Back From The Future – a Not-so-Tiny Toons tale.
Being the sequel to "There's No Drama Like Noh Drama"…
Chapter One
The old buildings of Acme Looniversity were in a sad state of decay, Ricardo Rat thought as he looked across from the bus stop at the corner where he waited with his sister Renata. "Kinda sad to see it like that. Dad said it used to be a jumping place. Toons would do anything to get into those classes."
Renata sniffed. "I don't see why you want to. Off back to Digitalis U for me!" She patted her carefully labelled Kevlar reinforced luggage (waterproof and fireproof, as per school regulations) addressed to the all-action film university in Even Bolder, Colorado. "You'll be the ones to turn off the lights and close the door, the day you graduate – kinda depressing? If it even stays open that long."
Ricardo shrugged. "I'm with a great bunch, us Juniors! So what if it took three years to scrape up enough Toons for a full class? We got the cream of three years, not one. It's just us and the Seniors – they're the last year they got enough students to make a regular class like they used to."
Renata cast her brother a searching look. "I've seen some of them. The staff must have been pretty desperate. They had to scrape a lot of barrels and look under a lot of rocks to make up that class."
"They're not that bad!" Ricardo protested. "So, they don't all look like they're drawn on the Warner Brothers ™ model-sheets – because they're not. You know the studio bought up a pile of franchises; they all had their own in-house look. So, we don't all look like we're drawn from the Golden Age." He respectfully nodded towards the distant Lake Acme where the statues of Saints Avery, Jones and Clampett used to stand. "It's not like there's been many Toons of any sort born, these days." True, the traditional storks carrying bundles seemed to have become an endangered species in the past ten years and more.
"Rather you than me. Well, looks like this is my bus. See you Summer holiday!" Renata accepted her brother's help loading her bags on the coach, and headed out for a Summer term of action, adventure and learning how to make four-wheel drive vehicles perform like a parkour champion over burning buildings while being chased by either aliens or black helicopters. Some days, both.
Ricardo waved her farewell and watched the bus till it vanished round the bend. Renata was the first in his family to attend Digitalis U, rats not being traditionally noted as action heroes and heroines. He winced slightly, recalling her last words to him about breaking other family traditions.
"We rats are meant to leave a sinking ship," he murmured, looking up at the peeling, unpainted tower of the Looniversity. "Not to join one."
"Hey, Retard-O!" A harsh voice ahead jolted him out of his musing. Blocking his path were a pair of hulking mastiffs he knew all too well; the Bone Brothers.
Ricardo forced a smile. "Hello, Ox. Hello, T. Got into Perfecto yet? I hear they're always looking for replacement Sports Scholars." The Looniversity's traditional rivals were thriving and kept their tradition of hiring expendable muscle. The ideal Sports Scholar was a heavyweight Toon who never thought to ask just why the turnover rate was so very high.
T Bone swelled with pride. "Yeah! Start in September! They say we gots to put in lotsa practice first."
"Like tackling. I see a tackle dummy, right here. Ain't that handy." Ox Bone grinned, cracking his knuckles. "And then it's pinata practice time – and you get to play the pinata!"
Ricardo's ears went down. He looked around for a handy tree or a wall to dodge around faster than the massive mastiffs could follow – but there was nothing.
Just then there was a roar as of an approaching jet aircraft – Ricardo looked round to see what looked like a small tornado cloud heading his way. He prudently dodged, and the Bone Brothers were caught in the maelstrom – to be instantly hurled a hundred yards into the topmost branches of a pine tree, where they dangled helplessly. Half a dozen young Toons ran out with long sticks, former victims of the mastiffs eager to get in some pinata practice themselves.
The maelstrom spun down, resolving itself into a startlingly handsome human boy Ricardo's age standing crouched like a coiled spring, his hair a wildly bristling mop of spiky purple. He gave an unnervingly wide grin, revealing more teeth than a human should have. "Yaa! Ricky-boy! Good friend!" The accent was vaguely Australian.
"Good to see you too, Bruce." Ricardo sighed in relief. "Back for another term."
Bruce nodded vigorously, "See friends, yaa! Hear good tales of old funny times!"
Ricardo looked round nervously. "Best keep quiet about that," he said softly. "You don't want the staff to think we like that sorta thing."
Ricardo and Bruce walked up into the surviving wing of the building; just having two classes to teach, the place felt empty. Ricardo suddenly grinned at the reminder of the final day of their Spring term; on the blackboard of Professor Coyote's Toon Science classroom was still chalked a hundred times: 'OSMIUM AND TERBIUM ARE CHEMICAL ELEMENTS. ODIUM AND TEDIUM ARE NOT.' Then he sighed, looking at the old-fashioned blackboard. "It'd be great if we still had computers. Make things easier."
"We gots computers!" Bruce waved at the motes of dust picked out in the sun shining through the windows. "All over!"
"But they won't talk to us anymore." Ricardo said. "Making them smaller was a good idea, to start with. And so was wireless network and power. Now they're so small we can't even find the things! Or even turn them off!"
Ricardo spotted two of his class – green-feathered mallard sisters, identically clad in severe floor-length black dresses, with pristine white starched collars and bonnets as if they had stepped out of the seventeenth century. One had blonde head-feathers (mostly hidden by the demure bonnet), the other russet auburn. He waved. "Marlene! Marylyn! Good to see you back again!"
The blonde one looked at him disdainfully, her beak wrinkling. "You know we don't answer to those names. Chastity and Fidela Mallard, we are."
"Quackers," Bruce muttered under his breath.
Ricardo smiled. "Well, anyway, welcome back. The old place needs all the Toons it can get."
Fidela sniffed. "You're looking disturbingly cheerful. You should try these." She produced a bottle of non-prescription pills.
It was Ricardo's turn to wrinkle his snout. "Killjoys? No thank you. I don't take painkillers unless I really have to – and I don't take those things. Not much fun as it is round here."
"See you in class." The black-clad sisters haughtily swished away down the corridor.
Ricardo smiled as another pair appeared, Toons of a friendlier disposition. One was a roundish girl bear who seemed to be furless – indeed, her skin was taut and glossy and looked more like vinyl than ordinary skin. Around her waist she wore a belt of thick, heavy looking metal plates. Her companion, carefully staying an arm's length from her, was a young porcupine boy.
"Bubbles! Spike! Great to see you!" Ricardo said. "Glad to see us getting back. Every term I wonder. Seen anyone else back yet?"
"Saw Marcus, cantering in," Spike offered. "There's no mistaking Double-M, even half a mile off."
Bubbles nodded. "And we met the dismal ducklings," she said. Her voice was high and squeaky. "What IS it with those two?"
Spike shrugged. "Being a rebel, I guess. Like kids of hippies join up with merciless mercenary squads, or circus kids running off to be stockbrokers. They could have picked a more fun way of doing it." He paused. "I've seen their mom on TV, she's everything they're not, all right."
"I know one of the seniors, that lizard guy, has the same thing. His folks are those Evil Reptilian Overlords™ who used to keep the place going," Ricardo offered. "And he's at Acme Loo, not Perfecto. Less of a dress code, I guess."
Bubbles shuddered. She looked down at the heavy weighted belt at her waist. "This, I need to wear. Those two NeoPur ducks – I've seen them in the showers. You know they actually choose to wear chastity belts, full medieval? There is no point! We're Toons, when we're 'concealed' there's absolutely nothing... there. Not even to X-ray vision schticks!"
"I think that's called, making a point. And porcupines, we know all about points." Spike grinned. His needle-sharp spines shivered as he flexed his back.
Ricardo choked back a laugh, then looked around nervously. "Don't let the Teachers hear that. Making jokes, at a Looniversity of all places..."
Just down the corridor, behind a locked door labelled 'Dean of Hard Knocks', the Toon teacher in charge of that classroom was busily typing at an ancient telex machine that needed no computing power. Which was a good thing, as there was none to be had any more apart from ageing survivors that were finally expiring as the years went by.
