The Fantastic New Adventures of Tony and Doug in The Time Tunnel – EP3, a time tunnel fanfic

After exiting the time vortex, Dr Tony Newman and Dr Douglas Phillips find themselves in the middle of a road. On one side there is an abandoned apple orchard and on the side there are several red brick buildings which are in an advanced state of disrepair. There is some hope for a brighter future as the buildings are encircled by a metal chain-link fence with a sign posted on it advising the land will be redeveloped to become a Polish sausage factory.

After walking for a number of miles, they find themselves on the main street of a small town. This is where they encounter two humans. One is an African American business man and the other is a young female with long, flowing red hair. What makes them very different from the humans the time travelers have encountered in the past is they both are producing individualistic, repeating sounds patterns such "Arooga Rooga Ruga Ruga Ruga Ruga" and "Honkie Honkie Toot Toot Tootie Ta." Attempts made to communicate with these two are not successful and the reasons for these strange noise patterns remains a mystery.

This town has a restaurant called Honky Bill's which specializes in Hungarian Cowboy food. Both Tony and Doug watch a video broadcast of an advertisement for this restaurant on a TV set in the restaurant's window. The commercial features an elderly person who is wearing a cowboy outfit with a French chef's hat. He is enthusiastically dancing around while singing about cooking food such as Hungarian Cowboy stew. The restaurant is, unfortunately, closed so their hopes of learning where they currently are located remains unresolved.

The time travelers continue walking down the main street of this town until they notice a group of people aimlessly moving about on the other side of the street. Each person is generating an individualistic, repeating sound pattern.

One of them is wearing a white t-shirt with black lettering saying "your valuables, give them to me." He is also wearing a modified 1980's era police motorcycle helmet. This person stops moving and looks across the street to see Tony and Doug staring right back at him. The repeating sounds he is making changes. He raises his left hand and with one finger presses a button on the side of this helmet. The helmet starts wildly lurching up and down on his head like a lowrider car with modified hydraulics. He next flicks open a switchblade and starts slowly walking across the street toward the two scientists.

The others are now aware of these two newcomers and their individualistic sounds switch to match the first person.

One person is wearing a pork pie hat on his head and is clothed in a striped zoot suit with baggy pants and has a gold pocket watch attached to a very long chain. The zoot suit man pulls out his pocket watch and starts swinging it around at a high rate of speed as he starts to follow the person with the fancy hydraulic motorcycle helmet. Yet another person picks-up a tire iron and, before long, everyone is moving ominously towards Tony and Doug.

Doug says, "These people don't look or sound even remotely friendly. I suggest we put some distance between us and them right now."

Tony has no problems with that idea so both start running away from this group of people.

In response, the motorcycle helmet guy and the others begin to move faster in pursuit of the two newcomers.

One member of this group is a sixty year old person who is stooped-over and in poor health. While clenching a Cuban cigar in his mouth, he is using a walker to move forward. He suddenly stumbles, the cigar goes flying out of his mouth and, as his walker lurches away from him, he falls down and heavily smacks his head on the pavement.

His eyes remain open as a pool of blood begins to form on the ground around his head. He is now dead but he continues to make the same repetitive sounds as the others.

Chomp Chomp Chompie Chompie Chomp Chomp Chomp

As the two scientists are running down the street, they see a vehicle approaching towards them. It is painted yellow but has not had a good washing in a very long time. On the roof is a sign that identifies it as a taxi. This taxi is currently moving down the street without the need for wheels as it has the ability to maintain a constant distance above the ground at all times.

Both Tony and Doug stand in front of the approaching taxi while waving their hands in the air. The taxi stops. There is nobody in the driver's compartment but an electronic voice says, "Taxi rides cost 10 credits. Please wave your identity card in front of the door sensor."

Besides not having any valid identity cards, looking through the grime covered door windows, they observe the back seats are already occupied by two people wearing military uniforms. Each has an asymmetrical, peaked, four-pointed officers cap on their heads called a rogatywka. The cap badge on each rogatywka is the crowned polish eagle perched on top of a shield and the coloured cap band is brown which identifies them as staff officers.

Neither of the officers make any attempts to communicate with the scientists. They are also not making any repeating sound patterns like the other people the scientists have already encountered in this small town.

