SPACEBALLS THE FANFIC II 1/2: THE SCHWARTZ SNORES SOUNDLY
BY
BOB WRIGHT
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Now that the Star Wars Sequel Trilogy is completely, it only makes sense to put that-and more-to general parody, so, whether you loved or hated this set of films, this story will hopefully be for you.
Spaceballs and all related characters and indicia are registered trademarks of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures and Brooksfilms. And now, as always, set back and enjoy the story.
ONCE UPON A TIME WARP...
IN A GALAXY VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY FAR AWAY, THERE LIVED A RUTHLESS RACE OF BEINGS KNOWN AS...SPACEBALLS.
CHAPTER XIV
WE KNOW HOW MONOTONOUS EXPOSITION CAN BE, SO WE'LL BE QUICK AND TO THE POINT HERE: THE EVIL DARK HELMET AND HIS COMPANIONS HAVE ESCAPED FROM THE BLACK HOLE THEY WERE LAST SEEN FLYING INTO THE PREVIOUSLY PUBLISHED SPACEBALLS FAN FICTION STORY ALFBALLS AND ARE PREPARING TO EMBARK ON ONE FINAL MISSION OF VENGENANCE THAT COULD, IF SOMEHOW SUCCESSFUL, SPELL DOOM FOR PLANET DRUIDIA AND ALL ON IT...
(IF YOU CAN READ THIS, YOU DON'T NEED GLASSES)
Deep in the heart of the Ford Galaxy, the casino planet Monte Kiffino spun placidly through space. Travelers and space gamblers came to it all the time to wager their spacebucks and enjoy themselves. Today was no exception, as the flagship Spacedust Casino was packed from wall to wall with gamblers spinning the roulette wheels, pulling the slot machines' arms and...crapping, for lack of a better word, at the craps tables. From his position at the top of the walkway overlooking the gambling floor, casino owner W.E. Fleecem Howe grinned down at the multitudes playing away below him. "Well, Rich," he told his top lieutenant as the man approached him, "This has to be some kind of record. Our semi-annual Christmas specials are going to break all the records here."
"I think so, Mr. Howe," Rich agreed, "I can't wait to count the money..."
"That's Count DE-MONAY!" shouted the 18th Century French nobleman from a slot machine underneath the walkway. Howe and Rich stared down in puzzlement, then shook their heads, unconcerned. "Anyway, Rich, nothing can possibly stop us now," the casino owner declared. As is often the case in such stories, however, no sooner were these words out of his mouth than there came a tremendous explosion from the front door, followed by screams and laser blasts started ringing out. "What in the...Spaceballs!?" Howe gasped, seeing swarms of Spaceball troopers rushing onto the casino floor, firing away in every imaginable direction, "What are they doing in here!? Military Appreciation Day's not for another month!"
"I don't know sir, but I don't like it. I'm getting out of here!" Rich turned to run, but it was too late: another squad of troopers had already made their way up the nearest stairs and blocked both men's exit. "Good afternoon," declared the well-dressed military man pushing his way through the troops, "In case you don't know, I'm Colonel Sandurz, supreme military commander for the imperious forces of Planet Spaceball; on behalf of President Skroob and Lord Dark Helmet, thank you for willingly becoming our prisoner," he walked forward and cordially shook Howe's hand.
"I'm not surrendering, Colonel!" Howe reached into his pocket for a phaser, but yelped and sank to his knees as a beam of ominous green light shot out from among the troopers and locked in hard on his privates. "I do believe you are," the somewhat menacing figure of Dark Helmet walked out, increasing the intensity of the beam from his Schwartz ring with each step, making Howe howl harder. "You and I have a conversation coming, Howe."
"All right men, take all the guests' money and help yourselves to all the machines you want," Sandurz ordered his men, who rushed down to the floor to partake of the casino's apparatus. The colonel drew a set of handcuffs and applied them to Howe while Helmet, finally deactivating his Schwartz approached closer to him. "Now, Mr. Howe, my father Kerr Ash Helmet left an important artifact in the care of your father before his tragic death in the Drone Wars," the villain told the casino owner, "I wish to know the location of that artifact as soon as possible."
"That old thing? Yeah, it's here, but I'm not telling you, Helmet, and nothing you say or do, even with that blasted ring of yours, is going to convince me otherwise," Howe said defiantly.