Professor Calamity Coyote sighed. Though a fairly young Toon, in fact only sixteen years a graduate, this job was wearing him out; it was a good thing he was grey furred to start with, he thought wryly. On the other end of the link and the far side of the country was his ex-classmate Bookworm, the highly educated annelid safe in the still-running MiskaToonic University near BosToon. Their arcane spell wards had shielded them from the effects of the Dumb Bomb, and Bookworm was his last source of accurate news. None of it was good these days.
You're certain the prophecies have it right this time? Calamity typed. We've had false alarms before. He waited for the paper tape to start moving in reply.
It all lines up. Bookworm typed back from his BosToon bolthole, as he read from a classic Dire Prophecy™. 'And that time will be easy to know, for Toons will be as the Great Stuffed Ones, beyond good and Evil, laughing and shouting and malleting in wild abandon. And the Great Stuffed ones shall come forth from Beyond and teach them new ways to laugh and shout and mallet, till the all world shall burn in the ancient Chaos…'
Ouch. Calamity winced. The first part of it's here. We should try and avoid Part Two.
Another dire 'end-times' prophecy, Bookworm typed back resignedly. Just once in a while, it'd be good to have a Nice prophecy…
Outside the building, another pair who had known the Looniversity in better days were looking up at it, holding each other's paws for reassurance. The statues of Professors Bugs and Daffy that once watched proudly over their students were gone; just smashed remains of their plinths survived.
"The place has really gone downhill," Babs declared, walking uphill to meet it. The steps of Acme Looniversity were dirty and poorly maintained; the wing of the building to their right was crudely boarded up. "Doesn't look like many Toons come here anymore."
"Students, or staff," Buster nodded agreement, pointing at a faded sign reading 'STAFF WANTED'. Someone had added by hand (or paw) the scrawled word 'Desperately!'
"Hmm. Seems like they need help. And we need to find out what's going on," Babs said, a mischievous light in her eyes. "Not the adventure we were planning but… here we are."
"Start of Summer term, looks like," Buster looked at the trees appraisingly, judging the slightly sun-scorched Spring tints to the trees. "Just in time for the next class to arrive. If there is one."
"Let's go look!" With that, the Bunnies picked their way up the stairs and into Acme Looniversity. They looked around checking for the traditional bucket of water poised above the door (in a comedy college, you checked every time), and pushed the big main doors open with a creak. Nothing fell or splattered. The reality was far worse.
The first thing they saw was a twenty-foot banner that hung where the murals of Professor Bugs and Daffy doing their thing with the rest of the supporting cast used to be. The banner read - IT'S NOT FUNNY.
"Uh-oh…" the bunnies chorused.
Cautiously, they advanced down the corridor, looking left and right – plus up and down, for dangers. Many of the rooms were obviously locked and disused, but there was a light on in one of the offices.
"Professor Wile-E Coyote's office," Babs whispered. "He's still around? We can ask him what happened."
"Close, but no chocolate cigar, Babsy." Buster whispered back. As they got closer, they could see the nameplate (actually, a piece of cardboard stuck over the brass original) read 'Prof. Calamity Coyote.' In faded marker pen.
Bracing themselves for a shock, they knocked on the door.
In a few seconds it opened, and they recognised their old classmate – now looking distinctly older. And haggard. The coyote's jaw fell to the floor with a Wild Take thump.
Calamity blinked, his eyes going wide and his speech signboard a flashing mass of exclamation marks. Babs and Buster? You're alive?
"Hmm. Let's see." Babs spin-changed into her Nurse Babs outfit, pulled out her clinical stopwatch and made a show of taking her own pulse. "That seems to be the diagnosis, Doctor."
"Any reason we shouldn't be?" Buster raised an eyebrow. "I don't recall any Dip floods recently. There's not much else can stop a Toon."
But… you vanished. Fifteen years ago. We searched for years. Shirley and her aura even searched the astral plane for your spirits… they said you weren't there either. You weren't alive or dead. I… I never gave up hope. Calamity's eyes grew dim with tears. And… you look so young. You even have another cub. I remember your first, little Blitz. He must be mostly grown now.
"Not so much," Buster grinned and turned round so the cub-carrier faced Calamity. "See for yourself; he's keeping warm right here." Blitz's QuanToon level fuzzy ears gained sharper definition as more people observed him. "Our little son and hare."
The coyote blinked. But he was born sixteen years ago! None of you have aged. He paused, the cooling vanes on his thinking-cap briefly glowing cherry-red. The only way that could happen is… time travel? You jumped forward, so for fifteen years you weren't – anywhere. But how? You got a time machine working?
"We took the wrong turn, trying to get home out of Wacky-land; it happens. For us, that was half an hour ago. No time-machine involved." Buster nodded. In his Hammerspace pocket he had a Wacky-Land souvenir for his friend; a collection of the supersymmetric particles he had heard scientists had been eagerly searching for a while (Babs had been more critical, declaring that they looked pretty nice, but hardly Super…). Now was not a suitably leisurely time to bring them out.
"Which is bad. Because if there Was a time machine, we could bamboozle the absent-minded scientist in charge and hitch a ride home on it." Babs' ears drooped. She looked around; there had been a distinct lack of customized classic Super-Cars parked outside the building. "What… Happened around here?"
The coyote shrugged. Fifteen years. Where do I start? It wasn't one big thing. People started getting offended about – anything. Just because they could, never mind a reason. You couldn't show this … or that…. We kept losing classes.
"What, no 'villain-whopping'" Buster asked, amazed.
Nope. That's 'moralist prejudice'. Saying villains are worse or different to anyone else, is out.
"No 'Exploding cakes'?" Babs asked, then her ears drooped. "Oh. I can see that one's got problems baked in."
"Hound-teasing tricks?" Buster asked, recalling Professor Leghorn's classes.
Species discrimination. You can get a year in a re-education program for that, the coyote shuddered. Don't go there.
"Ewww." Babs poked a pink tongue out.
"Spotlight stealing?" Buster recalled the only class Plucky had been fanatical about, taught by his mentor and idol, Daffy.
No spotlights anymore. Nobody to be in them. Being better than anyone else is 'offensive to the mediummajority' Calamity's face broke new records in the 'woebegone' expressions class. I'm the last of our class still around. Our Principal, Ms. Sioux-Zanne, she's a Looniversity grad, younger than us. She missed being hit by the Dumb Bomb; sensory deprivation tanks were an 'in' thing that week. She was in one when it all went down, it made for good shielding.
"Marie Sioux-Zanne." Buster said thoughtfully. "Same class as Babs' brother Mortimer? I heard of her. Saw her in the class play last month."
It really WAS only last month… for you. Calamity shrugged. She's done well in the 'new normality.'
"Oh yes. 'Mary-Sue', the class fink," Babs' adorable nose wrinkled as if she had bitten into a rotten carrot. "Mortimer told me all about her. Ratted on her own class to the Studio suits, worse than any natural-born rodent. I kinda doubt she's improved with age. She's the Principal? Are we allowed to say, 'Oy vey!'?"
No! Not without the right ethnicity, documented and chromoplasm tested. And triplicate paperwork to prove it. Or that's Cultural Appropriation. The coyote looked around fearfully. You don't want to get caught for that, either. His ears went right down. Most humour is banned. Even sarcasm.
"Like, banning sarcasm, that's a great idea," Babs snarked. "I bet it took a real genius to think up that one."
Calamity flinched back. Don't say it like that! Not to anyone else! It's two years compulsory treatment in a Humour conversion therapy camp!
Babs and Buster exchanged glances.
"The villains are in charge now?" Babs asked curiously. "So, why isn't Professor Yosemite Sam Principal?"