Unfortunately, the street hooligans are quickly closing in on their location. This prompts Tony and Doug to resume running down the street.

The taxi reactivates itself and starting moving forward again which causes the rogatywka worn by one of the polish officers to fall off his head. His head then falls forwards and lands on his lap. Both of the current occupants of the taxi have been dead for many years. They are nothing more than skeletons in uniforms, doomed to continue on a never-ending taxi ride.

Frantically hoping to escape from their pursuers, Tony says, "lets go down this alley."

As soon as they enter it, Tony realizes some alleys lead to dead ends. Not wanting to be stabbed to death by the guy with the helmet that is going up and down on his head or being repeatedly struck with the gold pocket watch being twirled around by the zoot suit guy, Tony stops briefly to check a door. To his very great relief, it opens. Tony beckons Doug to follow him into the building.

Once Doug has entered, Tony observes the door has a heavy bolt lock. Sliding it to secure the door, Tony is now feeling rather relieved as the imminent close encounter with those street hooligans is going to be postponed for now.

Doug asks for a few minutes to catch his breath as he is 91 years old. Even at this age he is still reasonably physically fit due to all the strenuous activities associated with spending 54 years living in the woods back in the year 10,000 BC. Manual labour such as chopping wood and hiking long distances while hunting for potential food with a bow and arrow and other such activities has done a good job of preventing his muscles from atrophying. However, suddenly being required to run in a marathon was still asking a bit much of his body.

Both are startled by a sudden loud impact noise coming from the door. Tony looks through the door window and sees the hooligan with the police motorcycle helmet. As the helmet continues to lurch up and down on his head, this person slams his head into the door again. Tony responds by sticking his tongue out at him. This greatly infuriates the hooligan who slams his head several more times into the door.

All of this head-butting abruptly stops when his helmet falls off his head and goes clattering onto the cobble stones in the alley. There is a look of utter panic on his face as he observes his helmet has stopped operating. His intended victims are quickly forgotten as he now only has one concern and that is for his precious helmet. He backs away from the door and goes over to pick it up. After examining his police motorcycle helmet for a short period of time, he puts it back on his head. He slowly raises one hand and with one finger presses the button on the side of his helmet. It immediately begins lurching up and down again.

Knowing they are not in any danger for the moment, the scientists begin examining the inside of the building. The long hallway where they are located has fancy wall to wall carpeting featuring intricate patterns similar to the designs one would find on Persian rugs. The walls are made of oak wood paneling and have hanging oil paintings featuring the portraits of previous Presidents of the United States of America. The scientists recognize some of them such as John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson.

Doug stops to gaze at the portrait of one president who looks familiar. When he finally remembers he tells Tony that this person was in a movie called Bedtime for Bonzo which featured a chimpanzee. The portrait is of the actor who played the role of psychology professor Peter Boyd. Tony reads the gold plated identification tag on the portrait which states "Ronald Reagan, President of the United States of America (1981 to 1989)."

There is a button directly below the identification tag which Tony presses. The recorded voice of President Ronald Reagan says, "The most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the government and I'm here to help."

Moving further along the hallway, there is a portrait of President Donald Trump and after that there is one for President Joe Biden. Both Tony and Doug are intrigued to see the next portrait in this series features a bearded man armed with an Uzi submachine gun in each hand. The name of this person is President Chuck Norris. While looking at him, Tony says he doubts there could be any foreign world powers who would want to willingly mess with such a president as that.

Doug sees the button under the name of President Chuck Norris so he decides to press it. The recorded voice says, "I once had a staring contest with the sun and I won because it blinked first."

They walk past the portraits of the remaining US Presidents in this series and then push open a set of double doors decorated in an art nouveau style featuring stained, multi-coloured inlaid glass. They now find themselves in one of the most opulent lobbies for a hotel they have ever seen. Both scientists are awestruck as they marvel at the grandeur of their current surroundings.

The lobby has marble flooring, carved, wood wall panelings with inset jewels and a grand staircase which has Roman style statues recessed into the walls all the way to the top floor. There is a very impressive, ornate chandelier hanging down from the ceiling which is sparkling with refracted light from the sun coming from the nearby skylights.

