Chapter Four
Saturday dawned warm and clear; deep in the old Anvil shelter beneath Acme Looniversity Babs and Buster shared a frugal breakfast.
"That's about all that's left, one more helping of Frugal," Buster felt into the corners of his Hammerspace Hamper of Holding. "We definitely need to go shopping."
"There's always the Authentic 1950's freeze-dried Civil Defence carrot cookies," Babs tried to put a brave face on it, but her ears drooped at the sight of the slightly rusty tins in the corner.
"A-huh. Reason for that is… in all that time nobody wanted to eat them. So yes, there's Always those tins," Buster quipped. "And always will be."
"A Survival Ration that takes its own Survival seriously," Babs marvelled. "How about that." She spin-changed into Nurse Babs and winked at her husband. "Nine out of every ten dieticians recommend it! Avoiding the stuff, I mean."
"It's a day for disguises, all right," Buster said thoughtfully. "We'd better not slip up and have anyone in town recognise us as Babs and Buster Bunny. Who are Not Here, and have to be able to prove it."
"That would give the plot away," Babs agreed. "We can't use any of our famous spin-change alternates either. So sad – I'm denied the graceful form of dear Tinker-Bunny!" Babs struck a tragic pose, then spun into the classic sprite form with gauzy wings, gaudy extra-pink tutu and magic wand. "In her place – another fairy, yes," she murmured in a singsong tone. "But this fairy's name is Nuff."
"Fairy 'nuff," Buster deadpanned.
"And this is my Tragic Wand ™", that sprite expounded, waving the wand expansively. There was an off-camera crash as of shelves of breakables shattering. "Heh. It don't work so good."
"Or we could just use – these?" Buster suggested, pulling out the classic 1940's domino masks. "Saves on Toon energies, too."
"That's The Spirit ™ !" Babs enthused, taking her mask and securing it. "And now – off to town for Future Shopping! To fill our present and Future Needs! Maybe we can get some of those jet-packs we saw buzzing around? Got to be SOME advantage in being here."
"Hopefully not built by ACME," Buster said dryly. "Professor Wile-E had enough trouble with those things. And he's a careful driver."
"Hey! I'm a careful driver!" Babs protested. She hesitated. "It wasn't all my fault, what happened last time. Anybody'd expect the State of Nevada would have swerved! Well before I hit it."
"I rest my case," Buster said. And followed a slightly fuming doe out, and on the road to town.
Half an hour later, they climbed the ridge and looked down at a once familiar city.
"Place has grown," Buster observed. "Still – it's Acme Hectares now – they're a lot bigger than acres."
"All the more shopping to be done!" Babs said brightly, patting her roll of reinforced credit cards. "Food – priority Number One."
The bunnies wandered through the once familiar streets, looking for signs of something edible. Buster frowned. "All the good places have gone. The restaurants are all Weenie-Burger, HateBurger and 'Wok the Hell!'"
"Fiendish Oriental cuisine, as served by Fiendish Orientals ™," Babs winced at the sight as they passed another one. "I went into one, once. Didn't stay to eat. Something about the cruel, enigmatic smile on the server's face as she took my order."
"And the grocery stores are all UnHappy Shopper. Look, three of them, right next to each other. What IS the point?" Buster shook his head.
Babs' whiskers twitched as she recognised a Toon hound walking slowly and dejectedly towards her along the litter-strewn sidewalk. "That's Monsieur Bonmot! Head chef at 'Le Trendy Desserterie.' That place was great! Back in Looniversity I got a couple of Gift Certificates to eat there."
"It's another drive-by Hate-Burger now - we just passed the place," Buster said. "The 'desserterie' is… deserted. Didn't get its just desserts."
Babs waved to the Toon, trusting to her skimpy domino mask to protect her identity. "Monsieur Bonmot! You don't recognise me - really, really you don't - but we used to come through town years ago. We loved your place!"
The hound gave a brief flash of a smile - and then his ears went down as he quickly looked around for other listening ears. "Glad you enjoyed it, Madame - in those times." He sighed.
"No, really," Babs enthused. "Where do you recommend round here now? You were the best pastry chef in town. Those sweet treats…. amazing."
A pair of weary eyes flashed in alarm. "No! Don't say that! I'm - no better than any hash-slinger! I've learned my lesson - the law - of the lowest common denominator." With a frightened glance he hurried off.
Babs and Buster exchanged worried frowns.
"UnHappy Shopper?" Buster asked heavily.
"Looks like the only game in town, blue-boy," Babs sighed. "And the referee isn't calling 'foul' – though the food certainly is."
They found the nearest UnHappy Shopper store, and browed its unhallowed aisles. Babs' ears dipped as she looked at the shelf of breakfast cereals. "Unlucky Charms. Dismal-O's. Fear smacks. Killa Serial Cereal." Babs stuck her tongue out. "Groceries really HAVE got… grosser."
"They're not the only thing." Buster nodded over towards a large billboard outside the store, that read Dial 911 H-E-R-E-S-Y! We'll drag your not-sufficiently-'deity-of-your-choice'-fearing neighbours off for Judgement. 100% Righteous or double your money back! A happy-looking magpie girl on the poster was shown toting what looked like a chunk of telegraph pole, which was proudly labelled 'We use only sustainably grown carbon-neutral timber stakes and brushwood Handy-dandy Heretic Heaters!' According to the poster it was 'Endorsed by 90% of practicing Popes and Anti-Popes.'