Even he left. Haven't heard from him in years. The Antagonists gave up too. Calamity projected a flashback of the ornery cowboy running wild for a few months, then gradually losing heart with nobody allowed to even disapprove of him, let alone provide the thrill of a chase. He had gone back to holding up trains for a time in the Wild West, but modern Amtrak rarely carried the sort of negotiable loot to make for easy disposal in shady cantinas South of the border. Last thing he said to me was, there's nothing like seeing your face on a good high-priced Wanted poster to make an outlaw feel… wanted. And now there aren't any, he's not.
"Ouch." Babs' ears went right down.
"Looks like you could use some help," Buster said, casting a glance to his pink-furred wife who nodded eagerly.
We could! And I'll tell everyone you're back! Most people left. Shirley's a Major now, serving with her unit overseas, 'Ghost Division'… Fifi and Rhubella live in France, Mary and her herd are on Mars, Furrball's in Japan with his families, Dizzy and Mitzi are in Tasmania… he broke off, seeing Babs shaking her head.
"Later, we'll tell them." Babs said. "But I think we'll keep quiet about being back. For now. We can help out."
I really, really need it. Calamity nodded. Over Easter Break Professor Meritus quit and Professor Knott-Bormann retired, back to Argentina. *
* (Editor's note: he retired when his main gag finally went out-of-date after enjoying decades of people saying "Not-Bormann? Ancient German guy, been years in South America? Sure, of course you're not Bormann…")
"New staff. You want it, you got it. But not Babs and Buster Bunny, who are missing, presumed Dipped. What you get… is a respectable couple, who happen to be slumming it in the ol' town. Biff and Buffy Vanderbunny!" Babs winked at her husband and they spin-changed in perfect sync. In their places now stood a pair of elegantly attired, slightly aloof-looking rabbits of patently patrician pedigree. An air of New England and Old Money wafted through the room.
"Quite a bijou-looking place, eh, Buffy?" 'Biff' drawled, taking a monocle out of his eye and looking around appraisingly. "Despite being deucedly… demi-monde, dontcha' think?"
"Decidedly demi-monde, dear," 'Buffy' replied in the same tones. "But possibly… perhaps, presenting... possibilities?"
"Precisely." 'Biff' nodded. He turned to Calamity "And now, my good fellow… if you could get the jolly old paperwork moving? For your new teachers?"
Spin-changing. I'd forgotten you could DO that. The coyote blinked tears of joy from his eyes. Toons don't get taught it anymore.
"Until now." 'Biff' said firmly. "And we have come… at the turning of the tide."
Everyone ducked as a copyright lawsuit zoomed past and off into the distance.
I'll get the paperwork! Calamity trotted away down to the School Office, looking happier than he had been in a long while.
A pair of disguised rabbits watched him go.
"I'm glad Calamity's here, but… it makes you wonder why even he stuck around," Babs whispered. She pointed to one of the banners on the wall, proclaiming Laughing WITH is really laughing AT.
Buster gave an embarrassed shrug. "Think about it, Babsy. Coyotes. Addiction to hopeless causes; it's a Coyote Thing. Just ask any Road Runner."
"Too true, true-blue," Babs said wryly.
The coyote in question returned, looking happier. Looks like Ms Sioux-Zanne isn't here yet.I can show you to your offices. He waved a sheaf of papers. Old Professor Knott-Bormann was doubling as school secretary… and he was a great Secretary, with years of experience. Life and soul of the Party, too. I'm not even sure where to file these.
Buster followed him to an office whose door still had the plaque that proclaimed 'Professor E. Meritus'. "Name rings a bell," he mused. With perfect timing, the school bell rang.
Yikes! No time now for the paperwork. We've two classes starting in half an hour and no staff! Take your pick – Juniors or Seniors. Calamity's sign displayed a flustered-looking font. I've got the class notes so you know who's who.
"I pick Juniors," Babs declared.
Buster nodded. "Seniors for me. What are they learning? Can't be far off exam time, this time of year."
Calamity's already woebegone face fell further as he passed them a sheaf of paw-written notes apiece. No tests. We're not allowed to discriminate on grounds of Academic ability.
Babs pulled a face. "Eww. Not that I liked exams but… how do you know how much you've learned?" She thought back fondly to her triumphant graduation, Professor Bugs proudly handing her what was only the third 'summa cum looney' graduation triple honours awarded in the whole Looniversity's history.
They don't learn much. Especially not Comedy. They're not meant to either; the entire place was meant to close five years ago. One of our students, George Clumper-Duff, saved us for now. It's a record-breakingly complex Legal thing, Contractual Obligation, don't ask me the details. The other side lost three very expensively qualified Evil Lawyers to the loony bin, just trying to work out how he did it.
"Hmm. George Clumper-Duff? If he's in the Seniors now... that means Elmyra's son was a legal super-genius five years back, at nine years old?" Babs guessed, calculating ages. "You'll be telling me next he's got a 4-figure IQ."
Calamity blinked. He has. So has his sister Myrela. They make me look like Concorde Condor having a bad day. They're always on time too, should be coming in about now. Good luck! With that, he vanished back to his office.
"Elmyra 'evolved' into Rymela, Toon of Mystery, when she took up bounty-hunting" Buster reminisced. "And her daughter's called Myrela?"
"Sister of George Junior, the son of George. Never had much imagination, did Elmyra," Babs shrugged. Her eyes widened. "That must be them, all right!" She pointed.
At the end of the corridor were a pair of tall, graceful-looking Toons walking towards them – one, an obvious hare rather than rabbit buck, was powerfully built but moved with grace and agility. His visible body-fur was pale ginger but his head-fur a deep, rich red. Next to him walked a respectably clad bunny-girl – not a purebred rabbit doe like Babs but more like a human Playboy 'bunny' who had been born as that being her natural model-sheet. Her vivid red hair was tied up in a prim bun, revealing a set of human ears as well as long, shapely rabbit ears that added a foot to her height. By the way her cottontail wriggled as she walked, it was not a clip-on.
"I know that hare-style," Babs whispered. "Just pull one quick-release pin, the whole hairdo swishes open, silhouetted against the light in a special 'revealing all her radiant beauty' effect."
"And I confirm George's glasses really are plain, flat glass, standard prop for the 'mild-mannered reporter' trope, to be taken off and reveal the Toon of Action," Buster confirmed. "Yup. That's them."
They walked down the corridor and stopped two paces from the senior students. "Biff Vanderbunny's the name, your new teacher," Buster said, in the lazy drawl of that character. He waved at 'Buffy' with an expansive gesture. "And my charming wife, the lady Buffy. Your other new teacher, don't'cha know. Pleased to meetcha."
Elmyra's children exchanged slightly amused glances. "Likewise, Sir, Ma'am – or should we say, Mister Buster Bunny. And the long-missed Babs Bunny, star of classic Bollywood." George's voice was deep and resonant. "Plus the triumph of cinema verité – in 'Ain't She Swell.'" He looked at Blitz, the fuzzy cub just poking out of Buster's cub carrier and bowed slightly.
"And Blitz Bunny, youngest ever co-star. He was in that film months before he was even born," Myrela smiled.
Babs blinked, checking her and Buster's spin-change disguises for flaws and finding none. "How did you know?"
"We deduced it." Myrela said, her voice a clear musical tone. "Welcome back to Acme Acres." She dipped an ear, looking around. "Though it's not as nice as when you left it, more's the pity. We were brought up hearing stories about you."
"We knew your parents," Buster said. He blinked. "I'm glad you turned out... well. Considering." Wouldn't it be funny if Elmyra's kids were the smartest carrot cookies in town? He thought, amazed. She's the only Toon got outsmarted by her pet rocks.
The huge buck smiled. "I know what you're trying hard NOT to say, Sir. We know our parents had their limitations. But they did their best for us – as best they knew."
"Yes. When we'd go camping in the woods Mother would spray us all over with bug spray to protect us." Myrela reminisced. She frowned slightly. "Then she did the same with the bear spray."