Not far from the main entrance to the lobby is a very large circular glass tank filled with some type of liquid. Normally, you would expect to see a plethora of exotic tropical fish in such a tank but this one has the corpse of a dead human floating around in the middle of it. He is a well-groomed middle-aged man with a square jaw similar to that of Fearless Fosdick. Just like those dead Polish staff officers in the taxi cab, this corpse is also not making any of those repeating sound patterns. He is currently standing erect with both arms outstretched towards the main exterior door to the lobby which gives the impression he is there to greet everybody entering the hotel. There is metal plate on this tank inscribed with the name "Atticus Algernon Pompilius III".

Near to the main reception desk, Tony has found a large machine similar in size to an old style cigarette vending dispenser. The surface has ornately inscribed designs on it with a gold finish and there is a glass window which displays an old reel-to-reel tape mechanism inside. This machine has one button on the front of it and the label below it says to press it in order to listen to a random song from the Top of the Pops.

Tony can not resist the urge to press the button, especially since it has been over 50 years since either he or Doug has heard any music.

The reel to reel tape spins forward at high speed for a couple of minutes before the first song begins to play which features a high-pitched, abnormal voice.

The belching hand goes to the can.

Everybody loves the belching hand.

The belching hand recites poetry on the can.

Everybody loves the belching hand.

The belching hand drinks out of the can.

And sprays the walls with urine while shouting "Shazam!"

Now nobody wants to go anywhere near the belching hand.

Tony presses the button to hear another song which causes the reel to reel tape to speed forward for 30 seconds.

This second song is performed by somebody who sings like an old crooner such as Dean Martin.

Those good old Moonbase Nazis in the sky.

Ta Dum Tee Dum Dee Daa Doo Da

They are coming down for you and I.

Ta Dum Tee Dum Dee Daa Doo Da

I am so happy I could cry.

Moonbase Nazis in the sky.

I don't know how and I don't know why.

Ta Dum Tee Dum Dee Daa Doo Da

Shall I bake them an apple pie or called the FBI.

Ta Dum Tee Dum Dee Daa Doo Da

The button is pressed again and the reel to reel spins backwards at high speed for 5 minutes before another song begins.

This song is performed by a person with a deep, guttural voice.

There is something in the toilet and it is watching me.

Doo Doo Doo Doo

It has a birth certificate that indicates it has an age of one hundred and three.

Doo Doo Doo Doo

It now says it wants to leave the toilet and come over to me.

Doo Doo Doo Doo

I flush the toilet and salute it goodbye.

Doo Doo Doo Doo

Flushy Flushy Squishy Squishy

Doo Doo Doo Doo

Ten minutes later it has come back again.

Doo Doo Doo Doo

It is now looking at me with an evil eye.

Doo Doo Doo Doo

A Taurus Model 608 pistol is now pointed at me.

Bang Bang Bang Bang

The music abruptly stops as Doug switches off the power button at the back of the machine.

"That has to be the absolutely worst music I have ever heard in my entire life," says Doug.

Tony replies, "This music sure is appallingly bad. I think we should call it 'Alternative Earth' music. The Beatles, Elvis Presley and other musical greats from our Earth must never have made it in the music industry here."

Doug smiles. "Tony, you are most likely correct."

Tony looks at the corpse in the tank and then exclaims, "Doug, the dead body has changed position all by itself!"

Both can hardly believe what they are seeing. The corpse is now bent forward and has partly pulled its pants down. It's posterior is pointed directly towards the music machine.

"I don't know how this could be possible but I am guessing he is trying to express his own disapproval of this music," remarks Doug.

Tony walks around the circular tank and gives the face of Atticus Algernon Pompilius III a very good look. "Well, the eyelids certainly don't blink and, being submerged in a tank filled with some type of liquid, he obviously can't be breathing any oxygen. This guy is certainly showing no signs of normal life but he did somehow change his position."

Doug remarks, "it is like we have landed in the middle of some type of freak show world. I have never encountered a town like this place anywhere before."

Suddenly there is a "ding dong" sound as the elevator door near to the staircase opens and an elderly gentleman wearing a cowboy outfit with a French Chef's hat on his head enters the hotel lobby.

He looks at the two newcomers. "What in blazing hell are you lot doing here?"

Tony recognizes him. "Say, you are the guy from the advertisement on the TV in the window of that restaurant. You must be Honky Bill!"