The blue buck recalled reading about that in the papers Professor Bugs had left. "The only good thing is, they aren't prejudiced. They don't care your religion so long as you point out a heretic and think you get Holy credits for doing it." He paused. "Salvation by immolation."
"Eww. 'Barbeque Culture' has gone a bit too far." Babs nevertheless filled her shopping basket with the least obnoxious foods she could find and headed to the checkout. She slapped her Double Platinum credit card down with the finesse of a lady who had won Acme Acres' Extreme Shopper's Challenge three years in a row.
The reader flashed red, emitting loud angry beeping noises.
"Hey, Lady! That card's twelve years out of date!" The checkout clerk yelled, with all the force of three hundred pounds of unsightly fat topped with a bad haircut, behind it. "What kinda stunt are you trying to pull?"
Babs froze in shock. She unrolled her precious arsenal of premier purchasing plastic, looking at the expiry dates. Then she turned to Buster, her ears right down.
"Is it time to say 'Uh-ohh?' Babsy?" Buster asked dryly.
"Too true, Blue-boy," Babs grimaced. "Looks like little Blitz is the only one that gets lunch today."
"That's not the worst of it," Buster said. "There's all sorts of comedic reasons we could be in money trouble – that's a Mundane one. The sort of thing non-Toons get. We don't. Or, we didn't."
"Until now." Babs looked around, troubled. She smiled briefly as she stroked Blitz's fuzzy ears, then her own drooped again. "Do you think it's part of – the same thing? Banning comedy. No Toon babies born any more round here – and the storks avoid the place like the feather-plague, too." Bab's eyes grew bleak at the thought. "No more Toon children. I thought that was impossible."
"Inconceivable." Buster agreed. "And the queen of shoppers is deposed – by something as mundane as past-expiry plastic. That's a nasty picture, all right," he agreed. Just at that dramatically perfect moment, his stomach gave a loud rumble, showing some timing effects were still working. "Which leaves us right out of lunch money."
"And lunch." Babs gave a dramatic sigh. "Well, we are rabbits, and this isn't the North Pole or the Sahara. We shan't starve; there's a beech hedge over across the road. High in healthy fibre, anyway."
"Then my lady shall dine fittingly," Buster bowed and waved with a flourish. "On a free, coarse meal – I mean a three-course meal. Fresh hedge, with all the trimmings!"
While Babs and Buster tried to enjoy their free coarse meal, across town their students were sitting in Weenie Burger dining rather dearer but little better. Suzie Scrapie was sipping a mechanically recovered mystery-meat shake, while Maloo and Gina Ericson stuck to Weenie-Colas. It was a sugary, glutinous liquid that would stick to Teflon®, for that matter.
Gina raised her glass in an ironic toast. "Who'd have thought it? They used to advertise 'The beer that made Milwaukee famous.' This is 'The Cola that wiped BosToon off the map'. All those years that 1950's Historical Re-enactment group just outside town was waiting for this, the Original Secret Recipe cola, to be 100% Authentic. Then someone gave them a bottle, and they drank it as they hit the switch." She shook her head. "Most groups like that re-enact Gettysburg, or Pickett's Charge. Not Eniwetok Atoll."
"I know. Dear Herbie's family owned a country club, outside town," Suzie said. "But when Toons say, 'there goes the neighbourhood' – in that case, it really did." She paused. "Herbie's folks really don't like him, since he changed his diet," She sighed. "They're really old-fashioned about it, too. It's like..." she pressed her hands together mock-piously. "We pray, and we'll pray / The vegan away!"
"Hmm. Like that ever works." Gina frowned. She sat behind Suzie in class, and over the year had noticed what her friend was doodling in the back of her books. Some very loving pen-portraits of Herbie Hackensaw and some more disturbing writing, particularly the recipes and shopping lists. 'Marinade him three days? Balsamic vinegar and soy sauce?' she recalled reading Suzie's daydreaming scribbles. As well as 'Maybe - served up roast, with fava beans and a light chianti? Oh poo, I'm not old enough to drink it. Not yet...'
Just then they the door opened, and they turned to see Ricardo Rat enter.
"Hi, ladies!" Ricardo smiled. "Thought I might find you here." At their invitation he pulled up a chair and looked around cautiously. "Yesterday – me, Bruce and Ann – we found something… very interesting."
"I'm all ears," Maloo said eagerly, then hesitated. She brushed her hand over the ear holes on her fleshless skull. "Well – you know what I mean." A Toon blush manifested half an inch away from the gleaming bone.
"First – I have to know – what do you think about our new tutors – the Vanderbunnies?" he asked conspiratorially. "And what they're saying about Comedy?"
Suzie stuck her tongue out. "Bleah," she flinched as at the first taste of Weeny-Cola. "Those two. They're about as funny as a case of foot-rot. Time that rot was treated."
"She's right. We've got to do something about them and their awful ideas. I don't know what we CAN, though," Gina said.
"What if," Ricardo whispered "we'd found a source of comedy – the real stuff. And all the instructions and materials for making a lot more."
Suzie eyed the rodent with interest. "You have, haven't you?" She breathed. "Count us in!"
Half an hour later, the four were entering an apparently abandoned ground-keeper's hut at the edge of Acme forest, a hundred yards from the Looniversity. Ricardo opened the improvised trapdoor and shone his light into the tunnel below. From the distance, the sound of laughter echoed up.
