Chapter 3
"Ice, ice, baby," Tanker sang to himself.
"Geez, Tanker, are you still listening to that song?" Sam asked, shaking his head.
Tanker sent Sam a withering glare.
"This is Beethoven, Sam. Don't you recognize the classics, little buddy?"
"Uh...right. Hey, where's Sydney?"
"Uh...who?"
"Your girlfriend? Our best friend since preschool?"
"Does she play football?"
'You don't deserve her,' Sam sighed silently. 'You really don't deserve her.'
"Look, Tank, I'm kinda worried. I think I'll go look for her."
"Great, man. Ice, ice, baby," he sang again.
"Oh, hey, Malcolm," Sam greeted, narrowly avoiding colliding with the other boy on his way out of the cafeteria.
"Hello, Sam," Malcolm said, staring intently at Tanker. 'Any minute now...Tanker's brain will cease to exist.'
Almost on cue, a blue bolt of electricity, which oddly resembled bad special effects, shot from the Walkperson, up through the cord, through the headphones, and directly into Tanker's ears.
"Ice, ice - OW!" Tanker barked. "What in the football was that?"
"Excellent," Malcolm noted. "It's working already."
"Whoa. Maybe football was right. I should go help him look for football. Football...gosh, she's so pretty..."
And so Tanker stood and left the cafeteria, in search of 'football' and 'football,' more commonly known to the rest of the school as Sam Collins and Sydney Forester.
"So, tell me again, Syd; what happened to you?"
"I've gone through it about four times already, Sam! I was beaten to the ground by someone who may or may not have been J. K. Rowling after she found out that I'd stolen her Time-Turner," Sydney replied tiredly, removing the ice pack and giving her head time to regain feeling before reapplying it. "She said that without it, she'd never have enough time to finish her next book, the eight-thousand page 'Harry Potter and the Mysterious Magical Artifact.'"
"I know, I know," Sam sighed. "My fault for asking. Anyway, you wanna get out of here?"
"The nurse wants to keep me here until the end of the day in case of concussions."
"Bummer," Sam noted in sympathy.
"To say the least," Sydney agreed, grimacing at the back of Nurse Stanley's head.
"Football! Football! Here you are! Do you know how long it took me to find you?" a voice demanded from the doorway. "And here you were, in the football, the whole football."
Sam and Sydney turned slowly in the direction from which the question had come. Tanker frowned sternly at them.
"Football?" Sam muttered. "And football? In the football? Is this some sort of bad metaphor?"
"Maybe I should keep you here in case of concussions," Nurse Stanley spoke up, eyeing the young man suspiciously.
"Um...Tanker?" Sydney began hesitantly. "Are you okay?"
The quarterback made his way over to her chair and knelt next to it, taking her hand.
"Yeah, I'm fine. Are YOU okay, football?"
She blinked.
"Pardon me?"
"Are you okay?" he pressed.
"Yeah, I'm alright, considering, but...did you just call me...football?"
"Twice?" Sam added.
Tanker scratched his head and turned to Sam.
"What are you talking about, football?"
"There!" Sam exclaimed. "You did it again!"
Tanker shrugged.
"Whatever, football. I've gotta get to football, or football, football, and football will have my football. I need to learn my football, and I can't do it from the football's football."
"Uh...what?" Sam asked hesitantly as the taller boy left the nurse's office.
Sydney shook her head, baffled.
"Tanker's spouting gibberish."
"Very footballish gibberish," Sam added.
"Oh, no," Sydney sighed as something occurred to her. "The play! They're probably rehearsing now. I've got to get out of here."
"But the nurse wants you here until the end of the day!"
The dramatic music played in the background. Sam and Sydney both glared briefly at the guy wandering past with the boom box.
"I know," she groaned. Then she blinked. Then she turned to the young man and seized his arm. "Sam!" she hissed. "Create a diversion. I'm breakin' out."
"Sydney!" Sam exclaimed reproachfully.
"Sam!" she exclaimed back, and then lowered her voice and continued. "Look, if I don't get to that rehearsal, Mandi, Candi, and Brandi are going to hate me...even more than usual."