"Of course I am. Anybody else pretending to be me would get into very serious legal trouble as I strictly enforce control over all aspects of the Honky Bill brand. Now tell me right now why you scoundrels are skulking around here!"

"We came here via the Time Tunnel and we landed here by accident," says Doug.

"Time Tunnel? What kind of a limp biscuit excuse is that? Have you two been doing some of those crazy newfangled drugs such as 'Bugaboo' or 'Mind Zapper'?"

"My name is Dr Douglas Phillips and my associate here is Dr Tony Newman. I assure you we are telling the truth. The Time Tunnel is a top secret government project so it is not a surprise to us that you do not know of its existence."

Honky Bill studies them for a bit before concluding that they don't look like drug addicts. "Well, however you wackos got here, this is still a restricted area."

Tony asks, "Can you tell us where we are? You are the first person in this town who is at least willing to speak to us."

"You should know exactly what this place is but I will explain it to you cabbage heads as I don't have anything better to do with my time right now. I have a big pot of Hungarian Cowboy stew currently cooking in the hotel's kitchen but it needs some more time before it is ready.

"You knuckleheads are currently located on Atticus World. The founder of this amusement park is located in the glass tank in this here hotel lobby. Very rich people who have nothing better to do with their time or money come here to have interactions with reanimated dead people."

Tony is shocked. "That is absolutely disgusting. This sort of amusement park should be illegal."

"I agree with Tony but why are these dead people making those strange noises?" says Doug.

"The deadies are generating a specific sound pattern which requires a specific response. To interact with a dead person, you need to pay 700 credits and then you are given the correct activation noise in order to begin an interaction."

"Why would anybody want to interact with dead people? Also, how is this even possible for the dead to be up and wandering about in the first place?" asks Tony.

"Obviously, rich people find this to be a total hoot. If you wish to discuss office politics, the African American business man would be your man. To get advice on the latest fashion in Japan you would want to communicate with the female with the red, flowing hair. Also, if your idea of fun is being chased down the street and get the stuffing beaten out of you, you would want to interact with the gang of local street hooligans.

"As for how the dead people give the appearance of being alive, their bodies are being maintained by nanobots and they have a computer chip inserted into their brains. Fully repairing dead brains is a bit beyond our current level of technology but the brain chips help to fully restore them. Without the chip, they would be slurring their speech, banging into walls and doing all sorts of inappropriate things."

Doug is about to ask a question when they hear some banging noises coming from the other side of the hotel windows facing the main street. The street hooligans have finally tracked-down the current location of Tony and Doug. While still producing the repeating "chompie chomp" sounds, the person wearing the motorcycle helmet uses his switchblade is scratch a message on the window glass.

Tony goes over to the window and reads the message out loud. "Please open the door. We urgently need to acquire your bodies."

Doug exclaims, "No way in hell are we going to do that!"

Looking at Honky Bill, Tony asks, "Does this town have a police department?"

Honky Bill replies, "There are no 'official' police here. Also, I would like to know how you reprobates managed to activate the street hooligans without paying to gain access to the proper activation code."

"We have no idea either but can you stop them from getting in here?" says Doug.

"The only person I can contact to deal with this kind of situation would be grandma."

Another hooligan suddenly presses his face against the glass while making a deranged facial expression. He retrieves a yellow rubber ducky from one of his coat pockets and presses the ducky against the window. In order to try to communicate the urgency of gaining access to the hotel lobby, he starts to frantically pump the ducky repeatedly which results in a lot of loud squeaking noises.

Having become rather alarmed at the crowd on the other side of the windows, Doug urgently says, "please contact this grandma person and get her over here right now."

Honky Bill detaches an electronic device from his belt and begins pressing buttons, flicking switches and twirling dials while watching the results on the LED display. Having completed the programming required for summoning grandma, he hits the activation button.

On the other side of town a door opens and a little old lady, holding a rectangular board under one arm, slowly descends the stairs of a two story building. She is producing a "Wibble Wobble" repeating sound pattern. Once she has reached the side of the road, she places the board on the ground, stands on top of it and then says "giddy up".

Before grandma's departure from the land of the living, she was known as the terror of the highways in the state of Texas. Her addiction was speed and no state troopers could ever catch her while she was driving her modified Lamborghini Diablo GTR which sported several JATO rockets for extra bursts of speed.