"Ouch," Babs shivered.
"They meant well. And at least now we're immune to the effects of peeling onions. And to tear-gas." George Jr. smiled.
"Tough love," Buster commented, trying not to think of the vast Pet Cemetery behind the original Elmyra's house, full of pets she had loved past their breaking point. 'Testing to destruction' was not solely an engineering thing.
"Indeed. We're the only rabbits – at least, the only Toons of lepine stock, in the school right now," George said. "We do what we can, but somehow…"
"It's as if there was a rabbit-shaped hole in the Fun-damental nature of things. We can't always fill it, being part human." Myrela finished for her brother. "We've observed the need, but we need more data to see what could have caused it."
Babs and Buster exchanged glances.
"No other rabbits?" Babs asked cautiously. A quick mental count put her two youngest litters of siblings at Looniversity age right now. Although not every young Toon had the interests or abilities for the courses they had offered here, she would have expected at least one sibling in class. "No brave bucks or darling does to hold the show together?"
"None." Myrela shook her head. "And now, Sir and Ma'am, we all have class. It's over there." She pointed, nodded respectfully and headed down the corridor with her brother.
As the two hybrid hares headed to the Seniors classroom, Babs' muzzle wrinkled in concentration. "Decision time, blue-boy," she whispered fiercely. "How do we play this? Principal Mary-Sue will kick us out on our cotton-tails for sure if we start trying to teach comedy – and that's what we know."
"And then we'd be of no help to the kids," Buster's ears twitched as he thought hard. Suddenly a mischievous light came to his eyes. "Remember when we shanghaied the Perfecto seniors to that retired gulag in KazakhsToon? And you played OverCaptain Commissar Carrotovitch?"
"Ooh yes, and WHAT a hard-nosed tail-kicker she was." Babs could not resist a quick spin-change to the overbearing officer, face concealed behind the mirror-fronted helmet. She thwacked her riding-crop against her spit-polished boot, grinned fiendishly and changed back to the languid Buffy Vanderbunny before any students saw her.
"That's the one. It's improv drama time again, Babsy. We can look like we're with the killjoys and... take it further. Way further. They can't argue with that. Until we push it till it breaks."
"Turn the dial to twelve and blow their speakers, for good. I like your style, buck of mine." Babs quickly kissed her husband's nose. A look of fiendish glee washed over her adorable features. "And I think I'm going to like this." The two exchanged cheek-rubs in rabbit style and went their separate ways.
Hurrying into the class marked "Juniors", Babs checked her Buffy Vanderbunny persona for flaws and found none; retaining the Cutest Toes in History might be a giveaway but nothing she was willing to change. Besides, none of this class have ever seen me, not in the fur... even if they grew up on our Bollywood films she thought with a pang. Already seated were a friendly-looking rat male and a shock-headed human boy who shifted and twitched as if he was about to leap into action at any second. They both rose politely as they saw her enter.
"You're a new teacher, Ma'am?" The rat asked politely. "I'm Ricardo Rat, of Acme Acres."
"Yaa! I Bruce Avery, of Tasmania!" The human bounced up and down eagerly.
"Yes…" 'Buffy' nodded languidly as behind the cover of the desk she franticly shuffled the class notes Calamity had given her, spotting who was who.
Ricardo Rat. Character Class, 'not-what-you-expect', she read. Helpful, a good friend to most Toons. Wealthy family but doesn't rub it in. Refused an offer from Perfecto to come here. Her eyebrows rose at the entry for the apparently human boy. Bruce Avery. Tasmanian exchange student, Character class Intelligent Wild Guy. Schticks; cast-iron stomach, eats anything and everything. Burns it off, too. Secondary schtick – said to have marsupial biology in places. Not sure which bits.
O-ho, Babs snickered inwardly as her devious bunny brain whirred. A Tasmanian Devil in human's clothing. Very interesting. Looks like he's got Mitzi's looks and brains plus Dizzy's energy. Some combination. She knew Mitzi had Scottish ancestry she had traced back to Robert the Bruce. So, if he inherits that too, it makes him Bruce the Bruce…
Just then two more Toons arrived, a plump bear girl with furless, glossy skin walking close to, but carefully not touching a porcupine boy. Babs nodded regally as they sat and she skimmed the notes again.
'Bubbles' Bolinski… sole survivor of an unsuccessful Studio project "Balloonatics". The pilot episode was released direct to landfill… She winced in sympathy as she read. Character class – Accident waiting to happen. Schtick: yes, she really is a balloon girl. Secondary schtick – forever needs to explain no, she's Not THAT sort of inflatable girl. Medical notes: if popped, bicycle repair kits work as first aid. You DON'T want to know the details of re-inflating her. Babs blinked, recognising the heavy-looking belt she wore was a classic diver's lead weight belt. Must make her feel more secure on windy days, she thought lightly. Gives a whole new meaning to 'watching your weight…'
The Toon the balloon girl was looking wistfully at smiled back at her, his needle-sharp quills glinting in the light in an Essence of Sharp trope.
'Spike' O'Hanlon, Babs had no difficulty in spotting the porcupine's notes. Character Class: Unfortunate Good Guy. He'd get a lot more hugs if not for the obvious problem with that.
Just then another pair arrived – duck girls, severely dressed in black and white Puritan outfits. Babs raised an eyebrow as she read the notes. Marlene and Marylyn Mallard, a.k.a. Chastity and Fidela. Character class – wet blanket. The sort that Fire Regulations say you're supposed to throw over a blazing deep-fat fryer to smother it. Someone should try it with these two. Babs suspected Calamity's notes were just a little bit partisan, or perhaps it was his ancestral predator streak surfacing. Ducks just had to be easier prey than Road Runners; everything was.
"Sister Chastity, Sister Fidela. Welcome to the class. It's good to see someone setting proper standards around here," 'Buffy' drawled. She did a quick mental count of the years, guessed ages and grinned a quick mental grin. Margot's daughters… by her maids. The first nest-full, anyway. I see they inherited her figure, plus Gladys and Gracie's head-feather colours.
Chastity looked startled for an instant by the praise, before settling down to her usual chilly demeanour. "We try, ma'm."
Very trying. For everyone. Babs snickered inwardly, as she looked through the notes. "The Mallard family, of fame and fortune. You have an eldest brother I believe, and two older sisters? And two more brothers? Are they at Looniversity?"
Fidela sniffed. "Our sisters we do not speak of. They are Bad Girls. Wantons. Nor of our twin half-brothers."
"But our eldest half-brother Douglas… he's a Senior here, a true leader of Toons. And quite virtuous, considering our family circle." Chastity declared. "Douglas aside, our siblings are corrupt, tainted fruit of... shameful, unspeakable acts."
"For unspeakable deeds, they sure talk a lot about it..." 'Spike' muttered.
"From base soil dunged with foulest guano, purest blooms arise..." 'Buffy' declaimed; a high-sounding Classical quote she had just made up.
The prim mallards preened for an instant, before catching themselves and sitting bolt upright. They brought out a bottle of pills apiece and put them on the desk ready for use.
'Buffy' dipped an ear. "You have a medical condition?" She asked.
Chastity gave a superior smile. "A spiritual, not a physical one. These are 'killjoys' – they block all sinful pleasures. So removing all chance of temptation."
"Hmm." Babs wrestled with the idea; it was far more alien to her than any of the Martian philosophies her friend Marcia had tried to explain over the years. "I thought you only racked up Virtue points if you ARE tempted – and say no."
A pair of duck beaks dropped wide in shock, as Margot's daughters looked at each other with horrified expressions.
"That is SO wrong, Ma'am, and we can prove it. And will." Fidela gasped.
'Buffy' nodded invitingly, sitting back relaxed as she waited.
"In …" Chastity said, her voice strained "an … appropriate time."
