"President Skroob, salute!" came the call as the planetary leader rushed up the hall towards the main Spaceball City hangars.
"HAIL SKROOB!" the troopers gave the salute. Skroob started to return it before he abruptly slipped on a bar of soap that the janitor had carelessly left lying in the middle of the floor and fell flat on his back. "I'm OK, I'm OK!" he said quickly, stumbling back to his feet, only to slip and fall down again, prompting amused snickers from his troops. "Everything OK, sir?" Sandurz rushed forward to help him up.
"Of course, Sandurz. I'm a little upset we had to lose Spaceball 3 like that, though," Skroob muttered.
"Lord Helmet was too, Mr. President," Sandurz admitted, his hand instinctively covering his privates, "But we've already begun construction of Spaceball 4, and with the construction droids set at Overwork capacity, it should be done later in this chapter."
"Good, good. Now did you make sure it doesn't have that same engine room flaw?"
"Indeed, sir. And as a bonus, allow me to present King Roland as your prisoner," Sandurz gestured up the hall, where Helmet, Wenn, and several troopers were leading the Druidian king towards Skroob. "Well, well, King Roland, at last we finally unofficially meet face to face," Skroob generously shook a grim Roland's hand, "In the interests of gentlemanship, I'll give you a chance to peacefully surrender Druidia to us now, and we won't have to blow it up."
"I'll never turn my people over to a fiend like you, Skroob," Roland declared defiantly, "And for your information, it won't matter how many ships and weapons you have, because you'll never get them anywhere near Druidia. I changed the combination to the air shield months ago, and absolutely nothing you subject me to will make me give you the new one."
"We shall see about that, your Majesty. Wenn, give the king some incentive to speak," Helmet told his apprentice, who activated his Schwartz ring and started firing fists into Roland's balls. The king grimaced from the onslaught, but said nothing. "See, you can't make me crack!" he taunted the villains, "I will not give you the new combination no matter what!"
"Oh yes you will," Helmet leaned into his face, "We have numerous Spaceballs torture devices, which will be available in stores for kids by Christmas, that will get the information out of you one way or the other."
"Give me all you've got, Helmet, but if you think for one minute anything will make me tell you the new combination is 6-7-8-9-10, you've got another...!" King Roland started to brag, then slapped his hands over his mouth in horror. "Stupid, stupid, stupid, Roland!" he lamented, pounding his head off the wall in frustration.
"Thank you, your Majesty," Sandurz thanked him, writing down the new combination on a notepad, "Now we know to type in 6-7-8-9-10 instead of 1-2-3-4-5 before we attack."
"6-7-8-9-10?" Skroob mused out loud, "Amazing; that's what I changed the combination on my luggage to too..."
"And we'll also be taking your crown, King," Helmet snatched it off Roland's head, "It is only fitting that the very symbol of your power on planet shall ultimately be its downfall."
"Your plan can't possibly work, Helmet," King Roland remained defiant despite having dumbly given away the air shield combination.
"Oh yeah? Well take a look," Wenn dragged him down the hall to the window overlooking the hangar, where Helmet's new fleet was floating, and Spaceball 4 was already rapidly nearing completion, "Sheer firepower'll destroy it. And don't think your daughter and her hack hubby'll do anything; I called my guys in the Knights of Wenn, and we're going to go hunt then down."
"Wenn?"
"As soon as possible, that's when!"
"But I...oh never mind," the king shook his head. A loud buzzer rang out in the hangar below. "Spaceball 4 completed," a voice intoned over the loudspeaker.
"Wonderful. Fire up the engines, and let's see what it's got," Skroob pressed the intercom button on the wall. Spaceball 4's engines sputtered to life below , then ignited with a roar...at which point the entire ship exploded in a massive fireball. Skroob and his companions hit the deck until the flames had subsided. "The problem's fixed, huh, Sandurz!?" he turned to the colonel with a glare.
"Well...we might have overlooked something..." Sandurz admitted sheepishly.
"Ah, what the hell, we're throwing all the money away as it is. Prepare Spaceball 5 for immediate construction to replace Spaceball 4," Skroob barked into the intercom.
Construction droids snatched up the pieces of Spaceball 4 and immediately started rapidly building Spaceball 5 on the spot. "Sir," a trooper now ran up to the president, "We've identified Lone Starr and the princess's location."
"Where?"
"On Gesundheit, sir, and it appears Yogurt's with them."
"Bless you, Corporal...but how'd you know?"
"Skipped ahead to the next chapter, sir," the trooper held up a large book with a familiar Winnebago on the cover below the words SPACEBALLS THE FANFIC II 1/2: THE SCHWARTZ SNORES SOUNDLY; A NOVELIZATION OF THE MAJOR MOTION PICTURE BY BOB WRIGHT. "OK, whatever does work. Helmet, take the best shock troops you have along with Wenn's knights when they get here and take care of Lone Starr," Skroob ordered him, "Bring me the princess and Yogurt alive; we have more use for the two of them still breathing. Everybody else, go ahead and kill."
"Everyone get ready, because here we go!" Yogurt declared over a megaphone. Standing on a raised platform at the end of the large obstacle course that had hastily gone up, Lone Starr was frowning severely. "Never pulled out all the stops for me when I got my Schwartz ring...!" he muttered under his breath, looking at his current ring on his finger, "What's so special about her...!?"
"What're you going on about down there?" Meteor called from the high platform in front of him.
"Don't you feel like we're being shafted by being asked to be pawns for Little Miss Perfect!?" Lone Starr grumbled out loud at him.