"Um...and?"
"This is my chance to finally break out of my shell of shyness and become a Broadway star! I can't throw it away by missing the first and most pivotal rehearsal!"
"I thought you had a dream of going to Harvard..."
"Yeah! Harvard School of Acting!"
"Wow...I knew they had a school of law, but I didn't know about any school of acting."
"A girl can dream, can't she?" Then she turned toward the imaginary camera. "Remember, Sam, always follow your dreams!"
"Of course!" Sam agreed. "What else makes life worth living?"
"Uh.money? Power? The violent and bloody deaths of ones' enemies?" Malcolm suggested. "Ooh! Ooh! A new hard drive!"
"Uh...hi, Malcolm," Sam greeted hesitantly.
"Shouldn't you be at rehearsal?" Sydney wondered.
"I was on my way," he explained. "And I thought I'd stop by and pick up the trash."
"That isn't funny, Malcolm," Sam said severely. "Don't talk about Sydney that way! She's going to go to Harvard School of Acting, you know."
"I was referring to you," Malcolm sighed. "And I refuse to comment on the Harvard School of Acting. I graduated from the Princeton School of Acting."
"What's that, the Princeton Preschool of Acting?" Sydney scoffed, crossing her arms and looking away.
"That's where I graduated from!" Amp announced as he sauntered past in his tutu. "When I graduated, they gave me a diploma, an academy award, and a lollipop! It was red! I lucked out, alright!"
For a moment, everyone was struck speechless. Then, very slowly, Sam stood up.
"Okay, against my better instincts, we'd better get going. If we continue to have these meandering conversations, the plot will never develop. We only have half an hour."
"We could make it a two-parter," Malcolm suggested.
"Actually, we're already on Part 3," Sydney informed everyone. "I think it's Yezo's influence."
"What?! A three-part episode of Super Human Samurai Syber-Squad?" Malcolm exclaimed, dismayed. "The people who watch this show don't have the attention span to last through the first commercial break!"
"Malcolm!" Sydney admonished severely. "Stop alienating the fan-base!"
"What fan-base?"
She scratched her head...or her hat, at any rate.
"Good point. Well, stop alienating Yezo!"
"Uh, guys?" Sam prompted. "To rehearsal!"
Ten minutes later, after getting hopelessly lost somewhere around the boiler room, during which Sam became slightly panicked when he found himself alone, the three arrived at the cafeteria.
"Where were you two, anyway?" Sam demanded as Malcolm and Sydney staggered into the room behind him, looking somewhat dishevelled and very happy.
"We found the principal's secret chocolate stash!" Sydney explained. "It was crammed into this little tunnel on the wall, and it took a little doing to get to it."
"You stepped on my head," Malcolm informed her moodily, before turning happily back to his chocolate bunny.
"Oh, the footprint looks good on you," Sam assured him, snickering.
"It'd be better on your football, though!" another voice proclaimed from the stage.
They whirled about to behold the rather strange sight of Tanker in tights, complete with his football jacket and helmet.
"Um...Tanker," Sydney began, not quite certain if even asking why was a good idea, "you do know that you don't need the tights for the first rehearsal, right?"
"You mean I can do it naked?! That's sick!"
"Er, that wasn't quite what I meant," she told him. "Although that wouldn't be bad..."
"Ergh..." Malcolm erghed, gritting his teeth. "Can we begin, please?"
"Why are you here?" Mandi chirped from the stage. "You're just the understudy."
"Erghhhhh..."
With that, the little Kilokhan appeared on his left shoulder again.
"Kill them. Kill them all," it urged, poking him in the side of the head.
A little Servo appeared on his right shoulder.
"Eh," it shrugged. "Go nuts. But let Syd live. She makes me lots of cool weapons and stuff!"
Malcolm nodded in agreement, then blinked as something struck him as rather odd.
"What did you say, Servo?" he demanded.
"I didn't say any-" Sam began, the stopped abruptly, reconsidering. "Who are you talking to, Malcolm?"
"Er, no one," he assured the other young man.
"Oh." Sam blinked. "Good."
