Tricks are No Treat!
Disclaimer: I don't own Danger Mouse, he's property of Cosgrove Hall productions. Lori L'amour aka M6 and Bagel are my characters, as are others here. This is fanfiction, not for profit… and no harm to the makers of the World's Greatest cartoon about the World's Greatest Secret agent…
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Tricks are NO Treat
By Trynia Merin
Part 3
Narrator: In our last episode, Duckula crashed the concert, and sent our heroes assistants running, while Danger Mouse disappeared. Now, M6 and the Squarkenclucks are a captive audience to the world's worst rock wannabe!
A loud squawking and a crash of thunder suddenly sounded in the midst of the rock band. Gila and Saul turned to see a short figure in long black cape, rhinestone Elvis costume, and a pair of shades. Strapped to his shoulder was a red flying V guitar, which he swung his arm around to play a cacophonic series of notes that set everyone's teeth on edge.
"Who the HECK are you?" demanded Gila as he turned on the newcomer who had crashed their show.
"This is UNCOOL man!" Petey Katt shook his head at the sight of the comical duck posing; his hair slicked back into an Elvis hairdo.
"The life of the party, here to ROCK out!" Duckula laughed as he slid the silver rod with the spinning mirror into the top of his guitar and played a lout dissonant chord. Everyone clapped hands over their ears and began to boo. He sent the mirror spinning with the frequency of each note that wailed louder and louder.
"Get off the stage you idiot!" Saul snapped as he strode forwards on platform boots.
"Saul, wait!" Lori cried as she fought her way past the elbows of the people shouting and booing.
"You are wrecking mein guests party!" said Count Squarkencluck as he leapt down from the organ.
"Uncle, auctung!" shouted Professor Squarkencluck as he rushed up, his eyes registering what Duckula had in one hand.
"Ohh I wanna play…" Duckula sang off key, and Gila stormed up, all set to pluck the guitar from his hands as the agents rushed the stage. Whirling around, Duckula aimed the beam of his flashing mirror into Gila's eyes, blinding him. Cursing, Gila stumbled as Duckula pushed him over with one finger and tangled him in the chord before he could get to his medallion of power. The other members of Smooch reached for their magical medallions, but they did so in vain. As if anticipating their actions Count Duckula spun about, beaming his ray and a loud dissonant sound into Petey and Tommy's eyes before they could react. Clapping their hands to their eyes they gasped, and fell rigid.
"CHILL OUT!" Duckula commanded.
"Why you little…" Saul snapped as his hands went for his medallion.
"Oh no boy, there's only room for ONE super star here," Duckula cackled as everyone gasped and started to try to get to their secret agent weapons stashed in their costume.
"Don't look at the light!" Professor Squarkencluck shouted. "It's a mind control…"
Lori leapt up onstage, dragging Saul out of the way before the ray hit him. Out over the secret agents the flickering stroboscopic mirror flashed in a series of pulses, blinding everyone who beheld it. Squarkencluck scrambled onstage, rushing up to his uncle who was rubbing his eyes and standing there like a zombie.
"You fiend!" Squarkencluck cried as Duckula aimed the ray at him. However his glasses suddenly flashed dark black, blocking the ray from view. He grabbed his uncle's glasses off and spun him around.
"What do we do?" Lori cried as Duckula started to beam the ray into the crowd of secret agents. The ray reflected off a large disco ball, which had suddenly dropped from the ceiling, and radiated into the overhead chandelier, magnifying the ray.
"Close your eyes!" Squarkencluck shouted, pushing Lori on top of Saul Stann. "And RUN! Take pretty boy with you!"
She gasped as she closed her eyes, and felt Squarkencluck grab her hands, and tug her. Saul Stann dazed and confused stumbled after her, as Duckula whirled on them and beamed his ray. Lori felt Squarkencluck push her offstage into the crowd of people and bark at her to run before shouts and cries sounded.
"STOP THEM! GET those people!" Duckula shouted into the microphone. "Those gatecrashers are ruining my spotlight!"
"Yes master," said the agents who began to trap Lori and the others. She opened her eyes, glancing at Squarkencluck, who was there with his uncle.
"Run, run…" he shouted. "We'll have to use the trap door…"
"Nephew… he…" gasped the Count.
"He's got the device!" said the Professor as they ducked and dodged the groping hands of the agents. Lori lashed out with her telescopic tail, trying to keep the people at bay from a radius of a few feet.
"What's going on?" Saul gasped, as Lori grabbed his hand. "Who is that guy?"