"Right." 'Buffy' said dryly. "Moving right along..."
In the classroom next door Buster looked at the notes as he scanned the class, recognising what would have been a perfect Comedy Duo had such things been allowed. "Name call! Bronze Eagle and Threecar." A 1930's style Hollywood Red Indian and an actual Native American, sitting right next to each other…. Oy!
"New teacher heap good medicine," Bronze Eagle said, sitting stiffly at his chair. He was, indeed, a yellowish-plumed American Eagle, with a head-dress of what looked incongruously like turkey feathers. Evidently Elmyra was not the only parent with limited imagination to choosing names.
'Threecar', a native mountain lion, cast an exasperated look at the eagle. "You'll have to excuse him, Sir. His character was done without reference material. Except an old Tom Mix film."
"Threecar speak with forked tongue." The eagle retorted. "Threecar tribe no real Indian, with braves and squaws. No hunt they buffalo. Hunt they rich gamblers."
"Sir, my folks discovered years ago the one sure way to make money at a Casino." The catamount flashed Buster a smile. "The secret is… to own it. Otherwise... no matter how you play, the House Odds WILL get you in the end."
"Fascinating…" Buster said languidly, keeping in character. "And… your name? I always thought your people were named after the first notable thing your parents saw after the Stork delivered you."
"Named he for three-car pileup," Bronze Eagle cut in smugly. "Casino customers heap bad drivers."
Threecar said nothing but looked daggers (tomahawks, actually) at the stoic bird sitting next to him.
"Right… and next we have… the Kate twins." Buster turned to a pair of rare breed girls – identical black rhinos. Both looked identically scandalised.
"Sir!" One of them put her hand up a fraction faster than the other. "We are NOT twins! I don't even have a Sister!"
"Neither do I," The other retorted, looking at her in disdain. "Some mad scientist made a cheap clone of me, the week before that was banned. It's been copying me ever since. They should have banned cloning years earlier."
"Yes, they should, you... copyright thief," the other Kate hissed. "Failed experiments get... deleted."
"Oh, what hath Science wrought?" Buster declaimed, shaking his head while suppressing a grin. Both Kates evidently believed they were the original; someday one of them would have a nasty shock discovering they were the dupli-Kate. Mutual Evil Twins, there's a thing, he thought gleefully.
Just them there was the sound of more feet and paws arriving. The big classroom had once been two smaller ones, and still had its original two doors. Through the left and right doors walked two tight groups of half a dozen toons each, heading for their respective sides of the classroom.
Buster raised an eyebrow as he looked at the obvious leaders. One was a green mallard drake, lean and muscular – easily the tallest bird in class, beating even the eagle. I saw him a month ago my time, no bigger than Blitz is now, Buster mentally smiled as he guessed whose first-born hatchling this was. Margot was much taller and more strongly built than Plucky, after all.
The other leader was a black and white furred skunk, of elegant and refined appearance – if the drake looked like an ice-hockey player, the skunk would be chosen by Central Casting to play a fencing or gymnastics star. Both sat down in the front row, with the classroom's one empty seat between them.
"Douglas Duck, I presume – and Victor LaFume, I presume," Buster made a show of looking at the notes. As both nodded affably, the class bell rang. Buster looked at the empty seat. "Are we all here? Anyone late, or off sick?"
"No, that's…" Douglas 'Dauntless' Duck started to say, then suddenly looked puzzled. "There's nobody there."
"It is the seat of…" Victor Ludorum LaFume said, then broke off, staring at the empty seat as if he had suddenly noticed it for the first time. "No persons."
"Right." Buster chalked up a mystery for studying later. "So, Class, I'm Biff Vanderbunny, your new teacher. Today's class; an object lesson in achieving success in the modern world. Your dear President Hitcher." 'Biff' announced. "I was privileged to see some of the early career of a sadly misunderstood Toon – who went on to become your President. Proving as we always said, that absolutely anyone can get that job."
Douglas 'Dauntless' Duck put a feather-hand up. "You mean President-for-life Hitcher, Sir?"
"The very same," 'Biff' smoothly covered, suppressing a surge of fear at that dire fact. "My good lady wife and I met him, ooh, it must be twenty years ago now. Long before his assault, I mean political rise, on WashingToon. I confess that like many, we did not appreciate him at the time." On their first ever Summer vacation from Acme Looniversity, being chased through an abandoned mine on rickety ore trucks by a chainsaw wielding maniac had been something he and Babs had, true enough, not much appreciated. "But now we understand him better."
Victor Ludorum LaFume raised a two-tone hand. "Sir, 'e is ze poster-Toon for ze Generically Mad."
"So we all thought. But now it can be told! A highly qualified team of WashingToon spin-doctors and a highly bribed backstreet brain surgeon have collaborated to tell the real story. Our dear president is simply an innocent carrier of Eastern Molvanian 'head-comes-off' sickness. Which explains so much."
"Sir, I have a national medical database onboard… I mean, I've read a lot of books, and I've never heard of it." This, from a remarkably smooth-looking human girl in the second row.
'Biff' checked his class notes and nodded knowingly. "Ah. Miss Ann D. Royd, I presume? Not everything gets recorded in the modern system. But there's plenty of such sad cases in Eastern Molvanian history – I might mention Vlad 'Mad hatchet-man' Rocuescu, or his contemporary Igor 'The happy halberd' Zhirinikov. Both of whom rose to power despite suffering the same medical disadvantages as our dear President."
"But… what about all President Hitcher's running around swinging an axe or chainsaw...?" Miss Royd said uncertainly. "And people ending up... in more bits than they started?"
'Biff' smiled a condescending smile. "Only if you look at the raw data, without the benefit of proper techniques. That's merely what we in Government call a 'statistical artefact.'" He watched the wave of shock and disbelief wash over the class. Step one, he thought, point out just how bad it's got. Step two… is for later.
After a morning of Buster giving his Method Acting skills a workout and telling himself that demoralising the very Toons he wanted to help was a vital first part of the plan, the noon bell rang and everyone headed towards the cafeteria – except for Ann Royd.
"Not dining with us this fine day?" 'Biff' asked her as he spotted her headed towards the basement.
"No Sir," Ann replied smoothly. "I find the food there... doesn't fit my energy requirements."
"Well, mind how you go down there," 'Biff' cautioned. "There's been loose wiring and stuff down there for years. Live electric cables all over the place."
Ann nodded, a sudden hungry look on her usually expressionless face, and headed downstairs.
Buster looked around as he strolled into the Acme Looniversity cafeteria. To say it had ever known for fine dining would be as accurate as saying that Professor Yosemite Sam was well-known for his caring and friendly disposition. But it had never been a Weenie-Burger franchise.
"A fine collection of new and reconditioned meals available for our value-conscious customers", he read one of the garish signs. Another boasted 'Try our new mega-value range – for big cost savings you can TASTE!'
Behind him, Babs wrinkled her snout as she queued up with her tray and tried to find something half-way edible to put on it. "I thought I'd died and gone to hell, and then I fell through a trapdoor and landed on Planet Nausea."
"Check on that" the blue buck shook his head ruefully. Still true, he decided – someone can always make a product a little bit cheaper and a whole lot worse. As they sampled the cuisine of the future, they discovered the food was just as expected.
"The chard was charred and the peas didn't please," Babs announced, pushing her half-eaten plate of violated vegetables away. "And those were the best bits." She paused. "It tastes of… sadness."
"The carrot smoothie was rough as heck, and the beet was badly beet-en by the chef," Buster agreed. "Mystery meat, they used to serve – or animal parts, anyway. Now it's more like Mystery vaguely food-like substance."
"This stuff would make a Martian hurl." Babs pulled a face. Martian food substitute and ersatz water was notorious.
Just then there was a slight stir in the crowd and a human they recognised appeared at the cafeteria entrance, her business suit decorated with strings of various cultural symbols. A simpering smile was on her face.
