Chapter 12 – Free Circus
"I don't like it," said Vince. "Why do they have to go to Dooville?"
"Scrappy wants to, and you know how hard it is to say no to him," said Flim-Flam.
"It's risky," said Vince. "Scooby has friends there, and if they ask him what he's been doing they could start asking detailed questions. Some of them might be smart enough to see through our plot."
"What are you going to do? You can't hypnotize the whole town," said Flim-Flam.
"Or can I?" said Vince thoughtfully.
"Even you're not that good," said Flim-Flam.
"We don't have to really do it, just give that impression to the parties that matter," said Vince. "Here's what we'll need to do..."
The next day, as the gang traveled on the train, Flim-Flam put them under hypnosis and got them to disembark from the train one station early, convinced they had arrived in Dooville.
"Like, where's the welcoming party?" Shaggy asked.
"Reah," said Scooby.
"I hear calliope music," said Flim-Flam. "There must be a circus in town. We should check and see if they're there."
Under his hypnotic suggestion they heard it, too. From there it was routine. He convinced them that a free circus had come to town and that everyone had gone to it. As they got more decoupled from reality he got them to think the circus was run by another escaped ghost, Professor Phantasmo, and that he had the evil intent of stealing the souls of everyone in town. Finally Flim-Flam convinced them that he himself had fallen under Phantasmo's control, and got Daphne to believe that she had, too. Finally they managed to break the calliope, end Phantasmo's grip on the town, and trap him in the Chest of Demons.
Under the guise of moving the house of Dada Doo and Mumsy Doo back to where it belonged (since Professor Phantasmo had transported it to the circus grounds using balloons), Flim-Flam got them to walk to the real house location. As they did, he called Vince again.
"Everything went fine on this end," Vince said. "I found the Doos are just as gullible as their son, and I got them to believe in the free circus, too. Now tell me the details of the story on your end so I can get their memories to synch up."
"What about the rest of the town? Won't they be suspicious that nobody else remembers the circus?" asked Flim-Flam.
"It will be one of the mysteries of the magic of Professor Phantasmo that nobody else remembers," said Vince. "But just in case, convince them it would be better not to talk about what happened, or about the thirteen ghosts at all, with anyone in town, so as to avoid a panic."
The real visit with the relatives went smoothly. Convinced they should keep to themselves, the whole group remained inside the Doo house.
"I'm glad to see you found yourself a nice girl, Shaggy," Dada Doo told him privately. "I think she's a keeper."
"Like, she's the best," Shaggy said. "I don't know what I'd do without her."
Later that night, Vince and Flim-Flam spoke again by phone.
"This was pretty messy, taking them across the country like we did," said Flim-Flam.
"We'll make a nice profit from the people that used their plane while they were gone," said Vince.
"We're almost out of ghosts, " Flim-Flam said. "We've done eleven of thirteen. Do you have a big score planned for the finale?"
"Better than that," said Vince. "We can keep this going much longer. I know a guy..."