My first point is, I wrote this story to fill an emotional need in me. I'm still emotionally recovering from cancer and this is written to fill a void in my soul. You know, as all good fanfiction is. It's an amalgamation of Space Ghost, Space Ghost Coast to Coast, and Cartoon Planet, but with certain things tweaked. Overall, I made the people a little... softer, I guess. If you can't stand to have anyone's [adult swim] style edge toned, you might not like this. This isn't to say I have a problem with the show. I love it for what it is, I just wanted things to be a little fluffier. I also just straight-up ignore things I don't like, so if I say things are a certain way, please believe me. It's cool. Don't worry about it.

In Cartoon Planet, the pirannamyte nebula was mentioned to be radioactive, and what made Brak stupid. In order to explore this, I moved "The Lure" to take place after the "Council of Doom" arc, as it doesn't really matter what order the episodes come in anyway.

All descriptions of medical things, as well as the nature of radiation, are not intended to be accurate as I know I'll get things wrong anyway, so Rule of Drama prevails. (Besides, medically speaking, they *are* aliens.) All legal things are totally made up because it takes place in Space so Earth law does not apply, and again, I know I'll get it wrong anyway so I made it work in context of the story without making a layman *too* angry.

Oh, also Brak and Sisto still have whiskers. That's incredibly important to me, that you picture them with whiskers. They're not straight up furries, but I want to imagine and write them as distinctly catlike.

Some days Moltar just wasn't in a good mood. His life wasn't as bad as it could have been, but occasionally vents of frustration welled up below the surface and came out as general dissatisfaction and anger directed at his boss, his station, his failed past, and his life in general. There wasn't much he could do about any of it, aside from subtly mess with Space Ghost's show and commiserate with Zorak, who felt much the same way.

He was in a particularly unpleasant mood today, and the last thing he needed was more frustration. Unfortunately, waiting for him in the magma chamber was the single worst person to run into when you didn't want more frustration. Worse than Space Ghost, Tansut, or even Creature King: Brak.

As Moltar was completely obscured by his magma suit, Brak didn't see a look of disgust or a slight shudder when Moltar first saw him. He was also busy working out the lyrics to a song about his favorite food, beans, and didn't seem entirely aware that he was no longer alone. "Okay, so there's navy beans… lentil beans… that kinda rhymes with pinto, doesn't it?"

"Hey." It wasn't a greeting from Moltar, it was solely to interrupt Brak's train of thought. Hopefully, he wouldn't be able to put it back on the tracks after it derailed. "What are you doing in the control room?"

"Wow, it sure is hot in here, isn't it?" Brak said cheerfully. Apparently the heat in the room countered Moltar's frosty tone, as Brak didn't pick up on it. "You don't got any ice cubes in here, do you, like in a freezer or something? My brother showed me one time that, um, if you rub them on the back of your neck you can cool off really fast."

"No," said Moltar curtly, "I don't have ice. I don't have anything cold. I'm a lava man. I like hot things."

"Aw, man, does that mean you've never been skiing?"

"No. I've never been skiing."

"This one time I went skiing up at the ice caps of, I forget which planet, but they had these really tall glaciers, and I went zooming down one, only I missed the jump and I slammed into a giant icicle. Boy did that ever hurt!"

"Is that why you're like this?"

"Huh?"

"I was calling you stupid," said Moltar.

"Oh, no, that's not from that, that's… uh… something else." Brak trailed off. It was less like he was made uncomfortable by the direction their conversation was taking and more like he just didn't know what to say next. Probably couldn't even remember why he was like that, Moltar thought.

Moltar had met Brak years ago when they sat on the Council of Doom. Back then Brak had been cunning and devious, and just as evil if not more so than Moltar himself. After the failure of the council, Moltar went a few years without seeing Brak again. When he did, he honestly didn't believe they were the same person; he thought he was misremembering the name or the face of that formidable space pirate and was mistaken about this buffoon seeming similar. It wasn't until talking to Space Ghost that he realized that something had happened to Brak in the intervening years. What that was, Moltar had never bothered to ask.