She's older but that's her, worse luck... Mary-Sue. Babs' ears semaphored in lepine code. Here she comes.
Principal Zanne gave a saccharine smile as she walked over. "Welcome to Acme Looniversity! Professor Calamity said his advertising had got us some new teachers."
"Teachers? That is so restrict-ist," 'Biff' drawled. "We choose to be termed 'Unstructured Activities Facilitators.'
"And not be prejudiced towards improving our students' skills or prospects," 'Buffy' chimed in. "We choose to be transparent about this." Around her the young student Toons reacted in a mix of shock and disgust – though far too many showed just weary resignation.
"Indeed. Our young charges will learn the valuable life lesson that there are many people out there who do not have their welfare in mind…" 'Biff' said smugly. "Quite the reverse."
Principal Zanne stepped back, awe in her eyes. "I can see we're all going to get along very nicely!" She gushed. "I'm most surprised a sadly... unreconstructed Toon like Professor Calamity brought in such up-to-date thinkers!"
"Oh, I think you'll be surprised at what we can do for this old place," 'Buffy' radiated an air of wholesome truthfulness. Behind her façade she smiled. But I DON'T think you're going to like it…
The Principal cast her gaze about, scanning the nearby students – and spotted Bruce Avery bounding in. "Ah! Here's one of my most Affirmatively Acclaimed stars. It used to be, if you had the lifestyle choice 'cannibal' you'd avoid putting it on your application forms for fear of public prejudice and official persecution. Not anymore." She turned eagerly to the madly grinning junior. "Tell me. Have you… fed?"
"Yaa! Bruce eaten." Bruce showed a more than human complement of sharp, freshly red-stained teeth. "Not say who."
Marie-Sioux Zanne clapped her hands together in delight. "And that is the sort of inclusiveness we want! So it's best for everybody."
"Indeed." 'Biff' drawled, his nose twitching. If Mary-Sue had a half-decent sense of smell she'd know he's just been eating red beetroot, he thought knowingly. And if Mitzy Avery's his mom… she'd know just how to play it with that application. Smart, smart lady. Guaranteed Bruce got his place here.
"After all, what is a cannibal but the last word in Recycling?" 'Buffy' flashed a fawning smile to match the Principal's own. "And we all know how important that is."
"Yes indeed," the Principal nodded happily. "I can see you're well versed in the prerogatives of the Medium Majority."
"Medium? I think not. The currently acceptable term I think you'll find is the 'Mediocre Majority.' Completely talentless, dull folk have been so discriminated against, don't you think?" 'Buffy' raised an eyebrow archly. "Until now. And above all else we need to avoid being a borfin. Or still worse, a blorfin."
Principal Marie-Sioux's eyes flashed in alarm for one film frame, then she stood, smiling. "I think at last, I have exactly the teachers this outmoded establishment has been looking for."
Babs and Buster flashed each other a knowing smile. "Absolutely." They chorused.
After lunch break and an afternoon of proving to their suffering students how misapplied the phrase 'no pain no gain' could be, at last the bell rang and two classes of shell-shocked Toons staggered out to head homewards.
Carefully checking nobody but Calamity was in sight, Babs dropped her disguise and headed over to the Seniors classroom to swap notes with him and Buster on how the day had gone. As Buster described his class, suddenly she froze up - special-effect icicles clung to her fur for a few seconds before tinkling to the floor.
Babs pointed to the perpetually empty seat in the middle of the front row; from what Calamity had said it had been a feature since that class started, though nobody could ever explain why. "Oh, Buster," she whispered, her eyes suddenly tearing up. "That's Blitz's seat. He was meant to be here all along. It's in the script that he IS here, except… he's not."
"Check on that, Babs," Buster said grimly. "If Toons meant to be in the film don't turn up – things on stage get messy. And not in a good way."
"You told me; you'd seen that. That second Christmas holiday at Acme Loo, our last official Class Film, the Christmas Special? You found out what things would have been like without you in the scene." Babs blinked. A depressed Buster had been sure the plot would have got along just fine without him, until he was shown a vision of that future by his Guardian Angel. Acme Looniversity becoming the 'pay-as-you-go Montana Max Business College' had not been the worst of it. It had not been 'A Wonderful Life' for any of his friends. Except, oddly enough, for Plucky.
"Yeah. You ended up as Plucky's flunky, stooge and… anvil-bait. Not good." Buster recalled, his ears right down. "And that's with just me missing from the scene. This timeline is minus me, you, Blitz and… more."
"Maybe a lot more." Babs' pink-furred hand pressed her tummy protectively. "We have to get back and fix this. This is NOT a world I want our litters growing up in." She paused. "Things didn't have to turn out this way; we've seen it otherwise, a lot better. I wonder what we did, that made such a difference. When we didn't."
Buster shrugged. "Maybe we never knew, Babaloo. Not that we'd want to step on any of those tricky Chaos Butterflies, but... big bunny paws, over the years, accidentally…."
"We could have stomped squadrons of them," Babs finished. "And young cubs will try and eat anything." She cast a loving gaze at little Blitz.
What you said to our Principal. A Borfin? A blorfin? I've never heard of those. Calamity looked puzzled.
"Borfin and Blorfin. Sound like a pair of dwarves from a third-rate Tolkien knock-off," Buster mused. "Never heard of them myself."
Babs snickered. "Neither did anyone else. So, I stole, I mean recycled, a Perfecto Prep meme. They can afford it. Those Toony snobs don't DARE ever hint there's fashion they don't know. So they'll go along with anything if it sounds exclusive enough. No matter how stupid."
"Emperor's New Clothes style. And Principal Mary-Sue will start feeling pretty chilly, pretty quick. Which won't look pretty on her," Buster noted. "You remember Rubella Rat? Her mom went through five years of Perfecto sneering at everyone for being 'Decembrists.' Made real sure to never explain what she meant by it."
That idea... works. Calamity genuflected towards the icon of ''Bob' Dodds on the wall. Saint Bob always says, 'we must have Slack.' Never defined that, either...
"Thinking of weird ideas… what's this 'Dumb Bomb' you mentioned?" Buster asked Calamity. "The place looks like it's been dumbed-down till Concorde Condor's head of the class." Today there had been an equivalent poster-toon for the single figure IQ demographic in Senior class, who strangely enough was an owl – by tradition the wisest of birds. There was a beaver as well, who had done his best to strenuously avoid doing a stroke of work.
Calamity sighed. We were hit by a rogue state. North...
"Korea?" Babs broke in, amazed. "They actually managed it?"
No, they're cool these days, since they got their new King Kim the 4th, the 'OK-I'll-admit-it-we're-really-kings-after-all' Leader. It was North Dakota broke away. Calamity's sign board showed a national map with a square-ish block next to the Canadian border flashing an angry red.
"North Dakota? Babs mused. "Weird. Except for twenty-foot snowdrifts in April, I never heard of anything ever happening up there."
"Maybe they got tired of that, and made things happen," Buster suggested. "All I know up there was that concrete burrow complex ACME recycled for us. And now they don't even have that." Reconditioned missile silos were popular with rabbit families, who appreciated having a really tough front door to close against the world.
"I bet that surprised WashingToon. Everyone expected the South to rise again, not the North." Babs waggled her eyebrows Groucho Marx style.
When North Dakota broke loose, they knew they had to defend themselves. WashingToon would want to grab them back immediately, whatever it took. Want them in the worst possible way, Calamity signed.
"The worst possible way. Hmm." Babs tapped her front chisel-teeth thoughtfully. "Worst way we ever tried it was... sideways. In a hammock."
Calamity shrugged. Anyway. They'd taken an Air Force base, it had some Smart Bombs but not the plans for making more of them. So they put a Reverse Engineer on the job.