Now that grandma is a reanimated corpse at the Atticus World Amusement Park, it was no surprise to anybody she was given the position of acting sheriff as only she could get to the scene of a crime at speeds that regular law enforcement officers could never hope to match.

Within less than a minute, grandma is fast approaching the location of the hotel. As she slows down the speed of her flying hover board, she quickly assesses the situation to determine the correct course of action to take.

Grandma makes several loud whistle sounds by sticking her fingers into her mouth. This noise gains the attention of most of the street hooligans. To keep them interested, she maintains just enough speed to encourage most of them to start following her.

Only the motorcycle helmet guy and the zoot suit guy continued to remain fixated on gaining access to the interior of the hotel. Zoot suit guy uses the long chain to swing his gold pocket watch around his head and then flings it at the nearest window. He repeats this process in the hope of cracking the glass.

The person wearing the motorcycle helmet on his head goes over to the locked main door to the lobby and starts punching the door repeatedly with one of his fists. The door does its best to resist this violent assault but the wood soon starts to fracture. One more powerful punch and his fist along with the rest of his arm finally achieves success. Using his hand, he unlocks the door. At the same time the gold pocket watch finally shatters the window.

As both of the street hooligans enter the hotel lobby, they each target one of the scientists. The motorcycle helmet guy moves first as he badly wants to have his day of reckoning with Tony.

As Tony prepares to defend himself, he yells at Honky Bill, "Can't you do something more with that gadget?"

Honky Bill starts frantically pushing buttons and twirling dials and then hits the activation button just as the motorcycle helmet guy is about to throw his switchblade.

"Chompie Chomp Error Honkie Malfunction Tootie Arooga Error," is the noise suddenly generated by the hooligan as he throws the switchblade. The sudden malfunctions causes a miscalculation in the weapon targeting lock on Tony and the switchblade flies right past Tony's head and embeds itself into the tank containing the corpse of Atticus Alergnon Pompilius III.

This causes the body of the corpse to immediately change position in reaction to this event. Atticus is now standing bolt upright in the tank with his pants down by his ankles. His hands are covering his mouth as if he just can not believe what has just happened. Both of this eyes are firmly fixed on the sharp-end of the blade which is sticking into the wall of the tank.

The motorcycle helmet guy quickly recovers from this temporary malfunction and closes in on Tony with both of his fists raised. As he gets near, Tony swiftly takes action by knocking the police motorcycle helmet off his head which goes flying across the room and lands near the reception desk.

Tony sees the panicky facial expression of the street hooligan just before he turns around and races across the room. He picks-up the helmet and places it back on his head and frantically presses the activation button several times before realizing the helmet's hydraulics are no longer functioning. With his mind absolutely consumed with fear that his helmet will never again lurch up and down on his head, he dashes out of the hotel lobby via the broken window and rushes down the street to a nearby repair shop.

The only hostile left in the hotel lobby is zoot suit guy who is using the long chain to twirl his gold pocket watch around above his head at a very high rate of speed. He targets Doug and flings it right at him. Doug manages to move backwards just in time to miss a potentially serious blow to his head.

Tony yells again for Honky Bill to do something.

Honky Bill presses some more buttons, flicks a couple of switches, and then tries to turn a dial on his device but it is stuck.

The zoot suit guy is again twirling his fast moving gold pocket watch above his head when Honky Bill finally manages to turn the dial and then hits the activation button.

"Chompie Wibble Wobble Malfunction Tootie Error." is the noise emitted as the street hooligan is about to strike Doug.

The gold pocket watch goes crashing to the floor as his facial expression changes to show great concern over a sudden, new development.

He blurts out, "Oh No. Oh No. Oh No. I now got poopies in my pants."

Zoot suit guy shuffles over to where Doug is standing and says, "I need help urgently. Will you clean me?"

For the first time in his life, Doug is completely speechless. He just can't think of anything appropriate to say to this guy who moments before was trying to clobber him on the head with a gold pocket watch.

Not getting a reply, the hooligan bursts into tears and then tries, as best he can, to exit the hotel lobby while his gold pocket watch is dragged along the ground behind him. Back on the main street of the town, he desperately looks around in all directions, hoping to find somebody who would be willing to help him with the problem he now has in his pants.

All the button mashing and dial twirling done by Honky Bill has also impacted many of the other deadies in this town.

