Chapter 24
Breaking into Television, or
The Spy Network
Phil, Sarah, and the Doctor watched and listened with horror as the sounds of dozens of snakes drifted up from the deep pit which Ima had just been thrown into for correctly guessing a letter in the Wheel of Torture puzzle. From the hissing sounds, the Doctor quickly identified them as asps and pythons, among the most venomous species of snakes on Earth.
"Doctor, we've got to do something!" cried Sarah.
"And we will, if these heavily armed guards would be so kind as to stop pointing guns at us," the Doctor replied.
"My friends, we must be calm," counselled Phil. "We must fill our minds with serenity."
"Oh, calm, of course!" snapped Sarah. "You and the Doctor, you always say that!"
"But more than that, we must channel our serenity to Ima, and through her, to the snakes. We can soothe their killing instincts and put them and Ima at peace if we focus and believe." Phil closed his eyes, placed his fingertips together, and hummed a quiet mantra to himself as he concentrated.
The hissing instantly stopped with an abrupt, scratchy squeak.
Phil opened his eyes. "Okay, that was a little fast, even for the power of positive thinking."
Ima's voice broke the quiet with annoyed disbelief: "You have got to be kidding!"
Seeing their gun-toting guards were momentarily distracted by the unexpected turn of events, Ima's three companions pushed past them and hurried to the edge of the pit. At the bottom, they saw Ima standing impatiently next to, not a horde of snakes, but an old-fashioned vinyl record player.
"This is the snake pit!?" a shocked Sarah exclaimed. "Where are the snakes!?"
"On thee record," answered Boris. "Thees ees a low-budget show."
The Doctor was aghast. In his long life, he had been imprisoned and threatened by the most powerful and ruthless forces for evil in the universe, and experienced methods of terror and torture more horrifying than most sentient life could imagine. This "snake pit" was an insult! "You mean you don't have real torture devices!? What about the iron maiden?"
"Natasha een a suit of armor."
"Whipping?"
"Bowl of cream and a vhisk."
"Rack?"
"Deesh rack."
"Karaoke singers?"
"They're real."
"Figures," muttered Ima.
"Never mind!" snapped Fearless Leader. "Eet's steell your turn, Nutt, so speen again!"
The four contestants were herded back to the wheel, and Ima reluctantly spun it again. It stopped on "Rerun of 'Let's Make a Deal'." She was really in trouble now. "Are there any S's?"
While they're continuing on with the round, which is so exciting I think I may fall into a coma, let's check on things happening elsewhere in Central Control, starting with the front door...
"J. R. Ewing," read a Central Control entrance guard who held Max's forged ID and looked like he could single-handedly replace the entire defensive line of the Chicago Bears. "You are a long vay from Texas."
"Fearless Leader's expectin' me," drawled Max. "He's a-lookin' fer more greenbacks ta fah-nance his new plan ta destroy democracy, an' ah'm lookin' ta invest in Pottsylvanian oil exploration."
The guard glared suspiciously at him. "I thought Pottsylvania's oil reserves vere tapped out years ago."
"That's what a lotta folks thought 'til a little while ago. It all started when this here wild man was found livin' in th' deep woods 'a Pottsylvania since he was a babe. They brought him back ta civili-za-tion, an' he started tellin' tales about black gunk just'a bubblin' up from th' ground."
"Crude?"
"Oil, that is. Black gold! Texas tea! Now, trouble is, Pottsylvania don't take kindly ta strangers just'a comin' in an' nosin' around, so what my R&D did was design some special apps ta work with Google Earth and look for that gunk from way up yonder in space. An' wouldn't ya know it, our apps found a huge plain 'a tar sand in your country, right there next ta the wild man's deep, dark woods! May not be quite the real liquid black gold we were lookin' fer, but it's still the richest find in years! Why, the whole world's talkin' about it by now, th' apps that found th' best tar sand field ever!"
"I never heard any of thees!"
Max gave him an astonished look. "Y'all never heard 'a... Tar Sand 'a th' Apps?"
The guard winced, turned green, and fainted with an agonized groan.
Max stepped past him and through the door. "Guess he doesn't like crude jokes."
That was quick... and painful... Let's try somewhere inside now...
