WARNING: This story contains the last of the meaningless crack, the last of heaps of fattening foods being consumed, and the last of men running around shirtless. However, this story does include a new poor sap in mortal peril, as well as chocolate covered buff men with a side helping of strawberries. You have been warned. Luckily for you, this is the last installment. Survive this insanity and you can survive anything. Viewer discretion is advised for the last time. If this story makes you turn over in your grave… sucks to be you, but you can't contact anyone this time. Deal with it.
Take the Man! The Freakish Conclusion
A month had gone by without any activity by the freakish dynamic duo of Helen and Jade. Flack hadn't been stalked, kidnapped, or seen any unicorns since and was grateful that the higher powers up above had granted his wishes. No longer did he wake up in fear of seeing the two girls at the foot of his bed with some rope and a blackjack. No longer did he hear the annoying whinny of that Japanese unicorn Helen had forced Flack to let live with him.
He yawned and smiled when he got up one morning and still didn't see Helen and her unicorn—Rhubarb, he reminded himself—waiting for him and drooling over his well-defined abs.
Flack's phone rang and snapped him out of his merriment. He looked at the ID and saw it read 'Danny'.
"Messer, great news!" he greeted his friend.
"You sound cheery for 7 in the morning," Danny replied from the other line. "Your mother finally move out?"
"Very funny… she moved out yesterday, but that's beside the point," he said quickly. "The great news is that my stalker hasn't shown her face around here for over a month!"
"You mean that crazy who forced you to marry her and that wacko blonde who tackled me and called me Carmine?"
"Exactly the same, Danno!"
Danny smiled even though Flack couldn't see it. "Well, good. Perhaps Mac will finally resort back to his normal self."
Flack chuckled. "This ordeal really scarred him too, huh?"
"Yeah, pretty bad. Stell said he wouldn't come out of his office and when she finally dragged him out, he was shaking and mumbling something about blondes, too much food for a teenager to possibly consume, unicorns, and being held against his will."
"Guess he wasn't much better off than I was," Flack mused out loud. "So anyway," he cleared his throat. "What's the situation?"
"Oh, yeah. Well it's strange," Danny said, and Flack could hear the confusion in his voice. "Guy's not dead, but pretty shaken up."
Flack raised an eyebrow. "Robbery, kidnapping, what is it? We don't get called in for guys getting 'shaken up'."
"I dunno man," Danny replied. "I'm still on my way there. Mac was the one who called me."
Flack sighed. "Be there in ten…"
Flack pulled his cruiser up next to Mac's Avalanche exactly 10.089 minutes later and walked over to the boss man who was leaning against a wall looking rather haggard. He saw Danny talking to the "vic" behind him. Flack smirked.
"Even less sleep than usual?"
Mac glared at him. "Every time I close my eyes that girl comes flying at me and tackles me to the ground…"
"Hey, at least you weren't taken on a joy ride through Manhattan on a unicorn or forced to marry a sixteen year-old girl!"
Mac shuddered. "It was still horrible."
Flack simply smiled sympathetically at his friend before walking over to Danny and the short, plump man he was still speaking to.
"So, what happened?"
Immediately, the man launched into his tale. "I was walking to work when these… thugs pushed me into the alley. One held me at gunpoint while the other stuffed this letter into my pocket," he handed it to Flack. "Then they turned and left just like that. Well, they did shoot me. I expected it to hurt, but it just bounced off me. I looked down to see what in the world it was and saw it wasn't a bullet, but a dart. When I looked up… they were gone."
Danny, who had been analyzing the story carefully, finally spoke up.
"You were shot with a Nerf gun?" he asked, bewildered.
Plumpy shrugged. "I guess so."
"Where's the dart?"
Plumpy pointed behind him and Danny walked over to bag it. Meanwhile, Flack unfolded the note the man had received and read it. It was pure chicken scratch, decorated with stars, and took him a while to decipher, but by the time he was finished, he had broken out into a sweat.
The letter read:
Bwahahahaha I am back! Oh yes, you're not out of the woods yet. I don't give up that easily. You still belong to me, you know—just check the bottom of your foot for evidence. I will hunt you down again and you will end up mine!
Love,
Your favorite person in the world
P.S. Do you enjoy chocolate and strawberries?
Flack gulped. It was his stalker. That crazy Mexican was back…
"OH NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"
When he was finished screaming in terror—it lasted five minutes—he reread the note. She told him to check the bottom of his foot for evidence he was hers? What was that all about?
Well, he had always been too curious for his own good and even gullible at times, why stop now?