Of the hooligans chasing after grandma, the one armed with the tire iron suddenly drops his weapon, sits down in the middle of street and starts to rock back and forth while sucking on one of his thumbs. The hooligan with the yellow rubber ducky places the toy in his mouth and starts vigorously pumping it with his jaw which causes a cacophony of squeaking noises.

Further back on the main street of the town there is the body of the dead sixty year old person. The pool of blood around his head is suddenly sucked back into his head. As he gets back up he grabs the still smoldering cigar lying on the street and puts it back into his mouth. While puffing on the cigar, he grabs his walker and then starts slowly moving forward again.

Meanwhile, grandma finds she is now having great difficulties controlling her flying hover board. It suddenly shoots straight up into the sky. It takes every ounce of her strength to stay in the centre of the board as it soon reaches 760 mph. At this high rate of speed, grandma violently impacts into a low-level cloud, resulting in various parts of her raining down all over the town below.

One hand, still attached to an arm, goes crashing through a glass greenhouse. The hand lands with the palm facing towards the sky. As the hand becomes aware of its surroundings, it discovers it is in the middle of a forest of plants. However, these are not any ordinary plants. They are genetically modified cannabis. The drug produced from these very special plants is called "Einstein a Go-Go".

People who smoke Einstein a Go-Go will quickly notice amazing results. After just a few days, they will now be able to think speedily while analyzing complex problems. For example, it would take only minutes to propose the necessary corrections to Albert Einstein's Theory of Relativity. Other tasks such as doing a chemical analysis of a Big Mac to determine what it is really made of would be nothing more than a walk in the park.

Be warned as such rapidly increasing abilities can result in serious, life-changing events. Users really need to control themselves in order to avoid becoming too addicted to this drug. Excessive consumption leads to continuous increases in brain size. Users will become smarter but skull sizes will not be increasing. Smoking too much combined with thinking too much will eventually result in the total structural failure of the user's skull, causing brain matter to go spraying-out in every direction all at once.

Fortunately, grandma's hand does not have any interest in drugs as it has a much more urgent mission to accomplish. After flipping itself over, the hand uses its fingers to crawl along the ground. The hand's priority mission is to travel to the nearest grocery store and acquire a grocery cart. While moving the cart around the town, various bits of grandma can then be deposited into the cart. Once the hand has accumulated all the parts, the nanobots will do their job. Before long, grandma will be as good as new.

In the hotel lobby, both Doug and Tony are concerned they could soon be attacked by some of the other street hooligans.

'We need to arm ourselves with some weapons," says Doug.

Tony looks at Honky Bill. "Does this town have a gun store, or, at least, a local convenience store that sells pistols and shotguns?"

"There is absolutely no need for any gun violence," says Honky Bill, "The problem will the street hooligans can be solved with this electronic device I got right here. Too bad I never read the manual but here goes nothing."

Honky Bill starts pressing some buttons, adjusting a few dials and flicking the odd switch before hitting the activation key.

All over town the deadies snap to attention, put one hand over their heart and start to sing the national anthem of the United States of America.

Honky Bill informs Tony and Doug, "Once all the deadies have finished singing the national anthem, they will power-off for the night. This is just like the olden days when a television station would shutdown broadcasting after midnight and only transmit a test pattern until broadcasting commences again in the morning."

"That is really good news," says Doug, "So, can be get a bus or something in order to get away from this crazy town before they reactivate?"

"What in darnations are you talking about?" says Honky Bill, "Don't you know where you are? I am starting to think your story about arriving here from some Time Tunnel thingy might be the truth."

"Scout's honour, that is exactly how we got here," says Tony.

"I would really like to know exactly where we are and how to get the hell out of here," says Doug.

Honky Bill still thinks both of them have a few screws missing but agrees to answer the questions.

"You are both on the planet called Mars and, as I have already stated, this is the Atticus World Amusement Park. There is a space ship coming from Earth but it will not arrive for another six months. Maybe you can negotiate a ride back to Earth when the ship makes the return trip."

Tony laughs. "There is no way this could be Mars. That planet does not have a breathable atmosphere and, where we are currently located, I have already seen the sky and it is blue with clouds just like on Earth."

"Laugh all you like but this is Mars. However, we are not on the surface. Atticus World is located in a giant underground cave system. What you see in the sky is just a fancy bunch of computer graphics being displayed onto the ceiling of the caves."