A lone guard stood watch in front of a door labeled "Lab Section, Authorized Personnel Only, Trespassers Will Be Swiss Cheese Within Two Seconds." The guard, a burly man with thinning black hair and bleary eyes from staring at nothing but the corridors and the opposite wall for hours, was glad his shift was almost over. Soon he'd be able to go home and relax with his favorite hobby: binge-watching Sam Peckinpah movies.
His hopes for an uneventful end to his workday suddenly had to be shelved when he spotted Klink and Schultz escorting a young man at gunpoint down the corridor toward him. Quickly hefting his rifle, he stepped into their path and barked, "Halt! Who goes there!?"
"Us, of course!" Klink barked back.
"Oh. Okay then- vait a minute! Vhat are you doeeng here!?"
"I have an important package for Dr. McRonnald."
The guard blocked Klink. "And who are you that you can just valk in here!?"
Klink glared at the guard in outrage. "You know perfectly well who we are! I am Colonel Klink, one of Central Control's top agents! And this is Sergeant Schultz, another of Central Control's... agents."
"Ja!" Schultz crowed. Then he wondered why Klink left "top" out of his credentials.
The guard stared alternately at Klink and Schultz, and then replied, "Never heard of you." He stared at Gary. "And who's thees?"
"One of your guests called for a taxi," Gary replied. "I'm her ride."
Klink gave him an amused, pitying look. "Then I hope she doesn't mind if the meter keeps running, because neither of you are leaving just yet."
"We had a deal! I give you some of the computer parts, you let me walk out of here with Ima, then I tell you where the rest of the parts are!"
"True, true, but first, I have to deliver these parts to Dr. McRonnald, and that may take quite a while. He is very busy these days . . . Then, I reunite you with your friend - but first, of course, I will have to find her, and that may also take quite a while! Central Control is a big place with a lot of very large prison blocks, and unfortunately we are in the middle of upgrading our operating system, so tracking down which cell she is in might be difficult right now! . ." Klink was clearly enjoying this way too much. "And then, before you leave with your... belligerent friend, you must honor the rest of your bargain and tell us where you have hidden the rest of the parts. However, how can we know you'll really tell us where they are? We will need to make sure, with some very lengthy... and perhaps very intense questioning! Toward you and your friend Ima!"
Gary scowled at him. "I liked you better as a clueless camp commandant."
"So did I," murmured Schultz. "There's been no living with him since 1945."
Klink glared at his partner. "Keep it up, Schultz, and you won't be living with anybody!"
"Did I say that out loud?" wondered Schultz, suddenly sweating like a sauna repairman.
"Take the prisoner to the cell block!" Schultz snapped. "DIS-missed!"
Schultz scurried away, his Luger in one hand and Gary's arm in the other...
...and pushed him through a heavy metal door into a small prison cell with no windows.
"Please don't take this personally," Schultz pleaded with Gary.
Gary sarcastically replied, "Don't tell me, you're just doing your job. That's what they all say! If you really don't like doing this, why don't you just get another job?"
"I can't get another job! Being a soldier and spy for an East European government is all I know how to do!"
"You mean... when it comes to other job skills, you know nuh-thing?"
Schultz glared through narrowed eyes. "Now, that is getting personal." He slammed the door shut and locked it tight.
As soon as Gary was sure Schultz had left, he said into the micro-microphone hidden on his clothes, "Okay 99, I'm stuck in a cell in the heart of Central Control, so now me and Ima are both in trouble! You are gonna get us outta this, right?"
He listened closely through the micro-earpiece that acted as his receiver for Agent 99 of Control, the only reason he agreed to take part in this dangerous scheme to trick Central Control into accepting fake computer parts for Ima's release.
To his rapidly increasing anxiety, there was no answer from 99. Gary tentatively tapped the earpiece. "99, did you hear me?" He tapped again. "Is this thing working?"
He tapped his earpiece more and more urgently. "99, come in! 99!"
He finally got a response, but from a more nasal and snooty voice saying, "A gracious good afternoon. This is Miss Tomlin of the telephone company. Do I have the party to whom I am speaking? A Mister... P. Funny?"
. . . . That's it, I'm canceling the cable. Desperately praying that his wife would wake him up, Gary replied, "That's Gary Funny! Look, I don't have time for this, could you please connect me with Agent 99 of Control?"
"Is that local or long-distance?"
"Uh . . . local?"
"One moment, sir." He heard the operator dialing a number on the other end of the line. There was silence for a few seconds, then she muttered, "One ringy-dingy . . . two ringy-dingies . . ." Then someone must have answered because she said, "A gracious good afternoon. Am I speaking to a Miss Nine?"