His curiosity was not piqued by this line of discussion. Rather, it was still focused on his initial inquiry, which he repeated: "Why are you even in the control room? Didn't you see the 'No Space Ghosts, Braks or Tansuts' sign?"

"Yeah. I noticed it said 'Metalluses okay.' He's a pretty cool guy."

"Are you dodging the question or are you an easily distractable idiot?"

"Um, the second one." Brak reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, card-shaped envelope. "I'm having a birthday soon and I wanted to invite you to my party."

"Oh, great," said Moltar, taking the envelope and already planning on throwing it into the lava. "So now I have to get you a present or something?"

"Oh, no, that's okay, there's only one thing I'm asking for and you can't get it."

"What do you mean I can't get it?" For some reason, being told he couldn't do the thing he didn't want to do irritated Moltar more than anything else in the conversation.

"I mean, it's completely impossible, so don't worry about it. Okay, bye! I have to go invite the other guys."

"Is the rest of the old council coming?"

"Well, they're invited, I dunno if they're coming."

"If Metallus is there I might show up."

"That's funny, he said the same thing about you," said Brak.

"Wait, really? You can understand him?"

"Yeah. I mean, it kinda sounds like 'whom whom whom whom' but I think that's the gist of it."

"Huh. Okay. Cool. Bye."

"Bye, Moltar!" Brak chirped cheerfully, and then he was out of the room. Finally.

Lunch for the cast and crew of "Space Ghost: Coast to Coast" was for an hour between the final rehearsal and the start of filming. Zorak, Space Ghost, and Moltar tended to sit at the same table not because they were the best of friends who loved spending time together, but because they were so accustomed to each other it was simply easier that way. Space Ghost was eating a sad looking sandwich he'd packed from home, while Zorak had a weird paste of crickets and mealworms. Moltar was just drinking coffee.

"So," said Moltar. "You guys get Brak's invitation?"

"Yep," said Zorak. He didn't look up from his meal.

"You going?"

"Nope."

"Oh, come on," said Space Ghost. "It takes so little to make Brak happy. It wouldn't kill you to show up."

"It might," said Moltar. "Have you seen what he calls food?"

"So just eat before you show up," said Space Ghost. "If he tries to feed you pieces of curb just take a few pretend bites and say you're stuffed."

"Sounds like a lot of effort if it's not going to make someone miserable," said Zorak. "I see enough of him on days when we're shooting that other show. I'm not going to waste what precious free time I have on that twerp."

"Well," said Space Ghost slowly, "you know, I'd hate to have to play this card…"

"Oh, here we go," grumbled Zorak.

"But if I wanted to make it a condition of your continued freedom, I do have that ability."

Zorak slammed his Tupperware onto the table and glared at Space Ghost. "One of these days you're going to suggest something that's actually worse than going back to prison, you know."

"Is that day today?"

Zorak gave him a long, fervent glower, before looking back down at the last few crumbs of lunch. "No. Fine. I'll go."

"Excellent!" Space Ghost beamed.

"It won't be so bad," said Moltar. "I hear Metallus is gonna be there."

Zorak perked up. "Oh, really? Metallus? Maybe it won't suck so bad after all."

"Really?" Space Ghost frowned in disapproval. "You'll go for Metallus but not Brak?"

"Yeah," said Zorak. "Metallus is cool."

"He's cool, Space Ghost." Moltar took another sip of coffee.

Space Ghost was indignant. "And Brak's not cool?"

"No way," said Moltar with a slight chuckle and a shake of his head.

"Huh."

His mug empty, Moltar stood up. "Well, I'm going back to the control room."

"Really?" Space Ghost was surprised. "We've still got over half an hour of lunch left."

"Yeah, well…" and Moltar was gone.