"Guys-uh!" Brandi exclaimed impatiently. "Can we have Macduff and Lady Macbeth on the stage, please?!"
"I was spoken to by a football of three footballs," Tanker was meanwhile reading. "They told me to take a football and stab the football right in the football!"
"Wow..." Yoli said, shaking her head. "Not only is that so not his line, that's not even Shakespeare."
"Give him a break, Yoli," Jennifer admonished. "I think Tanker's doing a wonderful job."
"He's awful, Jen!"
Jennifer tilted her head to one side in consideration.
"Yeah, you're right. He is, isn't he? What were the 'di's' thinking?"
"Ooh! Ooh! Can I hazard a guess?" Mrs. Starkey pleaded.
"Go ahead, Mrs. S," Jennifer laughed.
"How about 'duh?'"
"Sounds about right," Yoli agreed with a shrug.
"Bwah!" the tiny virus shouted from somewhere, skipping merrily around. "I control all! Within this Walkperson, at any rate! Ugh...I hate my life."
"Syd, I've been thinking a little more about could possibly be wrong with Tanker," Sam muttered as the two were seated in little plastic chairs at the side of the stage, waiting for Tanker, Brandi, Candi, and Mandi, and Amp were rehearsing the scene between Macbeth, Banquo, and the three witches.
Apparently, in this version, it ended with a huge make-out scene between Macbeth and the witches three, as Sydney had taken to calling them even before they had cast themselves in the roles.
"Hey, is this make-out scene really necessary?" she called, completely ignoring Sam's question.
"About as necessary as Lady Banquo," a very bored Yoli sighed from the chair next to her. Then she stood up resolutely and marched toward Amp. "Okay, you guys, this is the part of the play where Lady Banquo comes and drags Banquo off to a secluded cave somewhere so they can make little baby Banquos."
"Whoa!" Amp shrieked as he was dragged off.
Sam frowned.
"Hey! That's my line! And Sydney, did you even hear me?"
"Um...what?" she asked absently, still glaring black death at the three directors/witches.
"I said, I've been thinking about what's wrong with Tanker."
"Is that in alphabetical order, or in the order you've noticed then through the years?" Malcolm put in.
"Go away, Malcolm!" Sam requested.
"Yeah, I've noticed a few things wrong with him," Sydney replied, ignoring Malcolm. "He's pitifully stupid, obsessed with football, and completely inconsiderate. He sure looks good in tights, though," she finished, gazing appreciatively at his backside. "But he's certainly not putting up much of a fight when he has to make out with three girls!"
"No offence, Syd, but neither would I," Sam admitted apologetically.
"Nor I," Malcolm agreed. "Although, making out with one would be sufficient."
"Oh, shut up! Both of you!" Sydney exclaimed.
"Hey, football," Tanker called pleadingly as Brandi temporarily released him long enough to breathe. "I have to make footballs for my football!"
Malcolm cackled evilly, drumming the tips of his fingers together.
"Everything's working out perfectly...I am the greatest evil boy genius in the world."
The little Kilokhan appeared on his shoulder.
"Yes, Malcolm, you are completely brilliant. I love and respect you."
Then the little Servo appeared on his other shoulder.
"Yeah, Malcolm, even though you're my enemy, I love and respect you, too."
"It's weird, Servo," Malcolm noted, scratching his head. "You sound an awful lot like Sam Collins, only more echoey, and slightly lower in pitch, like a bad special effect."
"Uh...I'm sure it's just a coincidence," the Servo perched on his shoulder laughed nervously.
Malcolm beamed.
"I love my shoulder angels..."
"Um...your what?" Sam asked, frowning.
"Uh...er...nothing! I just meant that...er.I've been under a lot of pressure lately. Maybe I need a nap."
"Oh! Well, maybe you just need to lie down for a while," Sydney suggested. "C'mon, I'll take you to the nurse's office."
"No thank you, that won't be necessary," he replied.
"I'm going to the nurse's office with or without you, Malcolm. I can't watch any more of this..."
"Nor can I," he agreed. "It looks like some sort of primate mating ritual."