"Ohhh, bad news incoming. I can guess this one. A regular engineer would just have copied them. But a Reverse Engineer – reversed them." Buster winced. "The Dumb Bomb."
That's what they hit us with, Calamity nodded dejectedly.
"It took out the whole country? It was that powerful?" Buster blinked.
Didn't have to be. WashingToon started the 'reconquest' and a TV crew was filming them live on air when the Dumb Bomb went off – and one of the journalists was on the phone at the time. Psychiatric blast spread along both networks, amplified by every booster tower. Anyone watching TV or on a phone… The coyote winced. Became highly contagious by eye contact. Good thing I was out in the desert that day, and never was into afternoon soap operas.
"Ewww…" Babs shivered. "It would have got me. That was my favourite viewing time, weekends. Vegetable hospital…" She thought back to lunch and imagined that violated veg being rushed into Emergency on the show with all sirens wailing; even the best and most photogenic prime-time TV surgeons would be unable to save the patient.
Buster briefly spin-changed into a TV announcer, complete with microphone. "In today's dramatic episode, a pumpkin with an ailing pump is rushed into surgery, while Nurse Flora wrestles with her conscience over dating a patient, a handsome Swede. The staff are all rooting for her…" he declared, having watched along with Babs a few times. "Bet that's off air now."
Afraid so. Most watchable things are. Calamity signed. He paused. What did you think of your class?
Babs blinked. "I had a few surprises. Things have… really changed since our day. There's a horse sitting in the back row!"
Buster raised an eyebrow. "What's wrong with equines? It's not like they were rats or vultures; nobody ever looked down on them for their species. There was that Hans von Haflinger in Perfecto; if you can get in there you can get in anywhere."
Babs shook her head. "Not a Toon horse like him. A… umm, think National Geographic, not Warner Brothers. A sixteen-hands high jet-black stallion!" She paused. "At least he wasn't sitting in class naked. Not exactly. He wore horseshoes."
The Studio diversified, bought up a lot of channels, Calamity signed. That's Marcus 'Eddson'.
"Descendent of Mr Edd the Talking Horse, maybe? I guess that'd be out of copyright by now," Buster speculated.
"Well, he certainly talks. But he's not a classic Toon. And he is very, definitely a HE. What folk on the Farming channels call an Entire. Entirely so." Babs said. "It... shows."
Buster spin-changed into a classic 1960's Hippy straight out of the musical 'Hare!', complete with dippy expression as he made a Peace sign. "Hey man, let it all hang out."
Babs' eyes crossed. "Yes. He does. It's a bit… distracting."
Marcus has Martian citizenship, though not ancestry. Calamity's sign read. But like the notes say, he has a 'mystery origins' trope.
"Hmm. Nice to see someone round here managed to swap their 'political' correctness for 'anatomical.' A super-sized portion." Babs mused. "How does he get away with it?"
Claimed 'biological quadruped appropriateness,' and made it stick with our Principal. Calamity gave a wintry grin. Marcus is another major brain. Don't believe the 'non-sentient' bit; the 'clever Hans' act is just that. An act.
"He's not the only Martian here," Buster noted. "One of the Seniors. Human shaped, hole-in-the-film-black – you know, like Marcia? If I ever saw a Martian, he's one. That's not what his class notes say. They say he's Harold Stokrazi, exchange student from England."
He's incognito, Calamity shrugged. Prince in Disguise trope.
"I noticed," Buster said dryly. "Doesn't like being called Harold, either." He put on an absurdly fake mock cockney accent. "Harold? Cor blimey guv, stone the crows, do what, leave it ahht… just call me 'Arry, squire."
"Arry Stokrazi. Ouch." Babs shivered. "Buster, that's the worst English accent since Dick Van Dyke did Mary Poppins."
Don't blame Buster, Calamity signed, a wry expression on his muzzle. Wait till you hear Mister Stokrazi… who won't admit to being Martian, let alone royalty. Despite it being about as obvious as it gets.
"A lot of Toons aren't what they seem these days, looks like," Buster commented.
Babs nodded. She had noted the quotation marks around her only four-legged student's family name; Calamity had carefully called him not Eddson but 'Eddson.' On the office wall still hung the devotional icon of the grinning, pipe-smoking human toon 'Bob' Dobbs; as a devout member of the SubGenius Church the Coyote naturally revered him and his teachings, however slack. Most SuperGeniuses started off there before working their way up. Their great Prophet's true name was evidently not Bob. *
* (Editor's note: unless as a double bluff it really WAS Bob, since "that's the one name they Won't be expecting!")
They're not. Most have something to hide… can't blame them, the way things are right now, Calamity nodded.
Buster and Babs exchanged glances. "There's an awful lot of comic potential in class," Babs said. "That's hopeful." She had the vegan wolf and the mutant carnivorous sheep sharing a desk, with the unused comic potentialities building up making the air glow around them as brightly as the infamous ACME ultra-lightweight home nuclear reactors (Page 442 in current catalogue, with optional radiation shielding on pages 443-447. ACME boasted the unshielded ones saved on household heat and lighting, and their radiation was fatal to troublesome insect pests.)
"And a lot of pretty high-powered talent," Buster nodded, agreeing. "Including Elmyra's kids, amazingly enough. And Fifi's and Plucky's sons." He frowned. "What is it with those two? The way the class splits between them you'd think you're in Perfecto, with all its cliques. Victor and dauntless Douglas don't like each other?" He smiled at a sudden memory of his first year at Acme Loo, when his bachelor burrow still had the plastic model aircraft of his cubhood 'flying' on wires from the ceiling. The original Douglas Dauntless had been one of them, as indeed had the Duck flying boat.
Calamity looked pensive. It's not exactly that. Rivals, yes. The class does need a leader. And it's never had one.
"As if they'd have maybe pulled together, if they weren't… on the same level. If they both had someone to naturally look up to." Buster mused. All eyes turned to little Blitz, currently fifteen years too young for the job.
"At least – we're here now." Babs said. "And we've not been kicked out by Mary-Sue yet."
"Check, Babsy". In his afternoon class Buster had noticed from the corner of his eye that Principal Sioux-Zanne was standing at the doorway listening intently; from her pleased expression he was saying all the right things. He turned to Calamity. "Right; what to do next. Biff and Buffy Vanderbunny aren't going to knock on the door of Babs and Buster's families and ask for a spare bed tonight. That'd give the game away."
"Last time my family heard from us was fifteen years ago, their time – I'd just let them know I had another cub on the way. Or maybe a whole litter." Babs struck a mournful note. "Babs Bunny – missing, believed bred."
"So we won't walk in and give them a shock like that. Anywhere to stay around here?" Buster asked.
Calamity thought hard. There's some furnished rooms in the basement. You wouldn't mind – underground accommodation?
Babs snickered. "Sounds just like home." She paused, posing dramatically. "It's a rabbit thing."
"Tunnels, burrows… we dig all that stuff," Buster grinned. "we dig it deeply."
Right! This way. Calamity led them down to the basement and halted at what was apparently a blank wall. Professor Bugs stayed here secretly for months, nobody but I knew. He was the last of our teachers to go. There's a panel here... it's keyed to open at the right sequence of knocks. He frowned. Trouble is... he never told me the code.
"It's just a wild hunch but let me try…" Buster gave a familiar five beats, a small pause, then two more. A previously invisible door slid open silently.
"Shave and a haircut- two bits" Babs mused. "Catchy. Who'd a guessed it?"
They found the light switch and stepped through into a suite of well-furnished rooms. Buster looked at a faded, official-looking stencil notice on the wall. "Looks like these burrows were built in the '50s as a fallout shelter," he suggested.
Yes! Until the 'duck and cover' film came out. The Looniversity upgraded to those nuclear-proof school desks you hide under. This place was pretty much forgotten, Calamity signed.
