Chapter 9: The capture

A little while later, the Slime Mutant was wondering around the caves, growling. Someone has discovered his hideout and its connection to Fruitmeirs and the National Bank, and it has got to find out who the meddlers were.

The monster didn't have to wait long to find out the answer, as Fred was hiding behind a nearby pier, waiting for the right moment to attract the monsters attention.

Glancing at his watch, he figured that he got to act fast if he want to wrap the case up and head straight back home before his father becomes suspicious.

"Well, here goes." He thought to himself as he stood up and emerged from his hiding spot.

"Hey, tall, glowing and ugly, over here!" He shouted, attracting the Slime Mutant's attention.

The monster turned around and saw Fred waving his arms. Without hesitation, the monster made his way towards the leader of Mystery Inc., who quickly took off running.

The Slime Mutant gave chase, but it soon lost the blonde-haired boy as he entered a small tunnel just as he managed to duck from the green slime shot from the monster's arms.

"Hey, creepy, over here!" Velma shouted, and the monster quickly forgot about Fred and chased the short brown-haired girl.

Once again, he attempted to shoot slime at her, but he was distracted by Daphne's calling, "Over here, Slime Man!"

With Daphne distracting the Slime Mutant, who proceeded to chase her, Velma quickly slipped away to join Fred and the boys, who were setting up the trap at that very moment.

"Like, I'm not quite sure about this, Fred." Shaggy commented as he and Scooby helped Fred set up his Rube Goldberg trap while Daphne is being chased by the monster. "Shouldn't we have the trap set up long before we lure the monster over?"

"Don't worry, Shag, I've got this trap tested out a week ago, and it worked perfectly." Fred replied confidently as he placed a gnome on a seesaw.

Velma soon joined them. "Is the trap all set, Fred?"

"It's almost ready, Velms." Fred nodded.

"Like, Scoob and I are still not sure about the trap." Shaggy said. "The reason why I felt we should have set the trap up long before we start to lure the monster over is because we could use the extra time to figure out any possible mistakes in the trap's settings."

"Reah. Raggy's rot ra roint." Scooby agreed.

Before Fred could respond, he spotted the monster chasing Daphne towards where they've set up the trap.

"Alright gang. Now!" He ordered, and Shaggy and Scooby pulled a rope that was connected to a bucket containing a bowling ball.

That bowling ball fell out of the bucket and rolled down the wooden ramp before landing in a crate on a stick, which then fell over and landed on the other end on the wooden seesaw, launching the gnome into the air.

The gnome soon landed on another seesaw with a watering can on the other end of it, which was tilted over and poured water into a funnel connected to a pipe, with the pipe connected to a water pump that shoots a ball towards a T-shaped wood structure with an anvil (Tied up to a nearby water pipe attached to the ceiling above) resting on it.

At that moment, the Slime Mutant decided to shoot several of the slippery slime onto the ground, creating a large puddle of slime, which caused Daphne to slip and fall over.

Just as the monster corners the redhead, the collapse of the wood structure with the anvil caused it to swing over towards it.

Immediately, the Slime Mutant stopped just in time for the anvil to swing past it, unknowingly standing right on a red 'X' marked on the ground.

Distracted by the anvil, the monster stopped to watch, giving Daphne a chance to slip away, as the anvil swings over and hits a wooden board, causing it to flip up and hit a garden pruning shear, leading to it to cut the rope attaching the anvil.

The disconnected anvil then falls and lands in a mine cart, which rides down the tracks.

Watching the cart in motion, Fred said, "Now wait for it."

The cart, with a boxing glove on the front end of it, soon hits a cage suspended in the air and connected to a conveyor, leading to the cage to slide down the tracks.

The Slime Mutant watched the cage hitting a bumper before dropping down towards the ground.

Seeing that it is heading towards it, the monster quickly covered its eyes as Fred and Velma walked over, waiting for the cage to land and trap the monster.

The cage landed before the Slime Mutant uncovered its eyes. To it's amazement, it wasn't locked up in the cage.

Standing in the cage were Fred and Velma instead.

Watching the whole action unfolding, Shaggy commented, "Like, I knew that we should have got the trap set up before being the bait, Scoob."

"Reah." Scooby nodded nervously as the Slime Mutant soon turned its attention towards Shaggy, Scooby and Daphne.

"Looks like Shag was right, Velms." Fred said absent-mindedly. "What else could go wrong now?"

As if to answer Fred's question, the Slime Mutant shot large blobs of slime towards the duo, effectively trapping them in the sticky substance.

"Does this answer your question, Freddie?" Velma asked.

"Perfectly." Fred replied before remembering what the slime really was.

"I only hope neither of us gets a belly ache after this, Fred." Velma said.

"Right." Fred nodded before he and Velma dug in to free themselves.

"Oh, no, the Slime Mutant's got Freddie and Velma!" Daphne said as she and the boys saw Fred and Velma partially cocooned in the cage.

"Like, and it's going to get us if we don't get out of here!" Shaggy added as the Slime Mutant charged towards them.

"Run!" Scooby shouted, and the trio quickly took off as the Slime Mutant gives chase.

The monster soon chased the trio to the hole leading to Fruitmeir's, where Shaggy quickly leaped and grabbed onto the edge of the hole before helping Scooby and Daphne up, which he did effortlessly.

By contrast, the Slime Mutant seem to not have much luck in getting up the hole, and when it got up in the storage room, it gave a look (Breaking the fourth wall) as if it was saying, "Remind me to go on a diet sometime." before resume chasing the trio.

Outside, Shaggy, Scooby and Daphne split up in the dark with Shaggy and Scooby racing towards the kitchen while Daphne tries to reach the front door.

Just then, the monster shot a blob of green slime towards Daphne's feet, sticking them together and causing her to fall over, unable to move.

Looking up, Daphne saw the Slime Monster approaching her in a menacing fashion.

Before anything could happen to her, a large shot of green slime suddenly appeared out of nowhere and hit the monster, leading it to get partially cocooned as it gets stuck on the wall.

Looking towards the source of the slime, she saw Shaggy and Scooby armed with a hose with some of the smoothie dripping from it.

Without another minute, the duo put down the hose and quickly freed her.

"Oh, Shaggy, Scooby, you just saved me!" Daphne said gratefully after being freed.

"Like, it was nothing, Daph. The credit for this goes to Scooby!" Shaggy replied as he patted Scooby. "He remembered seeing the hose that was used to pour the smoothie onto the cones in the kitchen and told me to follow him to the kitchen when we got up from the hole."

Daphne smiled just as Fred and Velma emerged from the hole.

"Guys, is everyone alright?" Fred asked.

"Yes, Fred, and Scooby and Shaggy captured the Slime Mutant!" Daphne replied.

Just then, the front door slammed open, and in came the sheriff and two deputies.

"Well, well, well, look who do we got here." Stone said. In addition to him and the two deputies, the mayor and Franklin Fruitmeir were accompanying him.

"Fred, what in heaven's name are you doing here this time of the night?" Fred Sr. asked.

"And don't tell me that there goes another tourist attraction of the town, kids." Sheriff Stone added, the tone of annoyance being unmistakable in his voice.

"It's not a tourist attraction, Dad, sheriff." Fred Jr. explained as Velma proceeded to unmask the monster. "It's really..."

She then pulled the mask off, revealing a familiar-looking face as Fred Jr. continued, "Emmanuel Raffalo, our science teacher and the former business partner of Franklin Fruitmeir."


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