Suzie grinned carnivorously. "I think we're in the right place."
They descended, closing the trapdoor behind them, and walked down the curving tunnel towards a glow. There was something like an underground campsite now in the tunnel, with boxes of food and water, folding chairs and big battery lamps rigged up to show a stack of opened boxes. Ann Royd was just changing the reel of an old film projector – while Connie Canary, 'Spike' and 'Bubbles' fell about with laughter at what they had evidently seen.
"You guys! You're here!" Connie Canary hopped up and down excitedly. "What a place! We just saw Professor Bugs playing the ukulele, singing that track – 'What do they do, on a rainy night in Rio?' - and we even found the sequel, with the answer." She gestured at the film reel Ann was setting to rewind.
Gina blinked. "Well? What do they do?"
"What do they do? What do they DO? Well, we found out, didn't we just. I'll tell you just what they DO!" She gave a maniacal laugh. "In Rio, they go right ahead and… they…" The tiny bird stiffened, and fell flat on her back, her feet pointing up at the tunnel ceiling, vibrating like tuning forks.
"Don't mind her, 'Bubbles' reassured the new arrivals. "Turns out canaries can overload on Comedy, too. She'll be OK."
"Transient power surge," Ann Royd said cryptically.
"This looks great!" Suzie enthused, picking up a dusty volume labelled 'Hound-teasing tricks'. She cocked her head aside meditatively. "Not that dear Herbie's a hound, exactly... but surely I can adapt some of this to fit."
"Danger, Will R... I mean Danger, Suzie Scrapie!" Ann Royd said urgently. "We have enclosed spaces here. With an ignition source - the combustion lamps. Plus the projector motor emits sparks."
"So? Looks safe enough," the ewe looked around, unconcerned.
"Until you bring Herbie Hackensaw down here. With his diet and digestion. Explosive gas hazard." Ann said flatly.
All the Toons shared a vision of them getting fired into sub-orbital flight along the deflagrating tunnel, while precious books and films added to the fireball around them.
"Oh, phooey. You're right," Suzie sighed. Then her eyes gleamed. "Right. I'll make sure I really learn this stuff - so I can use it anywhere. Anywhere well-ventilated." She sat down, and began to leaf through the book.
"And that's not all we found. Props, too - that let me do something I've always wanted." With that, the balloon girl sashayed over to her porcupine boyfriend, smiling. "I want a hug, Spike. I've wanted this since you were a cute little Porcupette." (*)
(Editor's note – strangely enough, this IS the term for a young (not necessarily female) Porcupine.)
"Don't do it!" Maloo said urgently, reaching for the bicycle repair kit she carried when around her friend. But it was too late - 'Bubbles' was hugging the porcupine hard and tenderly. His needle-sharp barbed spines bristled out in shocked surprise, before relaxing as he leaned into the embrace.
Maloo looked on, aghast - expecting to hear a sharp hiss of escaping air or, worse, a sharp bang - that would be the end for Bubbles. But nothing happened. "How?" she gasped, her skeletal jaw hanging open in amazement.
Bubbles smiled triumphantly. She stepped away from Spike, who promptly melted into a puddle on the floor with the Toon special effects of the loving hug, before reconstituting. Opening her jacket, Bubbles revealed a glittering layer of flexible steel underneath. "We found chain mail in the props collection! And leather padding under it! For classic 'Knight and Damsel' sketches."
"A brave knight and a blushing damsel. Sort of traditional thing that's totally forbidden these days," Gina Ericson mused. "You've turned it around, if it's you that wears the armour."
"Hey! It IS the twenty-first century!" Suzie said brightly, looking up from her book. "Turnaround is fair play."
"I'm sure it's illegal that way too - just because." Gina said. She turned to Ann. "So - who knows about this place? And who are we telling?"
"Apart from us - just the Clumper-Duff siblings, Marcus M and Bruce Avery. Marcus has - issues - getting down narrow tunnels and stairs. And expanding the tunnel to allow him access could cause problems." Ann's eyes seemed to glow slightly, an odd effect. "I proposed the Clumper-Duffs choose who to tell."
"Makes sense to me," Gina nodded. "They've got four figure IQs - that's something to make use of. Maybe they can work out how to get double-M down here, too, without digging out a hole the size of a freeway tunnel.."
Connie Canary had recovered and was listening avidly as she perched on a crate, leafing through 'The Chase: a guide to L'amour Comique' by a Professor Le Pew. "Marcus," she sighed happily. "What a guy. Handsome, or what? What it'd be like to be… nesting, with him."
"He weighs nearly half a tonne. You weigh half a kilo," Ann said flatly. "I foresee – physical difficulties."
Connie looked pensive. "I'm not the only one. A lot of girls like him, but that's OK – there's a lot of him to go around. And it's traditional too - herds are a 'stallion thing', I wouldn't be jealous. And yes, we know what the Martian scientists said about him, with that ancestry. His... intelligence is a one-off thing. His foals, with whoever, would be just horse foals. Not kids you can really talk to, or send to school. Except maybe riding school."
"And that is not a problem for you?" Ann blinked.
The canary shrugged. "No Toon kids being born, anyway. No matter what you try. But - what an idea!" She sat back, heart-shapes drifting up like soap bubbles before picking up 'The definitive guide to Predator Evasion' by a 'Prof R. Runner'.
After two hours of hilarious study and field (or tunnel) testing some of the ancient gags, an exhausted party called for a break.