"This is Agent 99," she hissed quietly over the connection. "Who are you!? How did you get this number!?"
Tomlin snorted a short laugh. "Well, Miss Nine, how did you get your number?"
"99, can you hear me, it's Gary!"
"Gary! I'm so sorry, the signal cut out when I slipped into Central Control!"
"Central Control?" repeated the operator. "Mister Funny, you told me this was a local call, but if you are in Central Control, we are going to have to add roaming charges to your call."
"Whatever! 99, please just tell me you'll be getting me out of this cell soon!"
"As soon as I can, but right now I'm in the laboratory you saw earlier. I recognized the name Dr. McRonnald from our files. Intelligence is sketchy, but we're sure he's building something big for Central Control! I have to find out what!"
"There is also an international surcharge," the operator interrupted, "local Pottsylvania surcharge, E911 fee -"
"E911 fee!? Pottsylvania doesn't have a 911 system!"
"That's for my end of the connection, in case I need an ambulance when I split my sides laughing at your story!" She snorted another laugh.
"Listen, whoever you are, this is a secret communication channel! You're not supposed to be connected to it! You shouldn't even be able to connect to it!"
"My dear Miss Nine, the word 'shouldn't' is not in the telephone company's repertoire. We are omnipotent!"
"If you're omnipotent," Gary broke in, "how come my cell phone signal drops if I'm more than two feet from a window!?"
"Gary, someone's coming, I have to break off!" hissed 99. "I'll get to you as soon as I can!"
"99 -!" Too late, her signal cut out again. "Great!" he muttered.
Then he heard telephone dialing in his earpiece. "99, is that you?"
No, it was the snooty operator again. "Phoenicia, this is Ernestine. Would you bring up the records for a Central Control, Pottsylvania? I think I've found where they're reviving 'Candid Camera'!"
"I think I've found a massive plug for digital subchannels," Gary muttered.
Frustrated, he leaned heavily on the cell door. Moments later, to his shock, the door suddenly flew open with a loud wrench of metal, and he fell to the floor outside with a massive thud.
Once the stun wore off, Gary looked back at the door. The strong, heavy lock was intact, but the door's hinges were so rusted, they snapped right off the frame!
Gary picked himself, muttered, "They just don't make prison doors the way they used to," and took off.
Inside Lab #1, deep inside Central Control, was a very large workshop. Electronics components and dented metal parts were scattered across the benches, tables, and floor, but by far the most prominent feature of the lab was a huge, futuristic tank. Tinkering with the tank was a man who did not look at all like one of those white-haired, spectacled, foggy professors that people just can't stop associating with people like him - Why don't you people start getting a clue!? Anybody can be a genius, and a genius can look like anybody, young, old, short, tall, man, woman... Yes, this genius professor could have been a woman too! The only reason he's not a woman is how many women have you ever met named Donald?
The intruder spying on him from behind a large tool cabinet was a woman... Agent 99, to be exact.
The non-stereotypical professor's tinkering was interrupted by Klink's entrance. "What do you want!?" he demanded.
"Mind your tone!" Klink snapped back. "Are you Dr. Donald McRonnald?"
"I am."
. . . 'Donald McRonnald.' The writer isn't even trying anymore.
Klink held out the package with a smug grin. "Your top-secret computer chips, Doctor, acquired at great personal risk!"
"Uh-huh," muttered McRonnald, clearly not believing the personal risk part for an instant. He opened the package, and demanded, "Where's the rest of them!?"
"They'll be along soon. We have the fools who, by only the wildest stroke of luck, managed to steal them away from us. All they need is a little bit of persuasion, and they'll be only too happy to tell us where the rest are!"
"They better be! I can't work like this! If it isn't all the delays waiting for parts like these to come in, it's all the interruptions!"
There were three loud knocks on the lab door. "Like that! Who is it now!?"
The door opened, and in came a guy who was dressed like an urban cowboy and acted so over the top about it that he was already halfway down the other side. "Howdy, pardners!" he declared in what was still the worst Western accent ever.
99's eyes closed in dismay. "Max, we told you not to overdo it!" she mumbled.
Klink stared at Max. "Aren't you . ."
