Author's Note: Hey everyone. Back with another chapter for this Scooby-Doo/Pokémon, and I can tell that Plot Twist really got all of you (Looking at you Steel for ruining the review page (;). Just so you know, that twist was Joltie's idea and I just went along with it. But hey, it work didn't it? *Does evil Markiplier laugh*
Anyway, everyone, I just got something I would like to share. I'm sure you all have heard about 2016 Clown Sightings across the United States. If you're wondering if I'm a believer in that stuff, then the answer is; I don't know what to believe. All of this could just be some sick prank or something serious, but I don't which one is true. And not knowing is really starting to terrified me. I don't know what to do, I'm constantly worrying for my father since he goes out the most than me or my mother. Look, I'm not saying this to cause more fear, but I just want people to know if anything were to happen.
But, on a slightly brighter note, I am not going to let this Clown thing ruin my Halloween Spirit. So after posting this Chapter, I'm going to start working on a little something for all of you on DeviantArt. I won't say when I'm going on it, but I promise it will be posted this month. If any of you live in an area that has Clown Sightings, please be safe.
Enjoy the Chapter.
(P.S. Saw Markiplier's videos of Sister Location, AWESOME GAME!)
SHOUTOUTS-
Guest: Thanks! Yeah, Joltie seemed to like the idea of torturing Ash as much as I do. Well, I won't it'll help with the Specter incident.
R98: Yep. Guess the gang needs to save Ash again.
Joshua Ketchum: I'm sure Joltie will appreciate that! :) Uh... I don't think does two would even have a chance, Ash is ten and Daphne is like a teenager/young adult. Age difference is one of the many things on why they shouldn't be together. But yeah, they do have similar running gags. Enjoy the chapter!
Steel: Hahahaha! Sorry, Steel, but you always have the best reactions! I left a few hints? Huh, I don't seem to remember them. Ha, yeah, Greedy people, or animatronics in this case, tend to act like toddlers when they don't get what they want. Hope you enjoy this chapter!
Blaze: That's the whole point of a plot twist, my friend. Enjoy the chapter!
Lightwing: Oh, you don't even know what the Puppet Master is planning. ;)
Darkwing: I can't answer to that. Enjoy the chapter!
Chapter 10
Everything feels like Heaven. For some reason, all those horrible zombie people have mysteriously disappeared from the building and have left them alone. Not only that, but those horrible animatronics that have been tormenting Shaggy for a while now have finally left. Now, they're all alone, in place where there a flowers everywhere. Clean, green grass that stretch across the fields for miles, like an endless road where they can keep on going as long as they want too. It's a perfect place to go horseback riding...
...on a gigantic hot dog with four legs.
"Wahoo!" Shaggy throws his hands in the air as he feels the rushing wind from the back of his head. "This is, like, the best thing ever! Right, Scooby?"
"Reah!" Cried the Great Dane from his position on the front of the Hot Dog, who is still frolicking in the path that it's following. It's beady legs skipping with every grease puddle it lands on. Making it only more juicy for Shaggy and Scooby's taste buds.
"And the best part of all of this..."
"We get to this rot rog!" Scooby finishes with a cheer. With wide-open mouths, the two bend down so they can take a bite...
...out of their two chairs that they're currently sitting. But that didn't matter to the as they continue to live their "Hot Dog" fantasy.
Apparently, the lack of oxygen have finally gotten to the two cowards and now they're delusional. Lucky for them, the hypnotized citizens have already left when their hallucinations began. Now they're taking large bites out of their chairs, their saliva spreading everywhere. This was the sight everyone found when they made their way from the sewers.
"Uh, Shaggy? Scooby?" The two cowards look up from their "meal" to see everyone standing in the doorway with jaw-dropped expressions. If they were to look closely, they would have noticed the children's faces are stained with dried-up tears. "What are you two doing?" Freddie asks slowly, unsure what to make of this situation. Shaggy and Scooby have done some weird stuff before, this takes the case.
"Oh! L-Like, hey kids!" The hippie greeted the children with a small wave, appearing to have not notice that the grownups are there as well. "Wanna a bite of this gigantic hot dog?"
"It's rull of ruice!" Scooby adds in before sinking his teeth back into the chair.
The children blinked their red eyes. "Guys, you do realized that you're both eating chairs, right?" Clemont asked awkwardly, unsure on how he should have worded that sentence.
Luckily, they seem to be worded right as the two eye's widen. The grassy landscape disappeared from their visions and now they realize they're still inside the Security Office, and the thing they were feasting wasn't, in fact, a giant hot dog. They froze for a few seconds to let their actions sink in, before they suddenly shrug and continue on with their meal. Despite it being a chair, it wasn't that bad.