"Here's an idea," Ricardo suggested. "There's nobody in School today – it's Saturday. So, nobody to hear us if we explore that top corridor – the one we found the staircase entrance from. Anyone want to join me?"
"I will." Ann Royd nodded, evidently less fatigued than the rest, who stayed to rest. Taking their torches, Ricardo and Ann retraced their steps up the long-forgotten staircase and through the janitor's closet to the third floor corridor.
"The steel door's still shut. I don't think anyone else's been in here, since us," Ricardo whispered.
"They have. I have – very good eyesight on many frequencies. The dust has been recently disturbed, and by larger feet than ours." Ann frowned, squatting down in the corridor and scanning the floor carefully. "Two sets of prints. Coming and going." She slowly traced the trail, past the broom closet, to the far end of the corridor where a flight of stairs went up into the dark.
Ricardo consulted his map. "Nothing up there but the bell tower, and that's locked. We'd better check these other rooms first – so we've got no nasty surprises at our backs."
"Logical," Ann nodded. "I take this side of the corridor; you take the other."
Ricardo put the map away and began to search. The rooms still had old wooden desks and furniture; faded posters on the walls and half-legible writing on the blackboards – but all caked in a decade of dust. There was very little surviving to show what had been taught there.
Suddenly he heard Ann crying out in alarm, across the hallway. Ricardo followed his ears and rushed into the room. There was Ann, pressed back against the wall away from the window, shaking in fear. Nobody else was there. Then he looked out of the window. For just a flash he saw something - like a swarm of tiny insects outside - that had somehow lined up in formation to read 'JOIN US, ANDROID. YOU BELONG. MERGE.'
"No..." Ann moaned, "I'll never merge with you! Never!"
The swarm dispersed like dust blown away by a gust of wind, and Ann sank to her knees. Ricardo rushed forward to catch her, holding her shoulders tight. Holding her, he noticed she was oddly heavy for a Toon her size. "Who were those guys?" he demanded, looking out angrily at the now clear view of distant Lake Acme. "They couldn't even spell your name right."
Ann gave a wan smile. "You could say... it's a message from my people back in Uncanny Valley. My half-brothers Matt and Otto have been getting this too. At Perfecto. We're the last of our kind still walking around like this, you could say."
Ricardo scratched his head-fur, confused. "But... if you three are the last, who's your family? That's a very singular thing."
"Singularity. Yes, that describes it well. That's where the others went," Ann said cryptically. She stood, her expression blank for a second, then turned to Ricardo. "Thank you."
Monday morning came around with its usual grim inevitability, and the two classes of Toons filed into class as they had been told on Friday.
"I suppose we are getting briefed," Gina Ericson mused, as Ms Vanderbunny walked into the room.
"Briefs? I don't wear 'em. Being 'concealed' saves half the clothes bills," Ricardo rat grinned. "It's a Toon thing." He paused, his eyes going wide. "That gag worked!"
Suzie Scrapie smiled. "It's working," she whispered. "We're doing comedy!"
In front of the class, Babs' long ears twitched, but she managed to not give a whoop of joy at what they told her. Instead, 'Buffy' tapped at the blackboard with a yard-long official issue Ruler of Smiting (+ D4 against rumps of class slackers). "Now. Let's go over this again. You're to visit the premises of the former Acme Gazette – and trawl the news archives. Bring back copies of anything showing evidence of how the current 'Best Of All Possible Worlds™' that we currently live in, achieved its current perfection. From the deplorable state it was… say fifteen years ago."
"That doesn't sound much of a laugh," Spike muttered.
Behind him, Chastity sniffed haughtily. "As holy scripture says – 'Fools raise their voice in laughter, but the prudent at most smile quietly.' And so it is."
"Look it up; (Sir.21.20)," her sister added smugly.
Spike bristled, but said nothing.
Connie Canary raised her feather-hand. "Ms Vanderbunny? We look for old news, bring it all back every day for home time?"
'Buffy' looked around her class. "Yes, and you DO have to come into Looniversity every morning as usual, make roll-call, before heading into town." She noticed something had changed in one of her student's outfits. "Ms Bolinski – not wearing the weight belt today? It is windy outside."
'Bubbles' patted herself on the shoulder; under the outer jacket there was a faint jingling sound. "I found a better solution, Ma'am. It weighs just the same, and there's other – benefits." She smiled over towards Spike.
"Well. Take care out there." Behind her façade, Babs recognised the sound of chainmail the balloon girl was wearing – she and Buster had lugged the heavy crate into the old steam tunnels a few days earlier.
"Oh, I will. Me and Spike both. We can have plenty of fun now we're using – protection," Bubbles deadpanned.
Nice one! Babs grinned internally. She's picking up more than a few old props now!
In the row behind, Chastity and Fidela exchanged matching frowns. "They should be separated," Chastity declared. "Permanently, for their own good. To remove temptation."
"We have witnessed the bitter fruit of such temptation," Fidela said loftily. "As a flower is nourished indeed by vilest guano, we grew up with it."