"Ay-yup, J. R. Ewing, y'all! Ah jus' flew in from Dallas, lookin' ta open up some new oil markets in these here parts, an' ah thought ah'd mosey on inta Central Control an' chew th' fat with you hombres!"
After the several seconds required to process his spiel, McRonnald told Klink, "I think this cowboy's guitar is missing a few strings."
"Ready to ship first-class to a rubber stalag," Klink agreed.
"You say that like it's a bad thing!" crowed a crazy voice. Into the lab appeared the voice's even crazier owner, with a familiar cat-suited woman hot on his heels.
"The Joker!" Max muttered, momentarily forgetting his phony accent - thank goodness.
"Catwoman!" 99 muttered.
"And what do you want!?" griped McRonnald.
"I want to retire to Tahiti in style," Catwoman replied curtly. "Joker here wants his face on Mount Rushmore. Instead, we're both stuck delivering these diamonds you wanted."
She handed McRonnald the pouch of diamonds that had been driving her and the Joker crazy for several chapters. Check that - driving the Joker crazi-er. YAAAH!
(Narrator barely misses getting hit by a jet of acid squirting from the Joker's boutonniere)
"Let that be a lesson to you!" the Joker barked. "Nobody calls me crazy but me!"
McRonnald opened the pouch, chose a random diamond, and pressed a jeweler's loupe into his eye to examine it. "Oh yes, very good. Yes, these will do nicely," he muttered to himself. "I just have to calibrate the focusing elements for the diamonds' crystalline structure - " He peered more closely into the pouch, and demanded more loudly, "Where's the big diamond!?"
"Don't look at us," replied Catwoman, "we were just told to steal little ones."
"There are big diamonds in this caper?" exclaimed the Joker. "Why didn't Central Control tell us that!?"
"Isn't is obvious, Joker?" replied Catwoman. "They figured we'd run off with them ourselves."
"Of all the nerve! The untrusting ingrates!" After a pause, Joker added, "They're right, but that's no excuse!"
"But I need the big diamond!" shouted McRonnald. "Without it, my crowning invention won't work!" As he said this, he gestured toward the futuristic tank he was tinkering with, leading everyone else in the room to assume it was the aforementioned crowning invention.
"Your invention? A tank?" sneered Klink. "Tanks have been around for a lot longer than you've been alive, doctor, and even the very first ones were a lot tougher than your tin-foil toy looks! I wouldn't drive this thing across a playground, much less a real battlefield!"
"This toy, as you call it, will wipe out a whole battlefield full of your tough ordinary tanks!" McRonnald retorted.
"Ya don't say," drawled Max. "But how's a hu-mun-gous dah-mond gonna make th' diff'rence?"
"Simple. You think that nozzle on the tank's turret is just a giant gun? Wrong-o! It's the most advanced, amazing, most powerful weapon ever conceived. It'll revolutionize warfare forever!"
He paused for dramatic effect, then gestured Joker, Catwoman, Klink, and Max to lean in close, then whispered even more dramatically, "It's a laser!"
Joker, Catwoman, Klink, and Max were silent for several moments. Finally, Catwoman told McRonnald, slowly and carefully, "You do know that lasers have also been around since before you were born, right?"
"Not like this one!"
"And how is this one not like all the rest?" asked Klink.
"Come into my other lab and I'll use these small diamonds to show you."
"Well, I do have about half an hour to kill before my perm," mused the Joker. "Why not?"
"You're getting a perm!?" exclaimed Klink.
Suddenly very annoyed, Joker glared at him and snapped, "What, you think this curly clown wig is natural!? Hunh, I wish!"
They, Catwoman, and McRonnald started for the other lab. "You coming, J.R.?" asked Catwoman.
Max tipped his cowboy hat and replied, "Much abliged, Ma'am, but ah got people ta see. Anoth-ah time."
As soon as the rest of them left, Max tapped his hidden earpiece several times. "99, come in."
"I read you, Max. Have you found Ima Nutt?"
"Not yet, but I've infiltrated Dr. Donald McRonnald's laboratory in Central Control, and discovered some vital information about his operations here. Where are you?"
"Is there a large tool cabinet in the lab?"
". . . Yes. How did you know?"
"Look behind the cabinet."
Max carefully did so, and came face-to-face with 99. "How did you get here so fast?" he asked.
Skipping the attempt to explain, she instead said, "Gary's locked up in one of the cells. He should be safe for the moment, but we need to find his friend."