"Hoert zu, and sprecht nacht!" shouted Count Squarkencluck. "The lever nephew…"
"This way M6!" shouted Squarkencluck, grabbing Lori's tail and yanking her down as suddenly the floor dropped from under them, and Saul Stann grabbed Lori's waist. Under the groping zombie hands they vanished, to the confusion of others.
Duckula glanced back and forth, seeing the heroes disappear, and mumbled, "Sheesh, good help is SO hard to find…"
"Where are they?" a dozen voices shouted.
"All right, all right, never mind," Duckula said. "You, get Colonel K over there, I'm talking to you. You and that bozo to your left go find them. And you, Dragon guy, and you Cat guy, you go find that Superstar and the two German mad scientists…"
Gesturing to Gila and Petey, he shouted his orders. Both nodded, and Duckula cackled gleefully as they said, "Yes Master… we obey…"
"This is so fun…" he cackled, rubbing his hands together. "With those magic medallions you guys are my super powered slaves. My compliments to Count Von Squarkencluck. And you Tommy, sheep boy, you go find Danger Mouse and Penfold. Give them a SHOCKING good time… if ya know what I mean… while I entertain my captive audience…"
"Yes master," nodded Tommy Brayley, the Space Alien. Gila spanned his black cape, and suddenly took off, flying over the crowd as the Street Katt leapt off the stage and into the crowd, sniffing onto the trail of the Squarkenclucks. The Alien suddenly snapped his fingers and vanished in a haze of silver sparklers, leaving Duckula alone onstage.
"All right. Now, I suppose you're all wondering why I've gathered you here. Well, I wanna introduce you to my one and only finisheer… Duckula's one and only Lonely Band!"
A ghoul, a hobgoblin and two skeletons suddenly walked onstage and picked up the discarded instruments. Duckula aimed his finger at the Smooch sign and zapped it with a flash of energy, and it fell, crashing through the stage to make a huge mess of sparks. "QUAAACK!" he shouted, jumping back and glancing at his band. "One two… one two three four… HIT IT! IT was twenty years ago I'll say, when Duckula began to play…"
A strange haunting melody vibrated the castle, and the costumed agents began to clap as if they were sleepwalking. Colonel K and agent 23 marked off, their hands held before them, their eyes rigid and glowing red. The others slowly swayed to the beat of the undead band, lead by their vegetarian vampire leader who wailed and squawked to some bizarre parody of the monster mash. Although they were aware that what they were hearing was the equivalent of fingernails on chalkboard, nobody could leave, for they were hypnotized in place to the performance.
***
"Good Grief," Danger Mouse gasped when he peered into the room after he had doubled back, seeing Duckula onstage. "I'm too late!"
He wanted to go to help Lori and the others, but was relieved to see Squarkencluck had dragged them off the stage after helping pull his uncle out of the affects of the ray. Because Count Squarkencluck was virtually blind, the ray only had a temporary effect of stunning him, instead of putting him into the hypnotic trance that had befallen the others. Wise of Professor Squarkencluck to pull off his uncle's glasses before Duckula got another shot, he figured. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a pair of sunglasses and slipped them on, hoping the polarized lenses would stop any stray beams from hitting his single eye.
"Blast and botheration, what to do. If I know Squarkencluck, he probably has some ultra secret trap door by the stage for just such an emergency. Good job I scared Bagel and Penfold out of their wits," he noted to himself. By now they had run out of harm's way, and were probably the only ones not affected by the ray. He had heard the rumors of Squarkencluck's new invention, and had a mind to speak rather sternly to the Count and the Professor about leaving it so carelessly around.
"Now, to find the others," he nodded as he rushed off. Unfortunately he couldn't help his fellow agents till he found Squarkencluck, and could find out if there was some way of reversing the ray's effects.
As Danger Mouse picked his way through the dusty corridors, he suddenly heard a loud roar behind him. Whirling about he saw a green eyed black cat with a white mask suddenly pouncing on him. Danger Mouse whirled around, as onyx claws slashed one after the other. As he nimbly leapt, another swipe tagged his coattails, slashing out the back of his coat. Danger Mouse somersaulted out of the way as he came to his feet, facing the attacker.
"You just RUINED a 500 pound costume!" Danger Mouse scolded. "REALLY!"
"RRRROOOW!" hissed the Alley Katt, hunching on his hindquarters, ready to pounce. Danger Mouse backed away, and then froze still. The tail swished back and forth, and the Alley Katt launched himself forward, toward the wall just as Danger Mouse cartwheeled out of the way, and flipped out of his coat. It dropped over the face of the Katt, and DM suddenly pulled off his belt and wrapped it around the coat. Snarling and yowling, the Alley Katt kicked and fussed as DM rushed away.