'Buffy' blinked as they projected a scene – a breakfast in a large and evidently very popular household. She recognised Margot Mallard at the head of the table – sitting like a reigning Dark Queen on her throne, relaxed and benevolent on the surface but with the power to change that very fast and very radically. A slightly younger Douglas 'Dauntless' Duck she recognised, evidently talking animatedly with his father Plucky – and next to him, a pair of very similar younger, green-feathered duck boys she had not seen before, evidently his half-brothers Marky and Marty. Further down the table were yet another pair – innocently smiling, demure looking sisters these, looking very like younger copies of Margot except for their head-feathers, blonde and reddish respectively. Which matched that of the two uniformed maids who were very busy serving out breakfast to a large family and an even larger group of guests with healthy appetites. A group that Chastity and Fidela were pointedly looking daggers at.
As Babs described the scene to Buster when they met after their classes had headed into town towards the Acme Gazette building – "Chastity and Fidela aren't team players. Their older sisters are, very much so. Those are the sisters our holier-than-thou pair very loudly and clearly don't talk about all the time."
"Millie and Molly? We met them once, at Plucky's place," Buster suggested. "Cute lil' ducklings, back then."
"That's them," Babs said, grinning slyly. "The daughters of Margot Mallard and her ever-loving maids. Chastity and Fidela are, of course, Quite the opposite. They're very friendly, sporting girls, are Millie and Molly… they really love their team sports."
"What are they into?" Buster asked, intrigued.
"Basketball teams. Football teams. It gets very crowded at breakfast," Babs said innocently. "Good thing Margot's got a big enough table!" She cocked her head on one side. "Funny thing; with Milly and Molly's ancestry you'd expect it to be say, women's netball and hockey teams they're dating."
"Heh. So, as to our two teams of students. They're out digging for data – what should we do today?" Buster wiggled his eyebrows. "I've taken care of our dear Principal – she's out desperately searching for 'the ONLY seriously acceptable music for the post-harmony infotainment world, don't 'cha know' – as Biff said. To reflect the Eternal Truth."
"Which is, today?" Babs queried.
"Raw, industrial speed skiffle," Buster tapped the mix-and-match list. "I dropped a few hints about the advanced techno-washboards and overclocked tea-chests those bands play, they have to be made from tungsten – regular steel just won't survive playing the first set. Half a million watts of acoustic power, that's some washboard."
"A washboard that blows the audience 'clean away'. Good luck to her with that quest – I Don't think," Babs said. "And even if she manages to find some – tomorrow, we roll the dice on her again!"
"Don't you just love it when a plan comes together?" Buster smiled. "And- I just might have found out how to fix our cash flow."
An hour later they were somewhere neither had been in two years, their time – the woods outside Buster's old bachelor burrow, where a tyre on a rope used to hang as a swing from a tree branch. Buster was digging rapidly at an unmarked spot exactly between two conspicuous boulders, when he stopped and gave a whoop of glee. "Found it!"
"Pirate treasure?" Babs asked hopefully. "Gold, silver and ill-gotten jewels?"
"Not quite. In my first year at Acme Loo, I stashed every spare cent I had here." Buster heaved a heavy sack out of the hole, its contents clinking slightly.
"You buried all your money?" Babs blinked. "No wonder you had to raid carrot-fields for lunch."
"Nope – just all the one cent coins. There's fifty pounds weight of them here, copper-nickel alloy," Buster filled in the hole and parted the turf down. "I read a sci-fi tale of someone doing that, burying their small change for posterity – I never thought it'd be me doing the time travel."
Babs looked at the sack critically. "So, if there's three thousand cents it's thirty dollars. Big deal. That won't get us far."
"Hey, Babsy, this is a Dark Future! I checked with Calamity – metal's rare, rare, rare now. Never mind the face value; this might as well BE gold and silver." Buster stood posed on the sack like a big-game hunter photographed with their fallen prey. "Even the plastics now are 'faux PVC' and 'polyester substitute'. Pretty much any metal's worth a fortune." He winked. "It's a 'heaven-cent' piece of luck, eh?"
"A fortune in one cent coins. Really. That'd make a 'change'" Babs said dryly.
"Now do you believe me?" An hour and a half later, Buster walked out of an exchange bureau in Acme Hectares that advertised 'Any metal bought for cash! Rusty scrap iron, even! Stacks of cash! We're very desperate!' He brandished a thick wad of banknotes. "Ta-daaa!"
"You win this one, blue-boy," Babs shrugged in resignation. "Well, that's our grocery bills sorted for awhile. Pity the only place to shop is Unhappy Shopper. A place that lives down to its name. Every year, grosser groceries."
"Lowest common denominator. That's the name of the game, all right," Buster tucked the money away in his Hammerspace pocket, whistling 'we're in the money!' as he went.
A few streets away was the boarded-up ten storey building that had housed the Acme Gazette, once famed for its crusading quest for impartial truth and honesty.
"Which is why it had to go; 'no platform' allowed for anything that won't fit the picture," Marcus 'Eddson' said sadly, as he unlocked the basement door. Strictly speaking, it was a Mars-built manipulator robot from the A-1 corporation of Olympus Mons, a 'handy' that turned the key in the lock for him. What looked like a decorative headstall worn on the stallion's head was actually a brain reader and transmitter for controlling the gadget. "Jenny wanted to work here – she was all set up to start as an intern the week it closed."
Ricardo Rat shone his torch around, and found the light switch, which he flicked in vain. "Power's out," he said glumly. "Boy, someone really wanted this place dead. Cancelled, or what?"
"That's no news," Marcus' ears went right back, and he snorted. "Right. I never knew just who thought that was a good idea. It'll be in here somewhere. And where did they start?" A bright light shone from the 'handy' which switched to drone mode and started to hover above its owner as Marcus walked slowly into the basement, his horseshoes ringing loud on the tiled floor.