"Central Control is enormous. We may have to split up, no telling how long it will take to search the entire complex."
"Or, we could just check the TV."
"99, what good is watching Pottsylvanian television going to do us!?"
"Look!"
She pointed behind him at a small TV on the wall. The sound was turned down so that McRonnald wouldn't be disturbed, but the picture clearly showed the "Wheel of Torture" program, with Ima unwillingly taking her next turn spinning the wheel.
"She looks smaller on television than in her file," Max noted.
"Everybody does. C'mon, the studios are here in Central Control!" 99 hurried from the lab, with Max close behind.
And... back to the studio...
"I'd like to buy a vowel," said Sarah.
"Wait!" Ima interrupted. "If we're not playing for money, how do we pay for the vowels?"
"Blood," answered Boris.
"Blood!?"
"Just a pint! Thee Pottsylvania Blood Bank ees vun of Vheel of Torture's beeggest sponsors!"
The Doctor, still sharing Sarah's podium, spoke up with a big grin. "We'll buy an A!"
"And you're een luck, because there are four A's in thee puzzle!" Natasha turned the appropriate letters. The puzzle now looked like this: AxAxANxHx xS xxTTxx THAN NxNx.
"Doctor, didn't you hear them!?" cried Sarah. "They want to take your blood!"
"Of course, I heard, Sarah, but I can spare a pint or two with no ill effects," the Doctor replied, "and I'm not afraid of needles."
Sarah gave him a look. "Meaning what, that I am!?"
He gave her a look back. "Well, the way you carried on when that Taelidrian scientist tried to stick a needle into you..."
"She was trying to inject me with spores that would turn me into a giant slime mold!"
"Good job I arrived in time. Don't know where I'd find enough soap for you if I hadn't." To Boris, the Doctor asked, "Your needles are sterilized, I hope? Just to avoid any similar concerns?"
"Who said anytheeng about needles?"
The Doctor's grin partly faded. "What do you use?"
"Beh-heh-heh! Show 'im, Natasha!"
Natasha brought out a maple tree spigot as wide as a man's forearm. The Doctor's grin vanished completely.
"You can't be serious!" cried Ima.
"Do ve look seerious?" demanded Natasha.
"No!" all four contestants answered without a second's hesitation.
"Vell, ve are!" Boris grinned. With his trademark evil laugh, he then motioned three guards to hold the Doctor in place as Natasha approached him with the spigot and a large mallet.
Just then, everyone was distracted from the imminent bloodbath when the studio entrance at the top of the audience tiers burst open and Gary marched in. Looking thoroughly exasperated, he announced as the twin doors closed behind him, "I'm sorry, but I'm hopelessly lost! Does anyone here know where I could find a woman named Ima Nutt?"
With a startled yelp, the doors flew open again and knocked him several steps forward. Max and 99 jumped through, drawing their guns, Max shouting, "Nobody move! This studio is now under the control of Control!"
Every spy in the audience simultaneously drew their guns on Max and 99, and since every member of the audience was a spy, that was a lot of guns.
"... Would you believe, under the suggestion of Control?"
"Would you believe, we're outgunned fifty-to-one?" 99 muttered to him.
"That's a dis-tinct possibility."
Gary glanced down at the stage. "Ima! Phil!"
"Gary!" shouted Phil.
"Maxwell Smart!" shouted Boris.
"Boris Badenov!" shouted Max.
"Maxwell Smart!?" exclaimed Sarah.
"99!" shouted Natasha.
"Natasha!" exclaimed Gary.
"99?" asked the Doctor.
"Badenov!?" demanded Fearless Leader.
"Fearless Leader!" shouted 99.
"Phil?" began Ima.
"Ima?" continued Phil.
"Natasha?" asked Boris.
"Doctor!?" cried Sarah.
The Doctor grinned and held up his bag of: "Jelly babies?"
"EVERYBODY SHUT UP!" screamed Fearless Leader.
But Gary had one more thing to say. He saw the puzzle board, and before anyone could stop him, he pointed and shouted out, "Avalanche Is Better Than None!"
A loud bell signaled a correct answer. Natasha had no choice but to turn all the letters and show the puzzle as: AVALANCHE IS BETTER THAN NONE. Gary was indeed absolutely right.
The four contestants pounded their podiums in frustration. "Of course," grumbled the Doctor. "Obvious answer!"