This news takes both of them completely by surprise.

"Everything just looks so real," marvels Doug.

Tony says, "Well, if we really are on Mars, there is no point in us staying here. We need to return to Earth as that is where the Time Tunnel is going to be located."

"Tony is right. We must return to Earth when the space ship leaves," says Doug.

Tony inquires, "It would help to know who is actually coming from Earth."

"Atticus World has been purchased by a consortium and the new owners are the ones who are going to be arriving here in six months. The government of Poland is the majority partner with the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania also providing funding to transform Atticus World into a major industrial site. They have all sorts of big, fancy plans such as building space ships that will travel to the outer edges of our galaxy."

"Neither of us are enthusiastic about this long wait. However, since we are here, you might as well tell us what caused the demise of this amusement park," says Doug.

"There were a number of mysterious murders. It all started with a Russian oligarch who was found dead at the bottom of the deep-end of the pool in this very hotel. He had strange, waffle iron marks all over his naked body. When several more similar murders occurred, the tourists from Earth stopped coming here. You two are the first newcomers to Atticus World in over five years."

Doug asks, "Why are you here?"

"I am the caretaker. Just here to keep an eye on things. Anyways, you both must be mighty hungry. Can I offer you some Hungarian Cowboy stew? It is real tasty and very nutritious too!"

Tony is definitely interested in this offer. "Neither of us have eaten a full meal recently so, yes, we would love to taste some of your stew."

"Ok, then just stay right here. I will go back to the hotel kitchen and get it. When I return I will show you to the hotel's dining area. You can tell me more about this Time Tunnel while we eat."

Honky Bill enters the elevator and disappears.

Trying to pass the time, both aimlessly wander around the lobby, looking at things. Tony glances at the tank and notices Atticus Algernon Pompilius III has pulled his pants back up and has resumed his original pose as greeter to all who visit the hotel.

An unfamiliar voice then says, "Tony, Doug can you hear me?"

At the same time, both of the scientists say, "Time Tunnel, is that you?"

"Yes, this is Colonel Benjamin Hotspur and I have an old friend who wishes to speak to you."

"It is a great relief to all of us to have finally gotten a solid lock on your location after all these years," says Dr Ann MacGregor, "and the really good news is we can finally bring you guys back home."

Doug says, "Ann, what a pleasure to hear your voice but I have got to ask a couple of questions first as we have been picked-up before by Time Tunnels that are not from our Earth."

"We are aware that something like that happened when we previously managed to get a partial lock on your location in the year 10,000 BC," says Ann, "We originally were not entirely successful at communicating the first time with Doug when you were on that lake."

Doug says, "I heard parts of some English language words while one the lake. I knew it must have been the Time Tunnel so I quickly paddled back to the shore and returned to the log cabin to advise Tony."

"We managed to get another more solid lock on you and Tony at the log cabin but a much stronger time signal suddenly blocked our ability to communicate or initiate a transfer. All we could do is see and hear what was happening. We know that somebody claiming to be from a Time Tunnel spoke and then both of you were gone."

Tony says, "It was a total nightmare. We were picked-up by a Time Tunnel from another Earth where the Nazis from the Third Reich had won the Second World War. We escaped from that Earth but then got captured by another Time Tunnel controlled by a hostile alien race known as the Maedusonites. We helped the locals with a successful revolt to liberate their Earth and now we are here."

"We are both hoping we are now talking to our Time Tunnel," says Doug, "So, the first question we have is who won the Second World War?"

The colonel says, "Do not worry, we won that one."

"The next question is where is your Time Tunnel located?"

Ann replies, "Exactly where you would expect it to be, Doug. Under the desert at the Nevada/Arizona border."

Both Tony and Doug can barely contain their joy at now knowing that, after 54 years, they finally can go home.

"The lock on Tony and Doug is on the verge of drifting out of phase," shouts Dr Hugo Bolivar.

"Ann, initiate the transfer now," commands the colonel.

Ann twists a dial to its maximum setting, pulls down on two levels and pressing the flashing red transfer button.

The elevator doors to the hotel lobby opens and Honky Bill, carrying his big pot of Hungarian Cowboy stew, triumphantly steps out. He looks around and is suddenly a bit concerned.