"Lights out," he quipped as he ran away, laughing to himself. He made his way down the narrow stairs, guessing if Squarkencluck had a secret passageway connecting with a trap door, it would logically terminate in the basement labs. He had not gotten very far when something whooshed over his head, and he felt great heat sizzling the air around him.
"Good Grief what is that?" he gasped as he hit the floor, fire and smoke belching overhead. Coughing and rubbing his eyes, he rolled over and looked at a menacing shape suddenly landing, its long black bat wings extended.
"Your worst nightmare, Danger Mouse," hissed a voice as two red eyes narrowed to slits, and a long tongue dripped with green slime.
"And I suppose you don't know WHO you're dealing with, do you?" Danger Mouse said dryly as he tried to hide the nervousness inside. For the glowing dragon medallion at the Dragon's throat glistened as much as the sharp claws crooking toward him, and the long tail that lashed out. Fire belched toward the White Wonder, and he backed away, only to feel something hit his back. Cold stone, a dead end with no way out.
***
Around them the shouts of the agents had receded into darkness. She heard a low moaning from something breathing softly to one side, and slowly stirred, realizing she was lying on top of something.
"Are vhe all right?" came Squarkencluck's German accented voice.
"Ja, nephew," came the thicker accent from his uncle. "Das is gut dat vhe had the straw in here placed. Ist de fraulein und der Gitarrist alright being?"
"I'm here," mumbled Saul as he moved. "Barely. What on EARTH is going on here, man? Just who WAS that dude who crashed the party?"
"He ist und vampir," said Squarkencluck. Lori gasped with relief when a flashlight clicked on, and the light beamed ghostly up into the scientist's face. It underlit his face like some kid telling a ghost story on a campout and Lori writhed, realizing she was laying on something soft. The Count mumbled as his nephew hauled him to his feet.
"Is that my hand or yours?" she whispered. "Oh geez, sorry… I feel so silly…"
"You don't feel silly to me, babe," said Saul as he helped lift Lori off his lap, and she pulled him up to stand beside her. The Professor's flashlight reflected off the multiple rhinestones on Stan's costume, gleaming like stars trapped underground in the hole.
"Ahem, we are needing to stick to the task at hand being," the Professor said.
"Ja, getting that Vampire out of our home, we are wanting to do," said the Count angrily. "And showing him a lesson are we!"
"Now WAIT, just WHAT was that thing he used to put a whammy on my band mates?" Saul asked.
"Yes, you mentioned a hypnotic device… I thought…" said Lori.
"It was a project I was with my uncle vhorking on," the Professor explained. "This way?"
"Nein, this way," the Count tugged on his nephew's sleeve and indicated they should turn to the left.
"Who's your decorator, Boris Karloff?" asked Stan ruefully as he stumbled over the uneven stone paving the floor of the catacombs. He caught Lori's hand to steady her, gallantly. She shivered with a spark of electricity at his touch.
"This vhey," said the Count. "Mein laboratory…"
In front of a pair of massive oaken doors they stopped, the flashlight beaming onto the wrought iron beam slid in place to bolt them. Instead of drawing it back, Squarkencluck pressed a panel to the side and a small door opened up just under the second massive metal band midway up the door. Saul sighed as he realized he would halve to almost bend double like Lori did to follow the two moles inside.
"Tell me more about this invention," Lori said as they stood in the clean and tidy lab, stocked with ultramodern accessories, not at all what Stan would have expected in such a place. Fluorescent lights hung high in the stone walled chamber, which had black topped lab counters and a whole mess of computers and other electronics spares piled neatly on top of them. Tools and computers were here and there along the walls, and Squarkencluck rushed over to punch up a diagram on the screen nearest them.
"The Visualhynotron… a version of the sound device you have encountered before, from Cam-elion Rex, ja?" asked Squarkencluck. "On your last mission… vhen Herr Colonel heard of it, he asked me und mein Onkel to another one for the Agency to fashion. Unlike die andere vhich on the principle of sound operates, dies one on the principle of a patterrrn of light operates…"
"Alternating patterns of light," said the Count. "Trigger a rrrresponse in die kopf,… und trigger a trancelike state… und then the sound of choice conditions di subject…"
"Why make it?" asked Saul. "I mean if it COULD fall into enemy hands, why make it? Don't you agents have enough toys to make people's lives complicated enough?"