"Well, I'm keeping ex-directory, with Principal Mary-Sue nosing around", Babs declared. "Not that humans have much nose to speak of." She paused, looking down at the still unchallenged Cutest Toes on Record. "And their toes - are plain unspeakable."
Half an hour's exploration showed the tunnels were a basic, but serviceable base suitable for a week or two. Professor Bugs had evidently just used one section, moving aside into a side-tunnel a wealth of dusty boxes which had obviously been there for decades.
"Here's some of the original Emergency rations they must have stored in the shelter. Freeze-dried carrot cookies." Babs tapped a large box and read the faded label on it. "It says 'guaranteed to taste no worse after 60 years storage than on day of manufacture.'" She stuck a pink tongue out. "Eww..."
"Check this out, Babsy!" Buster had found a box of old Toon props and was digging through them. He stood up and turned around.
"Buster? Buster? Where are you?" Babs' ears went up in alarm. "Who are you? Where's my husband gone?" In front of her was a buck she had never seen before, wearing a skimpy but sinister black 'bandit' mask.
The mask came off, and suddenly Buster stood there. He looked down at the mask; it had covered at most a half inch strip of his fur around his eyes. "It works that well?"
Babs blinked. "I can recognise you spin-changed to Biff Vanderbunny. I didn't recognise you at all in that!"
Calamity's ears went up. It's a 1940's Secret Identity domino mask, he signed, a look of amazement on his face. They went out of style; nobody in Studio Management believed a mask that small could fool anyone. But they did. Nobody knows any more how they worked. I didn't know any survived!
"Well, there's two here," Buster held up a second mask. He handed it to Babs and smiled. "His 'n' hers."
"How convenient..." Babs smiled back mischievously. "Are you pondering what I'm pondering?"
Buster spin-changed into a dim-looking white lab rat. "Gee, I think so, Brain... but ain't Jupiter too BIG for a baseball? Narf!" He non-sequitured, before changing back.
"Heh. I think we can find a use for these." Babs carefully put the mask into her Hammerspace pocket. "We need a plan so fiendish that we get lawsuits from the Fiend's Union."
"Headquartered in the place all the lawyers end up. And now have to work for free eternally - what a punishment!" Buster agreed. "Yes, we need a proper plan. That'll take time."
I'll leave you to it, then. Lots of work to do upstairs; I'm the only one keeping the Looniversity going, Calamity signed. Till tomorrow!
The bunnies waved him farewell and locked the door securely behind him as he left. After an impromptu meal from the emergency picnic basket Buster pulled from his hammerspace pocket (time not operating in that dimension made 'best-before' dates for fresh carrot salad not an issue) they relaxed on the big sofa to take stock. A thermos flask of vegetable stock was included in the hamper and they took a cup of it apiece, steaming hot.
"Well... here we are." Babs commented as she sipped the drink. "Not where or when or how we planned it." She had let Blitz out of his cub-carrier and smiled watching the fuzzy cub exploring his new surroundings. "Just think - when we woke up this morning we were in Japan - fifteen years ago! That's what I call a long, hard day."
"Even when we left Japan, we didn't think we were going to miss too much," Buster agreed.
"I wouldn't have minded watching the first round of the all-Japan 'Irresponsible tank driver of the year' contest in downtown Neo-Tokyo the next day..." Babs mused. "It's an Anime Thing." She gave a quiet moan of pleasure as Buster massaged her adorable toes.
Suddenly a special-effect lightbulb flashed in the air above Buster's head. "I have a sneaky idea," he announced. "Everyone would expect us to use a trick just like Professor Bugs, our mentor."
"Like we generally do," Babs nodded. "Your point is...?"
"That we take a gag instead from the least likely Toon a pair of rabbits would choose," Buster wiggled his eyebrows. "To confuse the enemy!" *
* (Editor's note: in Babs' brother Mortimer's class, the English transfer student Henry Smith had confided that back home a neighbour was called Mr. Cholmondleigh - but pronounced 'Chumley', also to Confuse The Enemy. His other neighbour was called Chumley, which was naturally pronounced 'Cholmondleigh'...)
"Who? Elmyra? Elmer Fudd?" Babs blinked.
"Worse." Buster grinned. "The young, pre-Professor, really daffy, Daffy Duck! Though the younger Elmer Fudd did co-star, true."
"This, I gotta hear," Babs' voice had enough healthy scepticism to stock a sceptic's health food store. "So, which scene exactly were you thinking?"
Buster vanished into the side tunnel and came back with a World War 2 era kitbag packed with old clothing, which he set up as a punchbag. On the top layer was a set of boxing gloves, which he put on.
"The scene, the big fight," he announced, taking on the tones of a boxing referee. "In the red corner, Elmer 'the fighting fury' Fudd." He nodded to the punchbag. "In the green corner, everyone's favourite waterfowl - the young contender, Daffy Duck!" He gestured to the empty air across the room.
"Water-fowl? 'Wat 'er' ham, more like it," Babs heckled.
"Now, as referee, I want a clean, fair fight," Buster addressed the punchbag. "I don't want to see any of THIS!" There was a heavy thud as his gloved paw hit home.
"Ooh, low blow," Babs winced.
"Or THIS!" Another heavy thud.
"Fowl shot," Babs called out to the notional waterfowl.
"And I particularly don't want to see… any of THIS!" With his other paw Buster knocked the punchbag flying. He pulled off the boxing glove to show the complete four-pack set of horseshoes grasped in his fist.
Babs' eyebrow raised. "All very classic, but we already passed Daffy's class - back when class was worth taking. This helps us - how?"
Buster grinned. "We're not allowed to teach comedy, right? The Toons in class aren't meant to even know what it is. We have to show them just what we DON'T want to see..."
Realisation dawned on Babs, a special-effect pink glow of dawn light flooding the burrow. She pulled out from Hammerspace her most recent souvenir from Japan, a genuine Anime Shojo Mallet. "So we can't do THIS..." She swung it two-pawed, an overhead strike to connect with the hapless punchbag.
"Definitely not," Buster agreed, standing clear and munching an after-dinner carrot. "Why, to do a sucker-punch, you need a sucker. Not as if we knew where to find one."
"Or that!" Babs grabbed the horseshoe filled glove and rabbit-punched the deserving target, imagining Principal Marie-Sioux's features on it.
"Perish the thought," Buster shook his head disdainfully. "Oh, the very idea..."
"And very definitely - none of... THIS!" Babs grabbed an unlabelled rope that was suddenly there and gave a sharp pull. With a crash, a huge weight labelled '16 tonnes' descended from the ceiling and pancaked the punchbag.
"You get the idea," Buster drawled, finishing his carrot.
"Hmm." Panting slightly, Babs returned to the sofa, her bunny brain whirring audibly as she thought hard and deviously. "Shirley told me once there's this Japanese military force of Taoist monks, who practice 'Wu Wei' - or 'Doing by not doing.'" She winked. "Like they say - there's a right way, a wrong way - and a Wu Wei."
"Unconventional warfare. So unconventional nobody even recognises it. I've seen those guys do their stuff," Buster nodded. There had been a scene in his fourth-year class, when a dozen silent monks had parachuted precisely onto one exactly surveyed spot in the Looniversity's grounds each carrying a rake, a melon and a flowerpot - plus a very accurate atomic clock with which to time exactly what to Not do with any of the props, timed to the nanosecond. The news channels had reported the devastating Chaos Butterfly effects on the far side of the world the next day.
"Or Asymmetric warfare, even. Make the other side so asymmetric they fall over. So it's 'I've fallen and I can't get up' for them. That's the stuff," Babs agreed. A look of fiendish glee swept over her adorable features. "Tomorrow. We need to start seriously Not teaching the kids every trick we know. Or how will they know what not to be doing?"
Buster joined his pink and white furred doe on the couch, once more giving due adoration to her Adorable toes. "Babs," he said admiringly, looking up at her as he massaged. "You are one scary, scary bunny."
End Chapter One