Although, the same can't be said for the others as they all groaned in disgust at seeing the two continue eating the chairs. Velma then notice the computer screen and her eyes rolled in disbelief. "Well, at least we know why they're acting like this. They sealed the air vents."
The others did somewhat calm down from hearing. It would make sense that Shaggy and Scooby are only reacting from the lack of air in the room, causing them to hallucinate. Suddenly, as they continue to munch on the chairs, the two noticed that somebody was missing from their little group, not to mention Pikachu is being held in Serena's arms.
"Uh, guys? Where's Ash?"
At this, everyone froze. The question that they knew they have to answer, but at the same time dread when the question came from Shaggy and Scooby. The kids remember how Shaggy and Scooby act around the Specter when it was mentioned, and they didn't even want to imagine their reactions to this.
"Um..." Freddy decided to be the one to step up, rubbing his neck awkwardly while not bringing himself to look at his two friends in the eyes. "How can I put this without you two screaming? Guys... The Puppet Master got him..."
Silence then washed over them as Shaggy and Scooby process their blonde friend's words, everyone mentally braces themselves for the loud shouts that's going to ruin their eardrums forever. Dedenne even launched itself back into Bonnie's pouch.
Suddenly, the two burst into laughter.
"L-LIKE, THAT'S THE MOST FUNNIEST THING I'VE EVER HEARD!" Shaggy manages to gasps out in-between laughs. "L-LIKE, THE PUPPET MASTER KIDNAPPING ASH?! HA!"
"Y-YOU ALMOST GOT US THERE!" Scooby finishes as he and his best friend continue to laugh hysterically. This makes everyone wince, this is going to be a lot harder than they thought.
"K-Kids, can you, like, please ask Ash to come out wherever he's hiding?" Shaggy asked, still out of breath of his laughter. "Like, I really want to applaud him for actually agreeing with-" The cowards' laughter suddenly died down once they caught sight of the children's faces; they all had their eyes looking towards the ground, not even daring to look at the two in the eyes. Pikachu had its ears down, showing its downhearted mood. The fact that Serena already had a few tears running down her cheeks confirmed it all.
"No..." Shaggy whispered, he and Scooby standing up from the deformed chairs and walked over to the group. "Like, tell us it's not true! Tell us! There's, like, no way that bucket of bolts got him! K-Kids, come on!" But the children still refused to look at him, too absorbed into trying to back their own tears at the thought of their best friend kidnapped once again and that they couldn't do anything about it.
Reality finally sunk in. Scooby even began to do his little doggy whimpers.
"I'm really sorry, guys." Freddie begins, a deep look of regret in his eyes. "She caught us off-guard. We thought we lost her when we went into the sewer system, but she somehow found us and took the kid before we could do anything about it. I'm sorry-"
Freddie was suddenly caught off as Shaggy unexpectedly yanks his ascot with a ferocious tug, causing the blonde to stumble on his feet, luckily he was able to stop himself from falling to the floor. He looked back to Shaggy, wondering why he would suddenly do that to him, when he stop once he caught of the hippie's eyes. Inside those small eyes are the doorway to an unspeakable fury that is threatening to break through.
"LIKE, HOW COULD YOU LET THIS HAPPPENED, DUDE?!" The hippie screamed, shaking the blonde back-and-forth by his ascot. "WE, LIKE, TRUSTED YOU TO LOOK AFTER HIM!" Suddenly Shaggy let go of the blonde as he fell to the ground with his beloved dog. "WHY DID IT HAVE TO BE HIM?! WHY?!"
"RIT ROULD RAVE REEN ME!" Scooby screamed as he broke into sobs. "Rit rould rave reen me..."
Seeing their two friends like this has cause new tears to form into the children's eyes before the girls broke into sobs while Clemont tries everything he can to hold his own back, but failing. Taku could feel his own eyes being filled-up with tears, his heart aching at seeing so many people caring for his nephew's well-being as well as blaming himself for letting this happened. The rest of Mystery Inc. could only watch the others with remorseful eyes, feeling slightly guilty for not getting the chance to know the boy as well as they did.
The Puppet Master grin as she watch her little puppets unload the van full of money bags and begin to load them into the small room where the rest of her riches are placed inside the security room of the Music Hall, where no one was able to find but her. So this what it was like to be a mastermind behind this wonderful scheme, the feeling is giving her a bubbling sensation that's making her all exciting.
"HEY! LET ME GO!"
Of course, there's always her little guest there to ruin her mood.
The Puppet Master's face turn into a frown as she continues to hear the sounds of struggling and a foot making contact with something else, followed by a few grunts. The animatronic turned her head almost owl-like to see Ash, his arms being hold-up by a couple of hypnotized citizens, using his free legs to kick whenever more hypnotized people who are coming his way on the small platform she build for him. For a boy his age and size, he's a lot stronger than he looks, which she should have probably suspected since he was the fastest runner.