"Yeah, I remember seeing something like that when I was living with the pack of wild chimps on the Serengeti," Amp announced.
"Amp, you aren't here!" Sam reminded him. "You're in the closet with Yoli!"
"Oh, right!" Amp laughed as he disappeared in a puff of continuity.
"Odd," Malcolm frowned. "I've never seen continuity on this show before."
"Malcolm!" Sydney called sharply. "We were taking you to the nurse's office, remember?"
"More continuity?" he gasped. "I...I feel funny..."
"That's because you're going to pass out if you don't lie down soon," she announced, poking him in the arm.
"Oh, all right," he grumbled. "Let's go."
"Is this a football I see before me?" Tanker's voice drifted after them.
"Like, no! It's a dagger," Mandi informed him, annoyed.
"Let's rehearse the make-out scene again!" Candi suggested excitedly.
"It's a hard football," Tanker sighed, only half reluctant.
The sound of creaking teeth filled the air.
"Let's go, Malcolm," Sydney pleaded. "If I stay in here for another second, there'll be little bits of blonde hair lying everywhere, and the blood of three idiotic witches will run like water."
"I am seeing you in a whole new light," Malcolm sighed, watching with hands clasped and eyes shiny.
"That's because the budget's gone up, and we replaced the one that burned out last year," she told him as they left the cafeteria. "Someone found twenty bucks in the lining of their coat!"
"Hey, where do you think those two are going?" Yoli muttered aside to Amp as they wandered back to the stage.
Amp's eyes widened.
"You don't think they're going to do what WE were doing, do you?"
Yoli gasped in dismay.
"Oh, lord, I hope not. That would just...oh, lord, no."
Amp shuddered.
"They're not...they're not ready!"
"Yeah!" Yoli agreed. "Something like that requires a lot of forethought and preparation."
"I know! And we used up all the ingredients on OUR batch of brownies!"
"They do smell good, though," the young woman admitted, breathing in the aroma.
"Snack-tacular!" Amp agreed, grinning.
"Do you ever run out of those?" she asked, smiling up at him fondly.
"No-tacular!"
"Ice, ice, baby," Tanker sang to himself.
"Geez, Tanker, are you still listening to that song?" Sam asked, shaking his head.
Tanker sent Sam a withering glare.
"This is Beethoven, Sam. Don't you recognize the classics, little buddy?"
"Uh...right. Hey, where's Sydney?"
"Uh...who?"
"Your girlfriend? Our best friend since preschool?"
"Does she play football?"
'You don't deserve her,' Sam sighed silently. 'You really don't deserve her.'
"Look, Tank, I'm kinda worried. I think I'll go look for her."
"Great, man. Ice, ice, baby," he sang again.
"Oh, hey, Malcolm," Sam greeted, narrowly avoiding colliding with the other boy on his way out of the cafeteria.
"Hello, Sam," Malcolm said, staring intently at Tanker. 'Any minute now...Tanker's brain will cease to exist.'
Almost on cue, a blue bolt of electricity, which oddly resembled bad special effects, shot from the Walkperson, up through the cord, through the headphones, and directly into Tanker's ears.
"Ice, ice - OW!" Tanker barked. "What in the football was that?"
"Excellent," Malcolm noted. "It's working already."
"Whoa. Maybe football was right. I should go help him look for football. Football...gosh, she's so pretty..."
And so Tanker stood and left the cafeteria, in search of 'football' and 'football,' more commonly known to the rest of the school as Sam Collins and Sydney Forester.
"So, tell me again, Syd; what happened to you?"
"I've gone through it about four times already, Sam! I was beaten to the ground by someone who may or may not have been J. K. Rowling after she found out that I'd stolen her Time-Turner," Sydney replied tiredly, removing the ice pack and giving her head time to regain feeling before reapplying it. "She said that without it, she'd never have enough time to finish her next book, the eight-thousand page 'Harry Potter and the Mysterious Magical Artifact.'"
"I know, I know," Sam sighed. "My fault for asking. Anyway, you wanna get out of here?"
"The nurse wants to keep me here until the end of the day in case of concussions."
"Bummer," Sam noted in sympathy.