"Wow, I've never won anything on a game show before!" Gary exclaimed. "What did I win?"
"Ten thousand high-speed bullets!" Fearless Leader answered. "Guards, geeve heem hees prize!"
Every spy and guard in the studio instantly trained his/her/its gun on Max, 99, and Gary, and fired shot after shot in split-second succession, saturating the air with the smell and smoke of gunpowder and the deafening sounds of hundreds upon hundreds of gunshots plastering the back wall and closed twin doors. Horrified, the contestants just momentarily saw Gary and the two TV good guys spread-eagled against the back before the smoke and dust completely obscured them.
By the time the studio guards emptied their rifles and guns in the direction of the intruders, the entire studio was obscured in dust, smoke, and plaster fragments, and reeked of exploded gunpowder. Ima, Phil, Sarah, and the Doctor peered desperately toward the back wall for any signs of life, even though all four of them were certain there was no chance that there could be after such an orgy of gunfire. Slowly - agonizingly slowly - the dust began to settle and the air began to clear up. Still they continued to peer in the fatal direction, and finally, the air around where their friends stood for possibly the last time began to clear up, and they could actually see the back wall.
Or rather, the area where the back wall once stood. Now, there was a giant, gaping hole in it. The gunfire was so fierce that it literally disintegrated the entire back wall of the studio. But as the air cleared even more, they saw that three small sections of the wall were still standing. The sections were in the shapes of perfect silhouettes of Gary, Max, and 99, and standing precisely in front of them were Gary, Max, and 99.
Out of the 10,673 bullets that the guards fired, not a single one hit them!
It took a few seconds for this fact to register in any of their minds, after which they looked carefully at themselves and at each other, and finally saw they were completely unscathed.
The only comment Gary could think of was, "Look Ma, no cavities!"
Fearless Leader's mood changed from flabbergasted to furious. "EEDIOTS!" he screamed. "I've got eediots een my corner!"
One of his eediots turned toward him, wearing extremely thick glasses over extremely crossed eyes. "Sorry, Sir! Ve did our best!"
The Doctor gestured to his traveling companion. "Sarah?"
"Doctor?"
"Run."
"Right."
That's exactly what they, Ima, and Phil did, pushing past all the guards before they could react. Gary, 99, and Max took a cue from them and ran for it too, catching up with them just beyond the studio exit in another of Central Control's endless corridors.
"This way!" barked the Doctor. "Back to the TARDIS!"
As they started running again, Gary turned to Phil. "How'd you get in Pottsylvania?"
"I came with the Doctor and Sarah." answered Phil. "A long story, and while I wish our situation could be tranquil enough to go into detail, it will have to wait."
"Just as well! You said 'Doctor', and he said 'TARDIS'... I don't know how many more crossovers I can take!"
"You?" demanded Ima. "I don't know how many more crossovers this novel can take!"
The fugitives tried a door that led them into a large underground garage. "Wrong turn!" shouted Sarah.
"No, emright/em turn!" Ima contradicted her. "How are any of you at hotwiring a jeep?"
"These are military-grade Pottsylvanian class-five land rovers with the latest anti-theft technology!" protested Max. "Do you have any idea how long it would take to hotwire one!?"
The Doctor whipped out his sonic screwdriver and pointed it at the nearest jeep. There was a brief electronic whine, and the jeep's motor quickly started up.
"One-point-four seconds," he replied with some surprise. "It emdid/em take a while."
Zero-point-seven seconds later, the jeep's motor exploded, blowing the front hood fifteen feet into the air and dropping it like a giant blade into the floor between Ima and Phil. White as a sheet and feeling her blood pressure spiking into the high thousands, Ima slowly turned and pointed at the Doctor and commanded, "Do NOT do that again!"
Just then, a flying ball of light slowly passed through the wall of the garage and approached the band of fugitives. "Doctor," Sarah gasped, "isn't that the same ball of light that came at us back in Oz?"
"Yes," he answered, not knowing whether to stand his ground or run.
Oz!? Ima repeated in disbelief in her head. Doesn't the writer have any shame!?
As they watched, the ball of light floated gently down to rest on the dashboard of the next jeep in line. The light ball glowed brighter for a second, and suddenly the jeep started up perfectly. The ball of light then floated off and into the air again.
"Did you see that? It helped us!" Sarah exclaimed. "Do you think it's friendly?"