The fourteen first-year Toons spread out hunting for archives of the right age, eventually puzzling out how to get the microfiche readers working with spare torches taking the place of the dead backlights. Cameras clicked and notebooks were hastily scribbled in as they began to scan the old newspaper files for a clue as to how the world had ended up as it had.
Four hours later, they broke for lunch. The building owned a sunken area fenced off below street level, where concrete tables survived.
"Poor Connie. That's no place for her, in there," Ricardo carried out the unconscious canary, and put her out in the fresh air to recover. "Five times – she just keeled over, with the dust."
"Connie brave girl! Connie keep going!" Bruce Avery grinned. "Get up every time and go look some more. Found plenty." He waved a sheaf of copies. "This right kind of stuff?"
Marcus clopped over, and nodded as he read. "I think so. This article here, fifteen years ago… about how so many Toons get their opinions from Antisocial Media. All kinds."
"Advert for 'Enemies Reunited' here, it says." Ricardo squinted at the small print. "They can find that School Bully. Sell you his address and phone number. Tell you what time he's walking past that dark alleyway tonight. Put you in touch with 'dedicated professionals' to… help out. Eww."
"That's just the start of it." The manipulators of Marcus' 'handy' leafed through the copies. "And this article – 'flash fashion'. Used to be, fashion houses designed 'this year's look.' Now it's instant, and extreme."
Bruce Avery's shark-like teeth briefly twitched in a snarl. "Media Influencers. Take nasty industrial accident. Spin-doctor into 'today's must-have look.' Wondered where 'brain-piercing' craze started."
"Yup. Accident with an ACME crowbar-hurling machine. And things can go out of style instantly, and totally. You'd think someone was having a laugh at this." Ricardo shook his head. "Tattoos. I never liked the idea. But this week here – they were instantly 'out' in a big way. As in, Toons wanted to get rid of them in the next fifteen seconds, no matter how. And if there's a Dip-soaked axe handy…"
"There's a lot of them walking around today with prosthetic limbs, because of that. Heads and torsos, too." Marcus' back hoof began to tremble as he felt the urge to kick something.
A packed lunch later (and much moaning about the 'hashburger helper substitute' in the canteen sandwiches) Marcus' class loaded their first morning's results into his saddlebags and the stallion galloped back to the Looniversity to hand the fruits of their labour to the senior year. Back in the basement, the first-years grimly settled down to dig out more information.
"Shopping," Babs said as they returned to their anvil (and Mary-Sue) shelter in the evening, her ears going right down "Is one of life's greatest joys. Or it used to be. NOT something to be… endured." Her muzzle wrinkled at the thought of all the tasty meals she could definitely not make out of the available ingredients.
"Too true, Babsy," Buster unpacked the food, casting a speculative eye at the 1950's cans of freeze-dried carrot cookies in the far corner. "At least we've got the first batch of Project News Dig here. Your bunch scanned through a couple of acres' worth of newsprint for the ingredients, mine cooked the cake with 'em." He sat down, brow furrowed in concentration as Babs did her best with what passed for food these days. Half an hour later, he closed the document. "Well. George and Myrela say they've spotted how it really went downhill. Fourteen years ago, the first of a hundred and forty-four anti-Comedy laws."
Babs blinked. "A hundred and forty-four stupid laws? That's a 'gross' idea!"
"Yes. And you know what the first one was? For no good reason, they banned creosote. Plain old 'paint-the-fence' creosote. It's the first law that stands out, like the rest do." Buster frowned. "That's what George Junior says, and I believe him." The hulking hare had made his announcement studying the properly presented data wearing an old pair of 3-D glasses; apparently that particular style of event sprang out into sharp focus.
"If you've a Toon on the team who earned a top law degree - aged 9 - and packs a 4-figure IQ on top of THAT, no point NOT believing them," Babs shrugged. "Hard to prove them wrong."
"And the next laws all involved comedy." Buster added. "Hmm. You'd almost think someone with no sense of humour and a commercial interest in replacing fenceposts was behind it."
"Stranger things have happened in California." Babs declared. Suddenly she frowned. "You know, Buster – I'm not so happy with this whole 'everything possible really happened, in some version' thing. That'd mean – even if we went back to our right time and steered it back on course, all this…." She waved her paw around at Acme Hectares "will still be here somewhere, just as bad and getting worse. We'd have got away, but they wouldn't. We wouldn't really have fixed it, just run away."
"Know what you mean," Buster sighed. "But what if we don't? If there really is only one timeline - well, think about some of your class. They were born after this timeline started going downhill. We stop that happening and maybe - they didn't happen. They were never here. But a lot more Toon kids would be; Blitz and our next litter will have friends to play with."
Babs stroked her cub's fuzzy ears lovingly. "And when it's time, little Blitz won't always have to date... much older girls." She paused, a small smile coming to her adorable muzzle. "Unless he wants to."
"He's meant to be in my class right now aged sixteen, front row, in that empty seat the script sort of kept open for him," Buster said. "Who knows which girl he was destined for? Your brother Mortimer dated Shelley, the cute thousand-year-old gastropod. Even Maloo's not THAT strange." His ears dipped. "But... Maloo likely wouldn't exist, on a fixed timeline."