He says, "Tony, Doug, where are you?"

After doing a quick search of the hotel lobby area, he grabs his electronic device and presses a button on it and speaks, "Boss Man, please come to the hotel lobby as soon as possible."

A few minutes go by before a 60 year old man with a cigar in his mouth and pushing a walker enters the front door. He takes a couple of puffs before saying, "I assume you have good news for me? The newcomers have eaten the stew and are now fast asleep?"

"I don't know how to tell you this," stammers Honky Bill.

"You completely useless little schickelgrubber! Don't tell me they got away? I setup everything perfectly and everybody played their parts perfectly. Even that total dolt with the motorcycle helmet that goes up and down on his head didn't completely mess-up his part. By helping the newcomers, you should have gained their trust. You were then to feed them your drug-laced stew."

Seething with anger, Boss Man is almost ready to explode.

"Dumb Nuts! Dumb Nuts! I order you to reactivate everybody right now. I want an immediate search of the entire area. Get me those newcomers! Their life essence needs to be taken from them in order to recharge our nanobots. I don't want to spend the next six months in powered-off mode, waiting for those wretched, fresh human fuel sources to arrive from the Earth."

Honky Bill frantically starts working on his electronic device but the stress of incurring the wrath of Boss Man causes him to drop it. He picks it up but notices the LED display has gone dark and hitting the power-on button does nothing.

Not wanting to tell Boss Man the device is now broken, Honky Bill says, "Reactivation accomplished! So, please pardon me while I take that bowl of stew and return it to the kitchen."

Honky Bill quickly makes his escape via the elevator.

Boss Man, still in a fuming bad mood, pushes his walker to get closer to the tank. "Atticus, I don't suppose you saw where the newcomers went to?"

Atticus Algernon Pompilius III is now leaning with his back against the interior of the tank. His eyes are closed and he is currently pretending to be fast asleep.

Boss Man shakes his head and thinks to himself, "I am completely surrounded by bozos. It must be some kind of miracle that I have managed to keep all of us deadies alive for these past few years."

In the Time Tunnel, sparks are flying all over the place and a smokey haze soon permeates the area of the tunnel.

As the smoke begins to clear, everybody in the control room can see Tony and Doug walking towards them. The room is filled with loud cheering as Colonel Benjamin Hotspur and Dr Ann MacGregor move forward to greet the returning scientists.

The colonel warmly clasps and shakes the hands of Tony and then Doug. Ann responds by hugging and kissing both of them.

Both of the time travelers are beaming with happiness as Dr Hugo Bolivar says, "This is a once in a lifetime occasion. Time to drink some of the best bubbly known to mankind."

The doctor snaps his fingers and two soldiers, dressed in their best parade uniforms move forward, each carrying a tray with glasses filled with expensive champagne.

Dr Hugo Bolivar takes two glasses and gives one to Tony and one to Doug. The colonel, Ann and the doctor then take a glass for themselves.

The doctor says, "We all knew this day would finally arrive. Tony and Doug have now returned home to us. Incidentally, this champagne is a 1996 Dom Perignon Rose Gold Methuselah and costs $49,000 per bottle. I have been waiting a long time to try it and would have drank the entire bottle long before now except the colonel has kept it locked in the safe in his office."

Colonel Benjamin Hotspur says, "Time for a toast."

The colonel, Ann and the doctor raise their glasses of champagne towards a portrait on a wall and in unison proclaim, "Long live the King! Long my Britannia rule over us!"

Tony moves towards Doug and softly speaks, "There is something really wrong with this."

Doug whispers back, "The American Revolutionary War must not have been a success on this Earth. We better act accordingly and not raise any concerns."

On the visualizer in a Time Tunnel complex on yet another Earth, an observer is watching as Tony and Doug raise their glasses to the portrait of King Charles III of England while trying their best to sound enthusiastic as they repeat what the others have just said.

The observer nods his head while smiling smugly and then gives the command to initiate the transfer.

As Tony and Doug are about to take a sip of champagne, they abruptly vanish from their current location.

The rolling credits for Episode Three of "The Fantastic New Adventures of Tony and Doug in The Time Tunnel" now appear.

The final statement before all goes to utter blackness reads:

"This is a production of the Doug and Ted Skrecky Alternative Entertainment Corporation".