"To say the least," Sydney agreed, grimacing at the back of Nurse Stanley's head.
"Football! Football! Here you are! Do you know how long it took me to find you?" a voice demanded from the doorway. "And here you were, in the football, the whole football."
Sam and Sydney turned slowly in the direction from which the question had come. Tanker frowned sternly at them.
"Football?" Sam muttered. "And football? In the football? Is this some sort of bad metaphor?"
"Maybe I should keep you here in case of concussions," Nurse Stanley spoke up, eyeing the young man suspiciously.
"Um...Tanker?" Sydney began hesitantly. "Are you okay?"
The quarterback made his way over to her chair and knelt next to it, taking her hand.
"Yeah, I'm fine. Are YOU okay, football?"
She blinked.
"Pardon me?"
"Are you okay?" he pressed.
"Yeah, I'm alright, considering, but...did you just call me...football?"
"Twice?" Sam added.
Tanker scratched his head and turned to Sam.
"What are you talking about, football?"
"There!" Sam exclaimed. "You did it again!"
Tanker shrugged.
"Whatever, football. I've gotta get to football, or football, football, and football will have my football. I need to learn my football, and I can't do it from the football's football."
"Uh...what?" Sam asked hesitantly as the taller boy left the nurse's office.
Sydney shook her head, baffled.
"Tanker's spouting gibberish."
"Very footballish gibberish," Sam added.
"Oh, no," Sydney sighed as something occurred to her. "The play! They're probably rehearsing now. I've got to get out of here."
"But the nurse wants you here until the end of the day!"
The dramatic music played in the background. Sam and Sydney both glared briefly at the guy wandering past with the boom box.
"I know," she groaned. Then she blinked. Then she turned to the young man and seized his arm. "Sam!" she hissed. "Create a diversion. I'm breakin' out."
"Sydney!" Sam exclaimed reproachfully.
"Sam!" she exclaimed back, and then lowered her voice and continued. "Look, if I don't get to that rehearsal, Mandi, Candi, and Brandi are going to hate me...even more than usual."
"Um...and?"
"This is my chance to finally break out of my shell of shyness and become a Broadway star! I can't throw it away by missing the first and most pivotal rehearsal!"
"I thought you had a dream of going to Harvard..."
"Yeah! Harvard School of Acting!"
"Wow...I knew they had a school of law, but I didn't know about any school of acting."
"A girl can dream, can't she?" Then she turned toward the imaginary camera. "Remember, Sam, always follow your dreams!"
"Of course!" Sam agreed. "What else makes life worth living?"
"Uh.money? Power? The violent and bloody deaths of ones' enemies?" Malcolm suggested. "Ooh! Ooh! A new hard drive!"
"Uh...hi, Malcolm," Sam greeted hesitantly.
"Shouldn't you be at rehearsal?" Sydney wondered.
"I was on my way," he explained. "And I thought I'd stop by and pick up the trash."
"That isn't funny, Malcolm," Sam said severely. "Don't talk about Sydney that way! She's going to go to Harvard School of Acting, you know."
"I was referring to you," Malcolm sighed. "And I refuse to comment on the Harvard School of Acting. I graduated from the Princeton School of Acting."
"What's that, the Princeton Preschool of Acting?" Sydney scoffed, crossing her arms and looking away.
"That's where I graduated from!" Amp announced as he sauntered past in his tutu. "When I graduated, they gave me a diploma, an academy award, and a lollipop! It was red! I lucked out, alright!"
For a moment, everyone was struck speechless. Then, very slowly, Sam stood up.
"Okay, against my better instincts, we'd better get going. If we continue to have these meandering conversations, the plot will never develop. We only have half an hour."
"We could make it a two-parter," Malcolm suggested.
"Actually, we're already on Part 3," Sydney informed everyone. "I think it's Yezo's influence."
"What?! A three-part episode of Super Human Samurai Syber-Squad?" Malcolm exclaimed, dismayed. "The people who watch this show don't have the attention span to last through the first commercial break!"
"Malcolm!" Sydney admonished severely. "Stop alienating the fan-base!"