"Well, my ring may not scare you, but perhaps the one wielded by my new apprentice Ree Member Wenn will. Wenn?" Helmet turned backwards towards the figure wearing a spiked suit of armor with an absurd smiling face painted on the visor coming up the stairs. The newcomer raised his own Schwartz ring, which glowed brown, formed into the shape of a fist, then shot into Howe's balls with colossal force. More fists formed and followed the same trajectory in rapid succession. Howe screeched in agony. "OK, OK, it's in the vault, but I forget the damn combination to it!" he wailed, "Now uncle, uncle!"
"You forgot the combination to your own vault!?" Wenn demanded in a sinister voice.
"Hey, nobody's perfect..."
"Enough! Take him out back and shoot him, men!" Helmet ordered the nearest troopers, who seized Howe and Rich and dragged them down the stairs. "Grab as much dynamite as you can, men; we're going to blow the vault," Sandurz ordered his troops, who scattered down the stairs. "Well done, Lord Wenn," he approached Helmet's newest apprentice.
"Of course it was; when you and..." Wenn started gasping for air. He removed his helmet, revealing himself to be a frail elderly man, and quickly put an oxygen mask to his face and inhaled. "Much better," he declared, "When you and Helmet here were still learning to spell your names, I was planning to conquer galaxies. So of course I know how to handle these things; I was a king once, you know."
"Yes, Wenn, we've heard that nine thousand times already," Helmet sighed, "Proceed down to the basement, and..."
"And another note on that, Dark; I may officially be your apprentice, but as a former king, I take orders from no one. I'm here to get a full crash course in the Down Side of the Schwartz, that's all. And I expect Skroob to give me a new kingdom in return for this. Faster. men, get those explosives set up and ready to go!" Wenn ordered the Spaceball troopers now carrying boxes of dynamite towards the stairs at the rear of the casino floor. He rushed down the stairs to assist them. Helmet yanked up his visor and shook his head. "You sure he was the only guy to answer our ads!?" he muttered to Sandurz under his breath.
"The only one, sir. But the intergalactic economy has been bad lately," the colonel rationalized.
"And you hung the posters everywhere you could?"
"Literally everywhere, sir," Sandurz held up a posted on which had been inscribed:
WANTED:
ASPIRING EVIL OVERLORD
EXPERIENCE THE OPPORTUNITY OF A LIFETIME:
TRAVEL ALL THROUGH THE UNIVERSE IN A POSITION OF POWER AND LEARN ALL ABOUT THE SUPREME POWER OF THE DOWN SIDE OF THE SCHWARTZ FROM GRAND MASTER LORD DARK HELMET HIMSELF
PREVIOUS EXPERIENCE IN PROFESSIONAL TORTURE AND AGGRESSIVE WARFARE A PLUS
SEND A RESUME AND REFERALS TO:
COLONEL SANDURZ, SUPREME MILITARY COMMANDER, PLANET SPACEBALL ARMED FORCES
P.O. BOX 666 SKROOB HIGHWAY
SPACEBALL CITY, PLANET SPACEBALL 00666
OR CALL 555-6666 DURING WEEKDAY BUSINESS HOURS
"Oh well," Helmet shook his head, "At least he's intelligent and competent, not like that dope Count Cuckoo you signed up with me earlier, Sandurz. I actually felt good having to execute him..."
A blast of execution fire from some more troopers could be heard outside. "Are you sure we're not killing a good character off too soon, sir?" Sandurz asked his boss.
"Nah, what else would there be for the guy to do after this? Besides, he makes a great action figure for the stores," Helmet held up an action figure of Howe, with a Spaceball trooper pointing a blaster rifle at him. He pressed a button on the Howe figurine's rear end, which prompted the trooper's blast to make a firing sound and Howe's head to roll backwards off his shoulders. "Anyway," he pocketed the dolls and pulled his visor back down again, "Come with me, Sandurz. My inheritance awaits."
He led the colonel down the stairs. "Soon, Sandurz, my father's legacy to me will allow us to build the ultimate weapon of destruction. Combine that with what we're forcing Dr. Shipps to make for us, and soon we can wipe out Planet Druidia forever. Because if we can't have those ten thousand years of fresh air..." he stopped and paused for unnecessary dramatic effect before continuing, "then no one will..."
A dramatic musical sting rang out above. Both men looked upwards towards it until it died back down. "Exactly, sir," Sandurz agreed as they continued their walk towards the vault, "Dr. Shipps' pulverization technology combined with your father's instructions on weapon building should allow us to take the whole planet...and of course Prince Lone Starr...out. I've already sent out our secret air retrieval ships; they should be arriving on Druidia within the next six hours or so. They'll suck up all the air they can and head back to Planet Spaceball before we blow Druidia up. My only question is," he glanced sideways, "Are we being too sloppy with the exposition here, sir?"