With the sickening sounds of her spider-like legs clanging onto the floor, the Puppet Master made her way onto the small platform, those who were about to go to the platform themselves stopped when they saw their Master and move out of her way. The two citizens that are holding Ash back saw her and quickly went down to their knees, dragging the startled boy with them.
With a grunt, Ash looked up with a glare to see the Puppet Master, looking down at him in her normal form, looking at him like he's a broken toy that she's disappointed in. "YoU kNoW, i ReMeMbEr YoU bEiNg MoRe QuIeTe BeFoRe WhEn YoU wErE iN a PeRiLoUs SiTuAtIoN. tHeN aGaIn, YoU aRe FuLl Of SuRpRiSeS, bAsEbAlL hEaD."
Ash growled at the mention of that nickname, it still isn't funny or even clever. "You won't get away with this!"
The Puppet Master did her creepy wide once she heard that, her form flickering, causing Ash to sweat-dropped nervously. "oH tHe CoNtRaY, bAsEbAlL hEaD, i KnOw I wIlL. tHiS iS gOiNg To Be ThE greatest gRaNd PeRfoRmAnCe LuMiOsE cItY hAs EvEr SEeN!" She suddenly grasps the boy's chin by her long, bone-like fingers so he's looking into her cat-like eyes. "aNd YoU'rE tHe MaIn StAr." Ash just turns his head away so he didn't have to look at her anymore, the fear that was once used back at Camp is resurfacing, but he did everything he could to hold it down. There was no way he's going to give this creepy old robot the satisfaction.
"TiE hIm Up!" He snapped his head up only to see the Puppet Master walking off the platform as the two puppets holding him down suddenly made him stand up on his feet where he could see two more puppets coming towards him with rope in their hands, and it didn't take long for the gears in his brain to start working.
"NO!" Ash struggled with all of his might to get out of the zombies' grips, but they proved to be stronger than him as the two held him down as the other two begin to wrap the rope around him. With a fierce glare, he looked back at the retreating form of the Puppet Master. "You won't win, ya know! As soon as my friends get here, you're going to be sorry! You... You... YOU SORRY EXCUSE OF A SPIDER THAT GIVES OTHER CLOWNS, WHO ARE PROBABLY WAY SCARIER THAN YOU, NIGHTMARES!"
The Puppet Master froze upon hearing that, even her little puppets have stopped at what they were doing to look at the boy in shock. Now Ash felt his confidence shatter, wondering he'd just sign his death already. However, the Puppet Master just raise her hand and snap her fingers. "GaG hIm!"
"What?! Hey-!" Ash's screams were suddenly muffled by a piece of white clothe being tied around of his mouth. He could only watch helplessly as the puppets bind him.
The next morning after the kidnapping, everyone dragged their feet back back to the hotel they were staying at, all too tired to speak. As soon as they got there, the children collapsed onto a couch where the girls begin to cry softly again. Meanwhile, Shaggy and Scooby have taken up residence at a nearby table. It was there that they're beginning to draw their plans to rescue Ash.
"...Then we'll drop that giant weight on her head!" Shaggy announced, showing Scooby picture of them running away with a poor drawing of Ash. Apparently Scooby is dressed as a chicken while Shaggy appears to cutting the rope off what appears to be holding the two thousand pound weight up. At the corner, it shows a very poor drawing of the Puppet Master about to be crushed by the weight above her.
Scooby looks at the drawing with a critical eye. "It's rood," he admits. "Rut row are we ronna ret her underneath it?"
At this, Shaggy's bright smile instantly drops into a small frown. "Like, good point, Scoob." He crumbled up the paper and throw it to the trash bin, only for it to bounce from the ground due to the trash bin already filled up with the last rejected ideas. "Maybe we can-"
"That's enough, Shaggy..." The hippie and his dog turn their heads to see Taku, sitting down on the couch, staring at nothing but thin air. "Look, I really appreciate that you and Scooby care for my nephew greatly, but we don't know what's happening to him. He could be hypnotized, tortured, or even seriously hurt by now! Ever since that time with Hotel, I promised myself I would do anything I can to keep him safe." At this, he scoffs at himself. "But I guess that didn't turn out well. Now Ash is traumatized and he's being held against his will. I'm sorry everyone, but I'm afraid whatever that animatronic wants with him, I'm going to meet her demands."
"WHAT?!" Everyone currently present all snap their heads towards the millionaire in complete bafflement. He's just giving up?
"Mr. Ketchum, you can't let the Puppet Master win!" Freddie protested.
"You don't even know what she wants anyway." Velma points out, with Daphne nodding her head.
"I don't care." Taku snaps, making the teenagers flinch. "My nephew suffered enough because of me. It's time I make this right. He deserves a better uncle than me anyway-"
SMACK!