Sighing, he sat down on the curb and pulled off his shoe and sock. Not knowing what to expect, he hesitantly turned his foot over.
Property of Helen the Star was tattooed in the middle of a gigantic star…
"How did that get there?"
There were no leads in the case throughout the day, so Flack returned home early. Sitting down on the couch, he attempted to watch some educational television—meaning Whose Line is it Anyway?—but the letter from the morning haunted him. She said she'd be back for him. He wasn't safe here anymore…
"I think I'll go rent a hotel for the night…" he mumbled to himself before running to pack.
"Hey, what's the deal? He's leaving! He's not supposed to do that! That wasn't part of my genius plan?"
"Ummm… genius?"
"Shut it."
Two girls—guess who?—were perched up in a tree across the street from Flack's apartment. One had binoculars and was creeping on the poor detective and one was busy stealing acorns from a squirrel.
"So, what do we do now?" one asked after a squirrel attacked her and left with its acorns. "Knowing you, you probably have a plan B."
"Of course I do! How do you think I got here when the Rio Grande closed for the winter?"
"Beats me…"
"I stole a llama and rode it here!"
"Wow, you sure are dangerous…"
The girl spying sighed. "Why do I even bother to bring you along?"
The other smirked. "'Cause you absolutely adore me!"
"Sometimes I think I do too much…"
"That hurts…"
"Just eat your cookies and be happy."
A silence fell over the infamous duo—well aside from the constant crunching of Oreos—as they thought of their next move.
"Ooh! Here's a genius idea," Cookie Monster exclaimed. "Why don't we just follow him and see where he goes?"
"Why didn't I think of that?" the other muttered to herself. "Fine, let's go. He just left."
They climbed down the tree and waited in the shadows to wait for Flack to emerge across the street. He did and the two creepers smiled.
"There he is; let's go," Cookie Monster said.
"Right behind you… Oh, what's this?"
The other turned around. "What?"
The Stalker had her binoculars up to her eyes again as she said, "Hot guy, three o'clock." She lowered the binoculars and grinned. "Change of plans. Let's give poor Donny a break and go after this hunk instead."
"Fine with me," Cookie Monster shrugged. "I'm just tagging along to get inspiration for my stories… and because I don't want to be all alone."
After hopping and down giddily for a few seconds, The Stalker soon dashed off after her next victim.
"Hey, wait up!"
Josh Hartnett was simply strolling down the street minding his own business on this beautiful night in New York City. Having just come from a magnificent dinner at Burger King, he was now heading back to the luxurious hotel he was staying in. He had just made it to the parking lot of Comfort Inn when something hit him in the back of the head and he lost consciousness.
Stupid fan girls…
Flack was thoroughly surprised when he wasn't abducted overnight or didn't receive any more threatening letters the next morning. He shrugged it off. Perhaps his stalker was just suffering from short term memory lost and forgot all about her threat. That, or she finally decided to join Rhubarb and his friends in the Land of the Unicorns and Eternal Merriment.
Flack didn't care what the reason was, he was just glad he wasn't being targeted at the moment. He got dressed while humming a happy melody before heading down to the breakfast buffet at the Comfort Inn he was staying at. He grabbed a jelly doughnut and some Apple Jacks before finding a seat by the TV. He didn't pay it much attention until a story about a kidnapping came on the air. Being a cop, that made him look up.
"Authorities are reporting that at approximately midnight last night, Josh Hartnett—famous for his mind-boggling body—was abducted in the parking lot of the Comfort Inn on Broadway…"
Oh crap, that's where he was staying… It had to be connected.
"…Police investigating the case say that there was no evidence left behind aside from a folded note and a dart from what police suspect to be a Nerf gun. Investigators believe this may be related to a threat another civilian received the night before last. The man from the previous case wasn't kidnapped, but was shot with a Nerf gun and handed a note. More details will be released when they are known. In other news… A polar bear and an elephant at the zoo are starting to get more than just friendly…"
Wolfing down the rest of his breakfast, Flack quickly left the hotel and headed for the crime lab. He called Danny on the way.
"Danny, has anyone read the note left behind last night?"
"Um, no. Adam was just about to analyze it, though. Why?"
"Don't do anything to it yet. I need to read it," Flack told him. "I think the connection between the two cases is me."
With that he hung up and picked up his pace. He wanted to get there quickly. Why did he never carry money around for a cab?
Like an answer to his prayers he hadn't made, Flack heard a whinny behind him and cringed. He turned anyway and couldn't believe it when he saw a red unicorn charging at him down the street.
"Sooooooooyy!"