"Nah, exposition's exposition, Sandurz. Here we are," Helmet declared, entering the basement. A ton of explosives had been laid against the casino vault by the troopers. "We're all set, Colonel," one of them called to Sandurz.
"Very good, Corporal. All right, Wenn, blast the vault," Sandurz commanded Wenn, who hefted a detonator and pressed down on the plunger. With a loud bang and flash of flames, the explosives went off. Seconds later, the entire gigantic vault lurched out of the wall and shot across the room. Helmet, directly in its path, had just enough time to let out a terrified scream before the vault slammed hard into him and crushed him against the far wall. "Sir!? Sir, are you all right!?" a concerned Sandurz ran over to him. A furious barrage of muffled obscenities rang out from behind the vault. "Quick, push it back off him, men!" he ordered his troops. They strained to push the vault backwards, revealing Helmet stuck to the wall, now nine feet long and very flat. "Good, you're alive, sir," Sandurz breathed a sigh of relief.
"How very observant, Sandurz. Now get me out of here!" Helmet raged.
"Of course, sir," Sandurz literally peeled his boss off the wall and laid him flat on the ground. He waved forward two troopers who were carrying a red tire pump with the words SPACEBALLS THE AIR PUMP very prominently displayed on it. They stuck the tube in Helmet's mouth and started pumping. Helmet's arms and legs slowly started inflating with air. "Somebody check the vault for my present," the evil leader called to his men. Several troopers entered the now open vault. "Got it here, sir," one of them ran out carrying a large, wrapped Christmas present. "Wonderful. Wenn, open it up," Helmet asked his apprentice, who obligingly tore open the present. "How nice: 'To Dark Helmet from Kerr Ash Helmet.' Almost wish my son gave me reason to do that to him, instead of overthrowing me because he believed in democracy and freedom and all that rubbish..." he muttered.
"Never mind, Wenn. Give it here," Helmet extended a now re-inflated hand for the triangular object that had been in the box. "Aha, Sandurz, a communications device and map," he exclaimed, extending it towards the colonel, "Once I'm back to normal, call Spaceball City and inform President Skroob that we're ready to kick off the next phase of the final mission..."
Millions of light years away on Planet Spaceball, President Skroob was at that moment on the phone in his Spaceball City office. "...how much were you able to find?" he was asking the caller on the other end, "Well, with what we forced Dr. Shipps to make for us, that should be enough. You just gather the rest of your guys and the rest of his regular guys' you and the bigger guys in the gang come here, the rest of you head out to Hockeygol; we're putting everything together for the big finale out there. Got to run now, Vinnie; got something real important to handle now."
He hung up and bustled towards his private bathroom in the rear of the office. He entered one of the bathroom's stalls, closed the door, dropped his pants, and sat down to take care of business...
...at which point, unfortunately, the TeleWall lit up behind him. "President Skroob," came the authoritative voice of Commanderette Zircon on the screen. Skroob yelped in shock and jumped forward off the toilet, smacking his head hard off the stall door. "Zircon, how many times have I told you...!?" he started to protest, then quickly pulled his pants back up. "How many times have I told you to stop calling me on unlisted walls!?"
"Sorry, sir, but I have an important message to deliver," Zircon told him matter-of-factually, "Lord Helmet has just reported in from Monte Kiffino: he has obtained the communicator from Kerr Ash Helmet that was in the vault and is in transit now with it."
"OK, OK, that's good," Skroob admitted, rubbing his still sore head, "Our plan for final revenge against Druidia's coming together well. How's it coming on Hockeygol?"
"We haven't had any reports from Dr. Shipps in a few days, but at last check, it appears he had the basics of our doomsday weapon ready for testing," the commanderette told him, "Shall I have Snotty beam you over so you can get an update in person?"
"Zircon, you know I hate beaming. Every time I try it..."
"I know sir, but Snotty insists he's worked out all of the bugs this time. I believe it is safe now," Zircon insisted.
"Well, OK, but this is the last time, Zircon," Skroob pointed a finger at the TeleWall, "If this messes up, I'm smashing the blamed thing."
He exited the stall and bathroom and headed back to the beamer in his office. "OK Snotty, beam me over-and do it right," he commanded out loud. The beamer activated, digitizing the president into millions of tiny particles. Seconds later, he was reassembled in the central Planet Spaceball command center. "OK, now let's see..." he started to say, but then cut off. "What's the matter here? Why's everyone so much taller than me?" he asked out loud, noticing he seemed to be shorter than everyone else in the command center. Then he realized exactly why: the beamer, as he'd feared, had malfunctioned again, and as such his head was now literally coming out of his...