"What!? We're drafting the lawns of the Burshicks!?" the mole frowned deeply. Lone Starr rolled his eyes. "Of course, he's completely deaf as well as blind as a bat!" he growled under his breath, having had enough of original characters for the time being. His gaze fell to the front of the oversized obstacle course, where Mary Sue stood at the foot of a treadmill, which was slowly powering to life. "On your mark!" Yogurt raised a green flag high, "Get set...wait for it...wait for it...wait for it some more...and GO!"
The theme to American Gladiators started pumping loudly through the treetops as Mary Sue charged up the treadmill at clear record speed. Lone Starr activated his Schwartz ring. "Let's see how perfection stands up against years of training from one beloved canonical movie and one previous fan fiction story!" he muttered, raising the Schwartz blade high. He watched Mary Sue slide effortlessly down a balance beam, using ringless Schwartz powers to push aside the punching bags two Dinks were pushing towards her, smacking back into the Dinks and sending them careening off the platform. She then climbed up a wall, easily dodging the giant medicine balls tow more Dinks pushed down towards her from above, then made a spectacular Schwartz-powered leap that defied all logic of physics to the top of Meteor's platform, not bothering to use the cargo net provided. Yelling like a maniac, Meteor rushed her with a spear-and blindly charged right past her and off the edge of the platform, face-planting hard into the ground below. "Here we go...!" Lone Starr assumed a defense position as the trainee took another phenomenal Schwartz dive off the overhead platform, activating another Schwartz ring in mid-descent without breaking a sweat. Lone Starr swung hard, but Mary Sue started blocking each of his parries the instant her feet touched down and quickly forced him backwards. Lone Starr fought back as best he could, but soon ran out of room and fell backwards off the platform to the ground himself. "Hey, foul, foul!" he protested out loud, "That wasn't a fair fight...!"
"The winner, and new champion with an all time record of any trainee I've ever had!" Yogurt appeared improbably fast on the scene, jumped into Mary Sue's arms the instant she'd climbed back down to the ground, and raised her hand high. She was immediately mobbed by everyone else, clearly thrilled at her innate skills. Lone Starr's blood started boiling even further, hot enough now to cook a lobster had anyone wished to try to do so. "Wait a minute!" he shouted to the others. They paid him no heed, continuing to lavish unconditional praise on an overwhelmed Mary Sue. "Wait a minute...!" he repeated, louder now. Still no reaction. "WAIT A MINUUUUUUUUUUTTTTTTTTTTTE!" he bellowed at the top of his lungs, finally making the others turn towards him. "I'm calling foul!" he protested, "I didn't have a fair chance here; in fact, I'm calling foul on this whole training session; it was way too easy!"
"Dink dink dink dink?" one of the Dinks frowned in confusion.
"Yes, I'm calling foul!" the hero bellowed, "This was not realistic in the least! She must have cheated somehow, and I demand...!"
"Oh come on, boss, she did really good; why be upset?" Barf looked surprised.
"Why am I upset, Barf!? Wouldn't you be upset if you were immediately shoved aside for some ridiculous...space urchin who has no problems in the world and is suddenly the greatest thing since Spaceballs the Flamethrower!?" Lone Starr pointed an accusing finger at Mary Sue, "I demand a restart with a real challenge here, and...!"
"Sorry, pal, but you can't do do-overs of trials, pass or fail," Yogurt calmly explained to him, "And is that a bit of jealousy I detect here?"
"Of course it's jealousy, Yogurt, what do you think this is!? I'm hotter than the volcanos of Enoch-Mirshal-7, and I'm going to erupt more violently than fifteen Mount Saint Helens if somebody doesn't boot this interloper halfway across the galaxy to the spice forests of Dnalnydnac!" Lone Starr raged. He then slapped both hands over his face. "What the hell did I just say!? You can type this, Mel, but you sure can't say it!" he looked upwards and protested vehemently.
"OK, everyone just excuse us a moment, I'll take care of this," sighing, Vespa took her husband's arm and dragged him away from the others. "Are we going to have a problem now!?" she demanded to him once they were far enough away.
"Problem!? How observant of you, my dear; I've had a problem for the last chapter and a half, in case you didn't notice!" Lone Starr thundered, "I'm the hero of this fandom, not her!" he gestured contemptuously back at Mary Sue, who was looking dumbfounded that any of her actions could have triggered such a tirade, "She's done nothing to earn any accolades like this...!"
"Except just run a record course time and show some impressive ringless Schwartz powers! What it is, you're just jealous!" Vespa thundered back, thrusting an accusing finger in his face.
"Of course I'm jealous! If you'd have been downgraded for a newcomer like this, you'd be jealous too! And you know what, you're way out of character!" Lone Starr countered, "The Princess Vespa I know's a strong, independent woman who doesn't become a fawning admirer of every talented person she comes across, and if you think I'm going to stand by and let you be changed into a...!"
"Stop it, all right, just stop!" Vespa warned him, "Mary Sue's proven herself a worthy Schwartz user, and you're just being sexist...!"
"Oh, so any protest against a female character is sexist now, no matter how valid!? It's sexist, all right, but the other way around! And I'm going to keep protesting until all of you get to see that...!"
"Enough," Vespa put her finger back in his face, "Just don't start from here on, OK!?"
She turned and walked off. Roaring, Lone Starr started pounding his head off the nearest tree in frustration. "I'll get that space urchin for this, I'll get her if it's the last thing I ever...!" he started to rant, but was cut off as his poundings broke off the branch directly over him, causing it to fall down hard on his head. Groaning, Lone Starr toppled over backwards to the ground, unconscious, providing the perfect place for the chapter to come to an end...