"Don't know, don't care, don't give a damn," Ima replied. "I'll drive." They all piled into the jeep and Ima shoved the jeep into gear and burned rubber across the garage all the way to the main doors, not bothering to open them before driving through.
As it turned out, the jeep only had to drive a short distance through a dark tunnel before emerging from Central Control to the outside, on the outskirts of Pottsylvania's capital city. The city looked empty, but Max and 99 knew that just meant the city's population of spies were all in hiding, and probably watching their every move. They instructed Ima to immediately steer for open country.
"And I'm convinced that Pottsylvania is up to something big with those tanks, those computer chips, and the diamonds and lasers that Dr. McRonnald was talking about!" Max declared.
"You don't suppose they could be building an army of laser tanks?" asked 99.
"Laser tanks!? Don't you think that sounds a little retro!?" demanded Ima.
She regarded her passengers again. "What am I saying? What crossover in this novel isn't retro?"
In the back of the jeep, Phil, even through all the bumps and swerves and shakes of the harrowing ride, was somehow able to place himself in a lotus position and levitate a few inches off the bed and attain a Zen state, softly humming a mantra to himself.
"Very good," the Doctor noted. "Did you pick that up from Tibetan monks?"
"Yes, Doctor," Phil replied in a soft voice full of calm and serenity. "Have you sought their wisdom as well?"
"Oh yes, in exchange for a bit of my wisdom, of course."
"Really? What did you teach them?"
"How to speak yeti. Turned out to be mixed blessing, though. Wonderful conversationalists, yeti, but they do ramble on about the weather."
"I hope the weather here is good for getting out of this country!" Gary retorted. "I've had enough of Pottsylvania to last a whole lifetime of Saturday mornings!"
"We'll need to get far enough away from any cities so Max and I can call for an air extraction!" said 99. Up ahead, she saw an approaching sign. "It looks like we're in luck! That sign says it's only a kilometer to the airport!"
"Not the Pottsylvania Airport again!" Ima wailed. "My nerves are still shot from my flight in!"
Within a minute, they were within sight of the airport. If anything, it was even more sorry-looking then Ima remembered from the last time. Where's a bus terminal when you need one? she thought.
The sorry excuse for an airport appeared to be completely deserted. No, it wasn't. Standing near the sorrier excuse for a terminal were three people, two men and one woman in different outfits, plus... was she imagining things, or was something smaller fluttering in mid-air next to them? And were the two men wearing capes?
As the jeep approached, its passengers saw the three airport patrons stare up into the sky. They stared up into the sky as well and saw an airplane speed towards a second airplane and almost slice off its wing as it passed. Then they saw a third airplane appear out of the sky, speeding toward the second airplane. Airplane two, apparently not wanting to risk another close encounter of the kamikaze kind, suddenly speeded up to avoid being passed by this plane as well. Airplane one was just now struggling to stop on the runway before rolling off the end into... was Ima really imagining things, or was there a car half-buried in muck at the end of the runway!?
Within moments airplane two touched down on the runway and hurtled toward airplane one, clearly going too fast to stop in time.
At the same time, airplane three, racing to catch up to airplane two, hurtled toward the runway and touched down practically at airplane two's tail and also going too fast to stop in time. Before their widened eyes, the car suddenly rocketed out of the muck, and scant seconds later, the three planes crashed into each other, causing the most monumental explosion since the last star in this sector of the galaxy went ker-blooey. Burning wreckage and white-hot fire flew in all directions, overturning the jeep into a nearby ditch, and blinding everyone to the destruction and chaos engulfing the entire area.
Ima and Gary, as often stated before, are copyright to me and R. C. Gumby Productions. The Doctor and Sarah Jane Smith, as stated a few times before, are copyright to the BBC and brought to life by Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen. Boris Badenov, Natasha, and Fearless Leader, as stated too many times before, are copyright to DreamWorks Classics and brought to voice by Paul Frees, June Foray, and Bill Scott. Maxwell Smart and 99, as stated a few too many times before, are copyright to CBS Television Distribution and brought to life by Don Adams and Barbara Feldon. Max also pretended to be a character who, as stated once before, is copyright to Lorimar Productions and brought to life by Larry Hagman. The telephone operator, as never stated before but since this is her only appearance we better do it now, is copyright to George Schlatter-Ed Friendly Productions and Romart Inc., and brought to life by Lily Tomlin.
"And that's the truth," she replied with a raspberry.