"SNOTTY!" he bellowed in frustration at the beam controller, "Does this look like fixed to you!? This is your worst mess-up with this yet!"
"I'm sorry, sir; I thought it was fixed!" Snotty protested across the room, "Something wee in the circuitry must have slipped past me!"
"Well get me back to normal right now or I'll wee all over you, you stupid...!" Skroob was cut off as he lost his balance and fell on his rear end-and thus, under the circumstances, flat on his face, prompting everyone in the command center to crack up.
"Hang on a minute sir, I think I know what to do," Snotty grabbed a nearby wrench and pounded the beamer controls hard. "Hopefully that did it. OK, lock loan...!"
He hit the reverse button, activating the beamer again. Seconds later, Skroob reemerged in his office, and, as he found when he groped about his shoulders, back to normal. "Are you all right, Mr. President?" Zircon asked a by now all too familiar question on the office TeleWall.
"Fortunately for you and Snotty, yes. But make a note, Zircon: as soon as we destroy Druidia, I'm ramming this blasted thing right down his throat!" Skroob jumped off the beamer and kicked it in disgust-then howled in pain and hopped backwards through the now opening door to the command center, clutching his foot. "President Skroob, salute!" Zircon barked out the order.
"HAIL, SKROOB!" the command crew responded, giving the required salute. Skroob responded with it-in doing so losing his balance and falling over an inconveniently placed garbage can in his path. "Remind me to shoot the garbagemen too!" he muttered out loud. "OK, Zircon, what do we know?" he walked over to the commanderette, oblivious to the fact the garbage can was now stuck firmly to his rear end.
"Lord Helmet called in five minutes ago; his father's present included directions to a secret Down Side temple on the planet Mustanear," Zircon informed him, punching some buttons on the nearest console that brought up an image of the triangular device that had been in the vault, "Once inside, only Lord Helmet will be able to activate it and learn more about putting together the ultimate doomsday weapon."
"Mustanear? Why does that name sound familiar?" Skroob mused. He thought it over for a few minutes, then snapped his fingers in realization. "Of course! Ron Belzel Ringh. He got banished there after Lone Starr overthrew the oppressive empire he'd built in the Frankfurt Galaxy. Send out a message to Mustanear that we're coming, Zircon; Ron and I go way back, and he owes me a favor."
"Duly noted, sir," Zircon wrote down the note, "Shall I punch you through to Dr. Shipps now?"
"Go right ahead, Commanderette," Skroob authorized her. Zircon obligingly donned a boxing glove and punched the screen repeatedly until, somehow, an image of a laboratory came up. The outline of a figure could just be seen in a recliner facing away from the camera, rocking softly back and forth. "Dr. Shipps, it's Skroob," the Spaceballean president announced himself, "Just want you to know, we're moving ahead with the next phase of the plan, so we probably won't need you much longer. As long as the initial test of your pulverizer's a success, we won't kill the rest of your family. Got anything to say to that, Doc?"
The figure said nothing and continued rocking as it it didn't hear Skroob. "Hello? Waylon? Earth to Dr. Waylon Shipps, are you listening to me!?" Skroob demanded. There was again no reply from the figure. Something's wrong here..." he mused, concerned.
Zircon pressed another button on the console. "Attention Hockeygol guards, check Dr. Shipps' lab now!" she ordered. On the screen, the door slid open and a trio of Spaceball guards rushed in. They lurched to a stop and grimly surveyed the chair. "Well!?" Skroob pressed them impatiently.
"Sorry, sir," one of the guards slowly turned the chair around, revealing it contained only a dummy in it-specifically, a dummy with a sign reading SO LONG, SUCKERS hanging around its neck. "Spread out and find him!" Zircon ordered them, "He can't be allowed to get off Hockeygol, or if he already has, anywhere near Planet Druidia!"
"Yes, Commanderette," the leader of the squad declared. He and his men rushed out the lab door. "Don't worry, Mr. President, we'll find Dr. Shipps and bring him back," Zircon assured her superior.
"See that you do, Zircon. And while you're looking..." Skroob dramatically swung around, thus accidentally nailing Zircon with the trash can still stuck to his behind and making her yelp in pain, "Notify Lord Helmet aboard Spaceball 3 to look for him as well. If he manages to get to Lone Starr, this story'll be over before it even starts...!"