." Elvis Presley assumed the identity of Elvis impersonator Sebastian Haff and then injured his hip in the Bruce Campbell movie "Bubba-Ho-Tep" and would need to use a wheelchair to race.
-Anya and Andrew played wheelchair bumper cars in the BtVS episode, "End of Days."
-In one "MITM" episode, Stevie pressured Malcolm into getting into a wheelchair and participating in a basketball tournament. At one point Malcolm gets mad at Stevie and walks off the court, but the other now mad wheelchair-bound players decide to teach Malcolm a lesson before he can get away.
-Motorized chair user Stephen Hawking wrote "A Brief History of Time" and appeared as himself in the "Star Trek: The Next Generation" episode "Descent Part I."
-John Gage and Roy DeSoto were characters in the 1970's medical drama "Emergency" and Frank Pierce was the EMT played by Nic Cage in "Bringing Out the Dead." J.D. Dorian and the Janitor work at Sacred Heart hospital in the tv show "Scrubs" while Dr. Elliot Axelrod is from the tv show "St. Elsewhere" and Dr. John Carter is from "E.R."
-David is the bicycle racing brother of Kevin Costner in the movie "American Flyers," the Jam Pony crew is a bicycle messenger service from "Dark Angel," the Cutters are the townie cycling team in "Breaking Away," Jack Casey is a bicycle messenger in the Kevin Bacon movie "Quicksilver," and Pee Herman was devoted to his bike in "Pee Wee's Big Adventure." Forrest Gump is from the movie of the same name and Thomas "Babe" Babington Levy is the title character from the movie "Marathon Man."
-Rocky Balboa is from the "Rocky" movies and boxer Jack Johnson was played by James Earl Jones in the movie "The Great White Hope." James Brown sang "Living in America" before Apollo Creed's bout in "Rocky IV" and I'm sure Jimi Hendrix played "The Star-Spangled Banner" in "Monterey Pop," "Woodstock," or some other concert film. Paul Newman played Fast Eddie Felson in "The Hustler" and "The Color of Money," which also featured Tom Cruise as Vincent.
-Only Joss really knows why Anya doesn't like bunnies.