"What fan-base?"
She scratched her head...or her hat, at any rate.
"Good point. Well, stop alienating Yezo!"
"Uh, guys?" Sam prompted. "To rehearsal!"
Ten minutes later, after getting hopelessly lost somewhere around the boiler room, during which Sam became slightly panicked when he found himself alone, the three arrived at the cafeteria.
"Where were you two, anyway?" Sam demanded as Malcolm and Sydney staggered into the room behind him, looking somewhat dishevelled and very happy.
"We found the principal's secret chocolate stash!" Sydney explained. "It was crammed into this little tunnel on the wall, and it took a little doing to get to it."
"You stepped on my head," Malcolm informed her moodily, before turning happily back to his chocolate bunny.
"Oh, the footprint looks good on you," Sam assured him, snickering.
"It'd be better on your football, though!" another voice proclaimed from the stage.
They whirled about to behold the rather strange sight of Tanker in tights, complete with his football jacket and helmet.
"Um...Tanker," Sydney began, not quite certain if even asking why was a good idea, "you do know that you don't need the tights for the first rehearsal, right?"
"You mean I can do it naked?! That's sick!"
"Er, that wasn't quite what I meant," she told him. "Although that wouldn't be bad..."
"Ergh..." Malcolm erghed, gritting his teeth. "Can we begin, please?"
"Why are you here?" Mandi chirped from the stage. "You're just the understudy."
"Erghhhhh..."
With that, the little Kilokhan appeared on his left shoulder again.
"Kill them. Kill them all," it urged, poking him in the side of the head.
A little Servo appeared on his right shoulder.
"Eh," it shrugged. "Go nuts. But let Syd live. She makes me lots of cool weapons and stuff!"
Malcolm nodded in agreement, then blinked as something struck him as rather odd.
"What did you say, Servo?" he demanded.
"I didn't say any-" Sam began, the stopped abruptly, reconsidering. "Who are you talking to, Malcolm?"
"Er, no one," he assured the other young man.
"Oh." Sam blinked. "Good."
"Guys-uh!" Brandi exclaimed impatiently. "Can we have Macduff and Lady Macbeth on the stage, please?!"
"I was spoken to by a football of three footballs," Tanker was meanwhile reading. "They told me to take a football and stab the football right in the football!"
"Wow..." Yoli said, shaking her head. "Not only is that so not his line, that's not even Shakespeare."
"Give him a break, Yoli," Jennifer admonished. "I think Tanker's doing a wonderful job."
"He's awful, Jen!"
Jennifer tilted her head to one side in consideration.
"Yeah, you're right. He is, isn't he? What were the 'di's' thinking?"
"Ooh! Ooh! Can I hazard a guess?" Mrs. Starkey pleaded.
"Go ahead, Mrs. S," Jennifer laughed.
"How about 'duh?'"
"Sounds about right," Yoli agreed with a shrug.
"Bwah!" the tiny virus shouted from somewhere, skipping merrily around. "I control all! Within this Walkperson, at any rate! Ugh...I hate my life."
"Syd, I've been thinking a little more about could possibly be wrong with Tanker," Sam muttered as the two were seated in little plastic chairs at the side of the stage, waiting for Tanker, Brandi, Candi, and Mandi, and Amp were rehearsing the scene between Macbeth, Banquo, and the three witches.
Apparently, in this version, it ended with a huge make-out scene between Macbeth and the witches three, as Sydney had taken to calling them even before they had cast themselves in the roles.
"Hey, is this make-out scene really necessary?" she called, completely ignoring Sam's question.
"About as necessary as Lady Banquo," a very bored Yoli sighed from the chair next to her. Then she stood up resolutely and marched toward Amp. "Okay, you guys, this is the part of the play where Lady Banquo comes and drags Banquo off to a secluded cave somewhere so they can make little baby Banquos."
"Whoa!" Amp shrieked as he was dragged off.
Sam frowned.
"Hey! That's my line! And Sydney, did you even hear me?"
"Um...what?" she asked absently, still glaring black death at the three directors/witches.
"I said, I've been thinking about what's wrong with Tanker."