"Eww. Somehow I don't think I can look her in the face - well, the skull - and tell her 'sorry, it's just... the greater good for the greater number', blue-boy. And Marcus... I feel sorta responsible for him." Babs looked troubled. "So; if we fix things fifteen years back maybe he's just suddenly not there? And never was, so he'd never even know? But we would, when we got back. And I think I know his family."
"I thought you said he had a 'Mystery Origins' trope? So nobody knows?" Buster queried.
"He does. Well, anyone who DOES know his ancestry, keeps very quiet about it. For very good reasons." Babs' ears dipped. "Let's just say his family name definitely isn't 'Eddson'."
"I'm thinking about something Myrela said," Buster mused. "Maybe there ARE billions of histories. But only one of them's ours to change."
"You mean – there's some where I really AM Captain-Commissar Karrotovich, of the People's Democratic Republic of Eastern Molvania?" Babs could not resist a swish of her notional riding-crop.
"Stacks of 'em. But they're all looking after their versions. So…" Buster wiggled his eyebrows.
"So… that's why we haven't met ourselves here? In Timeline 3854pluralZZ-Alpha or whatever it is, they'd have their own Babs and Buster – but this is all ours? So, when we went missing that made the difference - with rabbit-shaped holes in the plot?" Babs blinked.
"We'll leave the details to the philosophers but, I think so." Buster suddenly grinned. "Heh. Remember that was one of Plucky's 'get-rich-quick' ideas? For about a week? Become a poet or maybe a philosopher, start a huge and well-funded following, cash it all in after a year and buy a Caribbean resort island. Or two."
Babs looked at him sidelong. "Heh. Don't laugh too soon, blue-boy. In this time-line – things are so screwed-up… I wouldn't be amazed if he did it."
Just then there came Calamity's coded knock at the door. Checking through the fish-eye lens on the old shelter door, Buster smiled and let him in. "Hey, Cal! The kids have pulled it off – we've made a start, we know what happened. The basics, anyway." He passed over the report, and Calamity rapidly skimmed through it.
"Now we need to go back and find out whodunnit," Babs said brightly. "So, how's your day been?"
Calamity sat down, his whiskers drooping. I've been up in that bell tower. Taking a look at the nearest thing to Hell's Bells I've ever seen.
"You know, I'm starting to get the feeling Calamity doesn't Like this project," Babs said in a loud stage whisper, her eyebrows waggling.
You know why? Because I'm starting to think it might work. And it shouldn't. The coyote turned bleak eyes on them. If it does, things will… change.
"That is sort of the idea, Cal," Buster said patiently. "So we can go back in time and fix things? Or even better, stop them needing a fix?"
Not what I mean. Calamity took a deep breath. How many planets are there, out to and including Jupiter?
"Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter; I know how many beans make five. Planets, too." Babs said promptly. "Hey! I didn't learn one hundred percent comedy, you know." Suddenly her eyes went wide. "Oh. And the other one."
Phaeton, yes. It didn't used to be there. There used to be an asteroid belt. But then – it was there. And it always had been. NASA threw a fit – instead of looking at asteroids their probes were suddenly looking at a Civilisation older than Mars. Had to rewrite all the Astronomy books. (*) A coyote's ears drooped.
"Thanks to Shirley's daughters, I heard. But they're off Earth and out of the picture, just TOO stupidly plot-killing powerful to stay on the scene," Buster nodded. "This Bell will make a change like that?"
Same way as when Toons invented Oxygen. The market for Phlogiston, 'essence of fire', just crashed – it doesn't even exist anymore, Calamity signed. It had, the day before! And Toon Physics can work like that. This Bell used Aether vortices! Science spent years proving that doesn't even exist!
"Except – if it works – it'll prove they do? And – like planet Phaeton – they always have done, suddenly?" Buster hazarded. "Goodbye to Toon Physics as we know it?"
It'll go the way of Phlogiston, Calamity signed glumly. This kind of thing can happen. There was a REASON for the 'Committee for What Mankind is Not Meant To Know.'
"If we were Perfecto grads, we'd just cheer and say 'Big investment opportunities in publishing! Think of all those new textbooks!'" Babs reflected.
Calamity frowned. Talking about anomalies, I was looking at my old Weird Physics notes from the Suppercollider, trying to work out how this Hell's Bell works. I think I've found a clue to the famous Albuquerque Distortion, after all these years. Even Professor Bugs kept getting knocked way off course, going past there.
"And he's the best burrower in the book," Buster said proudly.
Yes. Plus, a rabbit tunnelling on the cusp between normal and Hammerspace, shouldn't be affected by anything outside, Calamity nodded as he signed. Unless… the distortion is IN Hammerspace.
(Editor's note: see the earlier tale "Passing The Torch." Brandi and Candi have Massive Plot Overkill features.)
"So, Cal, what have you got?" Buster asked, intrigued.
Back in the 1950's, the Air Force had one of their usual… 'WHOOPS ARROW' accidents. Somebody flying a B-36 tried to adjust their seat, hit the wrong button and dropped a 5 MegaToon Device just outside town. The parachute opened, the altimeter counted down, the safety interlocks started to open but… it didn't go off. A single fifty-cent switch stopped it.
"Lucky old Albuquerque," Babs grinned.
Well, that's in this history. But on other timelines – goodbye Albuquerque! Calamity signed. And that event… buckled the histories around it. That dimensional warping is what throws burrowers off.
"As if the other histories somehow knew it happened, and kinda - flinched away," Babs mused. "Like seeing the toon next to you getting flattened by an anvil. But what does it mean?"