The unicorn nodded before picking Flack up and flinging him onto its back. It missed, however, and Flack went flying into a nearby dumpster. Sooooooooyy! quickly galloped over and waited for its master to pull itself up. It gave an apologetic snort before setting Flack on its back gently this time.
"Well, at least I'll get to the lab faster," Flack sighed. "Um… yah? How do I get you to," he kicked its side and it leapt off nearly throwing Flack off again, "GOOOOOOOOOOOO! Oh, crap! Slow down you stupid pony, you'll get me killed!"
Sooooooooyy! complied and slowed to a quick trot. Flack sighed and passed out on its back.
After a very unwelcoming wakeup call by his "loyal" unicorn, Flack had finally made it upstairs to the lab. He walked into Danny's and Stella's office where they were in the middle of a coffee chugging contest.
"Uh, guys?"
Scared, Danny spit his coffee out on Stella, who then cussed at him in Greek before tackling him to the floor. Flack sweat dropped, snatched the letter from Danny's desk, and left quickly, leaving the two to wrestle on the floor.
Unfolding the letter, Flack began to read:
Oooooh, now I kidnapped someone! I know you're a cop and I know how this works so here it goes: I'll release Josh Hartnett if you meet me at the following address at nine o'clock tonight. If not, I guess I can live without you. I mean, this guy is fine as well!
Love,
The Star
Great. Flack knew he had to show up. He didn't want this innocent man to suffer the same horrible fate he had. He knew he was going to show up tonight like he was supposed to and he knew he was going to end up her captive again.
"If this is what fate had planned for me than so be it," he said to himself. "I'm a man! I'm a sexy man! I can deal with this!"
Ripping off his clothes to reveal a Superman costume beneath, heroic music began to play in the background as Flack jumped out the window and landed on Sooooooooyy! below.
It was eight-fifty-five and there was still no sign of Flack. Jade walked into the holding room to let Helen know. What she saw made her crack up, yet also creeped her out.
Josh Hartnett was suspended in mid air, shirtless, above a giant vat of chocolate. He was screaming and trembling in fear and Helen was sitting reading a book on animals in captivity.
"Hey! Get me down from here! I'm allergic to chocolate! If I touch that horrid stuff I'll swell! Then what? I won't be so hot anymore, huh?" Josh was screaming, swinging back and forth in his binds.
Helen ignored him and just threw a strawberry at his head. It hit him in squarely in the eye and he let out a cry of pain.
"And I hate strawberries! They make me twitch!"
Jade walked in further. "Um… it's five 'til nine," she told Helen watching their captive out of the corner of her eye. "You think he'll show?"
Suddenly the wall opposite of them exploded and out of the hole emerged a red unicorn, Flack in his Superman suit, and a band of trumpeters playing a march in the background. Jade shot darts from her Nerf gun at the band members and they quickly scattered. They sucked anyway.
Flack hopped off Sooooooooyy! and approached Helen and Jade.
"Release that man now," he stated calmly.
"Um, I think we had a deal, didn't we?" Helen asked. "You for him?"
"You let him go first," Flack said.
"Fine," Helen grumbled. "Jade, release Josh, but make sure you stuff his mouth full of strawberries while you're at it. He's getting awfully annoying."
"Sure thing, Zest," Jade replied, walking off to do her master's bidding.
Josh walked over to Flack, all the while twitching madly, his mouth full of the sweet fruit. Helen smiled.
"Okay, now you," she pointed to Flack and then by her side, "here. Now."
Flack sighed. Well, there was no escaping it. He walked over to Helen and soon found handcuffs linking them together.
"You," Helen pointed at Josh, "get out of here. You're no longer needed."
Josh didn't need to be told twice and immediately fled, still shirtless and only in his boxers.
Once alone, Helen jumped Flack and hugged him hard. "Now you're mine again! I'm so devious!"
"Yeah, whatever," Flack huffed.
Helen frowned. "You better improve your attitude mister. We'll have to work on getting you to love me."
He scoffed. "Don't count on it," he said.
Suddenly, he felt a slight ache in his shoulder and all of sudden, he was head over heels for the girl in front of him.
"You know what?" he said. "I don't think this will be so bad. You are amazing and I was just blind this whole time. Let's go live happily ever after, shall we?"
Helen merely blinked. "Well, that was weird, but what the heck! Sure!"
Arm in arm, they skipped off into the sunset to live a merry life together. Meanwhile, Jade just grinned and stashed her Nerf gun on her. Her mission here was done. Discarding the rest of the darts labeled "make any guy fall for you", she soon left the warehouse and robbed a Kroger of all its cookies. She too, lived happily ever after.
THE END!
(Finally)