"Is that in alphabetical order, or in the order you've noticed then through the years?" Malcolm put in.
"Go away, Malcolm!" Sam requested.
"Yeah, I've noticed a few things wrong with him," Sydney replied, ignoring Malcolm. "He's pitifully stupid, obsessed with football, and completely inconsiderate. He sure looks good in tights, though," she finished, gazing appreciatively at his backside. "But he's certainly not putting up much of a fight when he has to make out with three girls!"
"No offence, Syd, but neither would I," Sam admitted apologetically.
"Nor I," Malcolm agreed. "Although, making out with one would be sufficient."
"Oh, shut up! Both of you!" Sydney exclaimed.
"Hey, football," Tanker called pleadingly as Brandi temporarily released him long enough to breathe. "I have to make footballs for my football!"
Malcolm cackled evilly, drumming the tips of his fingers together.
"Everything's working out perfectly...I am the greatest evil boy genius in the world."
The little Kilokhan appeared on his shoulder.
"Yes, Malcolm, you are completely brilliant. I love and respect you."
Then the little Servo appeared on his other shoulder.
"Yeah, Malcolm, even though you're my enemy, I love and respect you, too."
"It's weird, Servo," Malcolm noted, scratching his head. "You sound an awful lot like Sam Collins, only more echoey, and slightly lower in pitch, like a bad special effect."
"Uh...I'm sure it's just a coincidence," the Servo perched on his shoulder laughed nervously.
Malcolm beamed.
"I love my shoulder angels..."
"Um...your what?" Sam asked, frowning.
"Uh...er...nothing! I just meant that...er.I've been under a lot of pressure lately. Maybe I need a nap."
"Oh! Well, maybe you just need to lie down for a while," Sydney suggested. "C'mon, I'll take you to the nurse's office."
"No thank you, that won't be necessary," he replied.
"I'm going to the nurse's office with or without you, Malcolm. I can't watch any more of this..."
"Nor can I," he agreed. "It looks like some sort of primate mating ritual."
"Yeah, I remember seeing something like that when I was living with the pack of wild chimps on the Serengeti," Amp announced.
"Amp, you aren't here!" Sam reminded him. "You're in the closet with Yoli!"
"Oh, right!" Amp laughed as he disappeared in a puff of continuity.
"Odd," Malcolm frowned. "I've never seen continuity on this show before."
"Malcolm!" Sydney called sharply. "We were taking you to the nurse's office, remember?"
"More continuity?" he gasped. "I...I feel funny..."
"That's because you're going to pass out if you don't lie down soon," she announced, poking him in the arm.
"Oh, all right," he grumbled. "Let's go."
"Is this a football I see before me?" Tanker's voice drifted after them.
"Like, no! It's a dagger," Mandi informed him, annoyed.
"Let's rehearse the make-out scene again!" Candi suggested excitedly.
"It's a hard football," Tanker sighed, only half reluctant.
The sound of creaking teeth filled the air.
"Let's go, Malcolm," Sydney pleaded. "If I stay in here for another second, there'll be little bits of blonde hair lying everywhere, and the blood of three idiotic witches will run like water."
"I am seeing you in a whole new light," Malcolm sighed, watching with hands clasped and eyes shiny.
"That's because the budget's gone up, and we replaced the one that burned out last year," she told him as they left the cafeteria. "Someone found twenty bucks in the lining of their coat!"
"Hey, where do you think those two are going?" Yoli muttered aside to Amp as they wandered back to the stage.
Amp's eyes widened.
"You don't think they're going to do what WE were doing, do you?"
Yoli gasped in dismay.
"Oh, lord, I hope not. That would just...oh, lord, no."
Amp shuddered.
"They're not...they're not ready!"
"Yeah!" Yoli agreed. "Something like that requires a lot of forethought and preparation."
"I know! And we used up all the ingredients on OUR batch of brownies!"
"They do smell good, though," the young woman admitted, breathing in the aroma.
"Snack-tacular!" Amp agreed, grinning.
"Do you ever run out of those?" she asked, smiling up at him fondly.
"No-tacular!"