Everyone froze when Serena suddenly marched over to the millionaire, yanked on his jumper, and slapped him across the face. That scene reminded them how she snapped at Stan back at his camp, where her concern for Ash's well-being and her patience for the ex-conman has finally reached it's peak. The members of Mystery Inc. are beginning to wonder if she slaps people when she gets depressed while Bonnie and Clemont are gripping each other tightly in trepidation of what's to come. Pikachu and Dedenne even made a dive for Clemont's backpack to hide.
Meanwhile, Taku himself has froze as well. Although the stinging on his cheek is still there and hurting, Taku could feel everything going numb. His once guilty conscious has gone and left his mind. With barely any emotion on his face, Taku turn to face the honey-blonde girl, who is using her blue-eyes to glare holes right into his sockets.
Before he could say anything, he was cut-off by Serena.
"WILL YOU GET A HOLD OF YOURSELVES?!" She screamed, not only talking to Taku but indicating for everyone. "MY BEST FRIEND IS OUT THERE ALL ALONE WITH CREEPY CLOWN-ROBOT THING AND HERE WE ARE BLAMING OURSELVES! YOU TWO NEED TO STICK TO REALITY!" Shaggy and Scooby screamed when they see Serena's fiery glare is now on them and made a dive for the table. "YOU ALL NEED TO BE MORE CONSIDERATE ABOUT THE PEOPLE AROUND YOU!" Fred and the girls both cringe at the sight of the enrage ten year-old. "AND YOU NEED TO STOP BLAMING YOURSELF!" Serena turn her gaze back to the surprised millionaire. "YOU'RE NOT THE ONLY THAT FEELS GUILTY ABOUT ALL OF THIS, BUT DON'T BE ANOTHER PUPPET IN THAT CREEP'S SHOW! ASH WOULDN'T WANT YOU TO DO THAT!"
With that rant done, Serena stood back and took deep breathes in hopes to try to calm herself done. Although they knew she was done, the others still remained in their frozen positions. All of them are staring at her with wide eyes.
"Like, man, am I glad I'm not that animatronic right now." Shaggy said to Scooby, both of them still hiding underneath the table. Scooby nods his head, completely agreeing with his cowardly counterpart.
Taku was still staring at Serena with wide eyes, before he sigh. Everyone's attention is now turned towards him. "You're right, Serena." He then looks back at everyone else. "I'm sorry, everyone. I've been wallowing in self-pity that I forgot how crafty that animatronic is. She won't let him go that easily. Besides, Ash wouldn't want me to listen to her anyway." Taku looks back at Serena, who has calm down now. "Thank you, Serena. I can understand why Ash always look for you when he needs it."
Serena smiles gently at the older man, a hint of blush slowly spreading across her face. "It's no problem, Mr. Ketchum!" Seeing that she is now calm, the others have now relaxed from their tense positions.
"So, now that we got that out of the way," Freddie begins awkwardly, still feeling slightly warily around the honey-blonde girl. "I think it's time we set a trap for that old robot. And I just got the perfect net for-"
"No nets!" Bonnie screamed, throwing her hands over her ears. "We've heard enough nets in our lives!" This makes Freddie slump his shoulders, his mood clearly ruin.
"Maybe we can try locking her up in a cage?" Clemont suggested.
"No, that Puppet Master is way too smart for her own. I don't think we can just lead her into a cage without her suspecting something." Velma points.
Freddie's mood suddenly brightens up again. "How about a regular old fishing net when she least-"
"NO NETS!" The blonde jumped at the high-voice that little girl is able to produced.
Shaggy suddenly walked up to them while holding something behind his back. "Like, may I make a suggestion?" He shows the picture behind his back, which shows a cruelly-made drawing of the Puppet Master being chased by what appeared to be a giant wrecking ball.
"Uh, Shaggy? I don't see how we're gonna fit a gigantic wrecking ball inside the theatre without her noticing." Serena awkwardly pointed out, putting her hands behind her back.
Shaggy's face instantly turns into the frown as he crumbles the paper into a ball before throwing it away. "Like, back to the drawing boards, Scoob."
"Hey, I know! Why don't I use that bazooka from-?"
Everyone couldn't help but let their groans escape. They knew that Fred is going to keep suggesting it until they finally agreed to it when their patience has finally reached their peaks, but looking at it now, though, using nets are probably their only option they can use against the Puppet Master. So finally reaching her breaking point, Daphne snapped. "Alright! We'll use a net!"
Hearing this made Fred jump up into the air in excitement. "Yes! I'll go get the bazooka!" He quickly made his way out of the room, a gigantic grin plastered across his face.
"Just make sure you learn to point that thing in the right directions!" Bonnie called out, but the older blonde was already in the other room. Even from here, they can hear Freddy's giggles of excitement as he unloads the bazooka. They all shot each other cringed looks.
What have they done?