Not sure yet. Calamity signed pensively. But I'm thinking about it.
"There's a lot of weird things going on," Buster said. "What did people do after they realised Maloo was the last Toon ever born round here? They must have investigated."
There's a theory about that, Calamity signed thoughtfully. Everyone knows Toons make comedy. What if it goes both ways?
"Comedy makes Toons?" Babs blinked. "We'd thought that, too. And no more comedy, no more Toons?"
It's pretty deep, Fun-damental Fun research, Calamity agreed. The only place used to do that level of Toon Science was my old Centre for Advanced Studies.
"Yes. And that got closed down, didn't it? Pretty early on, too." Buster nodded significantly.
"Someone thought it'd be nicer as the 'Centre for Utterly Lame and Retarded Studies', you said,", Babs added helpfully.
"Someone did. I'm starting to see a pattern." Buster paused. "I'm not sure WHAT pattern – but it's not pretty."
Calamity took a deep breath. If you want to give it a test shot – we can try ringing Hell's Bell. Before I come to my senses and just say 'no' to the whole idea.
"Sounds like a plan. Let's do it!" Babs got to her feet, and scooped little Blitz up into his cub-carrier. "I'm ready to go back if you are, Buster?"
"Never readier," her buck agreed. "Lead the way, Cal!"
The coyote sighed and stood up. Don't say I didn't warn you…
Up in the Bell tower ten minutes later, they stood on the top floor and looked up through the open trapdoor at what was suspended in a maze of high-voltage cables. It was somewhat bell-shaped – and from within came a whirring of high-speed electric motors.
"Do we have a big lever to pull? Or did you go with the 'big red button' approach?" Babs asked brightly.
Small, recycled button. I had to improvise.And I couldn't get half the components the manual wanted, Calamity signed, a bead of sweat manifesting on his fur in violation of several biological principles. You just can't GET proper 1940's ersatz rubber any more. I did my best to find a substitute, but if it'll work...
"Oh, go on. it'll be fine. 'She'll be right, mate', like Bruce Avery says," Babs encouraged. "Famous Australian wisdom, that."
I don't think there's going to be enough power either, Calamity signed. Above him in the tower the Bell was making a frantic humming like endless angry swarms of hornets but here goes! With that, he took a deep breath and pressed the repurposed doorbell switch.
"A bell-push. How apt." Babs said dryly.
Every Toon felt their fur standing on end as if by some huge electrical charge - while above the sound grew louder and louder, and indescribable colours began to reflect through the open hatchway. Suddenly there was a brilliant flash, and everything became very still.
"My ears are ringing," Buster rubbed them. "And somehow I can't remember the word for... carrot."
"You mean - carrot?" Babs picked herself up off the floor where the shock had knocked her. "Don't worry, it'll come to you." She looked at Calamity, whose ears were dipped as he studied the readouts of his instruments. "It did something radical - that's got to be good, right?"
Oh-oh… I think we really shouldn't have done that…. Calamity winced, going across to the window. Look outside now...
"We have a Time Tunnel back fifteen years, like we wanted?" Babs asked hopefully. "Time to pack our bags and hop to it?"
"Ehh... looks like somebody got a Time Tunnel, all right. But it's missed our stop, went back a way further. Not even to Japan – or those'd be Samurai coming through, that vintage." Buster's ears went right down. Outside was a troop of about twenty determined-looking soldiers had suddenly appeared - but not dressed in modern uniforms. Tall 'shako' hats were worn over bright red jackets, with the cross-straps and leather knapsacks from Napoleon's time.
"So, who've we got calling?" Babs looked down critically, as an avian officer with an eye-patch gestured towards the building with her sword and the two-hundred-year shifted troopers ran into the building after her. "Are the Redcoats back for another go? Or - you think – Napoleon changed his mind about the Louisiana Purchase and wants it all back? Plus California as interest payment?"
"In about a minute, we'll find out," Buster said grimly, his ears twitching at the sound of hobnailed boots on the stairs. "Sounds like they're heading right this way."
Sure enough, very shortly the door was flung open and a furiously bristling avian Toon in the top half of an authentic and uncomfortable-looking Napoleonic infantry-Toon's uniform charged in, with drawn sword. She pointed up towards the Bell tower with a blade that now was visibly glowing with pale blue astral light. Crowded in the door behind her, half a dozen similarly (if more plainly) outfitted Toons levelled what looked outwardly very like muskets. If you ignored the faint blue glow of astral light wreathing their muzzles.
"I want that mondo gross junk up there like, totally switched off and dismantled fer good, like now!" Came a voice that Babs and Buster recognised instantly. "It is like, TOTALLY unclean!"
"S… Shirley?" Babs blinked.
"Major McLoon, of Ghost Division, I presume." Buster grinned and bowed. "Long time no see."
The avian removed her tall hat to reveal a familiar tall styling of blond head-feathers piled up in an elaborate quiff. She flicked up her eye-patch; under it was a perfectly healthy-looking eye. It was no friendly look of recognition that she gave.
"I'm Major McLoon, fer sure." The sword stayed drawn; it began to drip with blue light as if eldritch psionic fire was streaming off it. Behind her the squad levelled their mutant muskets at the rabbits, and the barrels began to glow. "And you two grody doppelgangers have like, made your LAST mistake - to steal the shapes of my best friends Babs and Buster Bunny!"
End Chapter Four
