"Barney's Castle"
Chapter 2
The stagehands quickly rebuilt the sand castle. The producer took up his position again. "Let's try for the next scene shall we people?"
"If you insist," replied Barney.
The producer rolled his eyes. "Believe me when I say there are much better things I could be doing, but unfortunately I have to be stuck here. Now shall we move on? Without the theatrics if you please."
Vegeta humphed inside the purple suit.
"And, action..."
"Barney!" cried Tina and Derek.
"Barney?" joined in Goku.
"Who did you think it was? The tooth fairy?" the purple monster replied as he tried to fold his arms across his chest... and failed.
"It's good to see you again, Barney," Tina simpered as she did her best to give the dinosaur a hug. Unfortunately, this was pretty hard since said dinosaur was doing his best to avoid all physical contact.
Back-pedalling rapidly, Barney stumbled over the remade sandcastle and went sprawling.
"Awww Barney... Can't you watch what you're doing?" Goku said as he surveyed the ruined castle for the second time.
"You have any idea how hard it is to see in this damn outfit?" came the muffled response. Vegeta tried unsuccessfully to raise himself from the ground. He ended up rolling over to his stomach and pushing himself up, much to the amusement of the two youngsters and Goku. Dusting himself off he yanked the T-shirt back down and faced the group again.
Derek thought for the sake of the producer's sanity they had better move this show along. "So, Barney, you come to play with us?"
A choking sound came from inside the head.
"You okay in there, Vegeta?" Goku tried his best to peer down the dinosaur's throat.
"I'm fine, now leave me alone." Barney turned around. "Why are you building sand castles?"
"We thought we would play some war games," Goku stated.
"Yeah, he is defending the castle while our guys come along and try to break in and take over. Once we infiltrate the building, it will be a simple case of tracking down the opposing soldiers and cutting their throats, therefore eliminating any further opposition. With the main army out of the way we can then proceed through the castle, locate the brains behind the strategies, and take him prisoner. When we have him we will take him to the dungeons of the castle where there are all sorts of groovy torture equipment, this will ensure that he *talks* and gives us all the information that we need. If he dares to try to oppose us then we can pull out his fingernails, tie him to the rack and improve his height; and if that doesn't work we can always subject him to a repeated playing of the Barney signature song..." Derek paused to take a breath, his eyes glinting ferally.
Silence dominated the studio for a moment.
"Anyone ever tell you that you have a serious problem, kid?" Barney mumbled.
Derek glared at the dinosaur.
"What are they teaching these kids in school nowadays?" Goku asked as he scratched his head.
"I think it starts with the preschool years and the programs they watch," replied Vegeta, the smirk evident in his voice.
"Can we get back to the script?" Tina asked, hands on her hips.
"Ummm... Sure."
Barney waved his hands in the air. "Well that sounds like a whole lot of fun, but how would you like to see a real castle?"
"A real castle?" chorused the three.
"What are you lot, a bunch of parrots?"
The three scowled.
"Step outside the back gate and we can go and see a real castle."
Goku looked across the set to the back gate. "But that gate only leads to the other side of the studio and there wasn't any castle there when we came in."
Barney rolled his eyes; which was pretty nifty, especially since the eyes were fixed on his head. "You idiot! You use your imagination."
"Oh."
Barney proceeded to trip and stumble his way from the sand pit to the back yard gate. He paused and rested his hand on the handle. "Just use your imagination..." He opened the gate slowly and the three stuck their heads through. There before them was an alleyway, garbage cans lined neatly along the sides.
"Okay, who isn't using their imagination correctly?" Barney shut the gate and stared at the group.
"Oops, sorry," Goku replied. "You didn't say what it was we had to imagine."
Vegeta sighed. He could imagine all sorts of ways in which he could dispose of Kakarott, but unfortunately his dreams wouldn't come true. "Imagine a castle," he ground out.
"Oh, okay. I can do that."
"Thank heavens for small mercies. Now, can we try this again?"
"Sure."