"Um, vhell, vhe have a job to do, ja?" said Squarkencluck. "Unlike you, some of us must a living make mit our brains, nicht our voices und good looks…"
"Sorry," mumbled Saul as he flushed.
"It's agents like us who make it possible for you stars to sing whatever you want," Lori said softly. "Don't forget we protect freedom around the world…"
"I'm sorry, I'm just… well how did this Duckula guy get hold of it, and why does he want it?"
"He wants a star to be being," said Squarkencluck. "Und he has put all the agents under his spell…"
"What about Danger Mouse?" asked Saul.
"Here is the cameras view in the main room looking," said the Count as he punched buttons on another console. "Duckula is a captive audience making, ja?"
"Is there a way of counteracting?" Lori asked.
"Do you think we would an invention making without an antidote having?" asked the Count. "Mein nephew und mich may eine bisschen verruckte being, but vhee are not stupid being…"
"But it is not so easy," the Professor sighed. "To break ziz trance. For the device Duckula has ist the only vone, the prototype being…"
"Vhee must another one making being," said the Count. "Und your fellow agents are after Danger Mouse…"
Saul and Lori's eyes darkened in anger when they saw the other cameras flash their views onto a composite bank of screens. Almost every region of the castle had a camera display appear on a large wall mounted flat screen, controlled by a series of buttons pressed by the Count. Upon one screen they saw Bagel and Penfold running away from Colonel K and Agent 23, who was firing an ultra secret ray gun after them. On another they saw Danger Mouse overcome the Alley Katt, only to be backed up against the wall by Gila Scalesimm, the Dragon.
"That monster… he's turned my friends against us…" gasped Saul.
"I've got to help Danger Mouse and Bagel," Lori said.
"Und who ist going to help us?" asked the Count as they heard a loud banging at the door.
"Drat," mumbled Squarkencluck.
"Hold on a minute," Saul said, reaching for his medallion. "I'm not the super star for nothing. Lori, stand back…"
The door suddenly blasted open, as a crackle of lightening sizzled the lock. Standing there with his hands raised was the Alien, lightening crackling between his fingers. His eyes glowed blue, and his hair frizzed in a black halo around with static electricity.
"Schnell, on the crate be standing!" shouted Squarkencluck to the others as he and his uncle leapt up on some boxes. Lori nodded as she grabbed Saul's hand and pulled him up onto a lab counter when the electricity sizzled into them. They gasped as the lightening pulsed through them. Raising his hand, Saul suddenly narrowed his eyes, and sent a beam of light into Tommy's. The sheep gasped and stood rigid.
"Sehr gut," said the Count as he reached for a large magic want with a ball on top. He tapped each of them in turn, discharging the electricity that had built up on them.
"Now what?" Saul asked.
"Keep working here. Can you use your powers to reverse the hypnosis, Saul?" asked Lori.
"I'm not sure…" he mumbled. "I mean if they were caused by a device…"
"There ist no time. You two must help Danger Mouse und the others," said Squarkencluck. "Macht schnell!"
"But the agents under Duckula's song…" Lori said.
"Vhee will be taking care of that," said the Count with a grin as he shoed them out the door. "Leave that to me… this is mein berg… mein castle… now macht schnell…. This passage leads to Danger Mouse… and this to Penfold and Bagel…"
"I will be here working, Onkel," said Squarkencluck with a nod. Both nephew and uncle nodded in agreement, their brilliant minds clicking on the same odd frequency. By the look on their faces, they were working the whole plan out, taking all variables into account.
Hand in hand, the two mice rushed off, the Count following them. He showed them to a series of pneumatic tubes that would convey them to other parts of the castle. Opening one, he shoved Lori inside, and then turned to shove Saul into another before he could protest. Then he opened the last, and let it suck him inside.
"Good luck," he wished them both as they were ducted off to their separate parts, Saul to help DM, and Lori to help Bagel and Penfold. That left him to deal with this other upstart Count, an enemy of his family for generations…
"There ist a score to settle, with the Von Squarkenclucks," mumbled the Count as he reached for something in his pocket, a particularly putrid rotten egg.
***
Narrator: Oh no, will Danger Mouse be flash fried, or the next item on Duckula's Halloween roast? Can Bagel and Penfold escape, and will the Squarkenclucks find a way to reverse their hypno thingy? And just WHAT is the connection between the Duckulas and the Squarkenclucks? What on EARTH is that invention called? And will Smooch's leading man become a falling star? Find out in the next scalding episode of Danger Mouse!