Barney once more opened the gate; there beyond lay a magical forest. "Guess that will have to do, at least it's an improvement on the garbage cans."
"Wow! That's great Barney. How did you do it?" Tina stated flatly.
"Do you really want to know?"
Both Derek and Tina stared at the purple lump. "Yeah." They both gave the dinosaur a challenging look.
"You see it's called special effects. The camera man over there stops filming for a moment while the effects people change the scenery behind the door. Once the new set is ready, the camera films it again. When the scene is shot they will run the film through a heap of technical equipment and computers to enhance, add, subtract and generally change things in the film to make it all appear real." One smug dinosaur waited for a reaction.
"Ummm. Barney, do you think you could run that by me again? I kind of lost track after the special effects bit," Goku said sheepishly.
"Arrrgggghhhhh!" the dinosaur roared. "Get through the gate and into the forest or you will find this dinosaur can breath fire!"
"Okay, okay, I'm going. No need to get yourself into a tail spin." Goku shot through the gate along with Tina and Derek.
The four stood in what was now an open meadow with the forest bordering it. "Ohhh look... flowers." Tina gushed and promptly ran over to where a stem poked up from the ground, several bell shaped flowers hung from the branch. "I wonder if they ring?" She took a firm hold of the stem and shook it.
*Boing! Boing! Boing!*
The bells rang loudly. Derek, Goku and Barney clamped their hands over their ears. "Tina, stop it!" yelled Derek.
"What?"
"I said, stop it."
"Sorry, I can't hear you."
Derek raced over and stilled the girl's hand. He put his mouth right by her ear and filled his lungs. "I said ,stop it!" he bellowed.
"Hey, no need to shout! I'm not deaf you know."
"You might not be but I think the rest of us are," mumbled Goku. "Ohh my poor ears."
Barney staggered into the clearing. "I think we should be moving on."
(Echo) ~ moving on... moving on...~
"Hey, what was that?" Derek said in a bored voice
(Echo) ~ was that... was that... ~
"That's my friend the Echo, idiot," Barney replied.
(Echo) ~ echo idiot... echo idiot... ~
"That's pretty cool," Goku grinned.
(Echo) ~ pretty cool... pretty cool...~
"Gets annoying after a while," Barney stated.
(Echo) ~ after a while... after a while..."
"Yeah I could see it would drive you nuts."
(Echo) ~ drive you nuts... drive you nuts... ~
"Oh shut up, echo," Barney groused.
(Echo) ~ you shut up... you shut up... ~
"Eh?"
Tina snickered. "I don't think the echo likes you much, Barney."
"I really don't care."
(Echo) ~ me either... me either... ~
"For heavens sake, let's get moving again and get away from this stupid sound."
(Echo) ~ please go... please go... ~
"But how do we know which way it is to the castle?" Goku asked as he looked around.
(Echo) ~ to the castle... to the castle... ~
"Try following the signs." Derek shook his head in disgust.
"And they reckon we kids are dumb," Tina agreed with her fellow actor.
"What signs?" Goku said. He didn't recall seeing any signs.
(Echo) ~ the one over there... the one over there... ~
Goku looked around again, there to the side stood a sign. It clearly stated 'To the castle' with an arrow pointing down a track. "Oh, that sign."
(Echo) ~ yes that sign... yes that sign... ~
"Thank you, echo."
(Echo) ~ you're welcome... you're welcome... ~
"Can we please leave now?" Barney humphed.
(Echo) ~ yes leave... yes leave... ~
Getting decidedly tired of the constant reverberation, Barney headed to the track and began to walk along it, not caring if the others were following or not. He was beginning to get rather hot in the suit and wanted to get out of it as soon as possible. Besides, the heat was causing him to itch and with the way he was dressed he hadn't a hope in hell of scratching anything anytime soon.
Goku grabbed Tina and Derek by the hand and started to skip along the track in the direction Barney had taken. "We're off to see the wizard..."
"Wrong show."
"It is?"
"Trust me."
"Okay."
~ oOo ~
tbc...