The four weasels rushed towards their leader, amazed to see him standing before them once again.
Stupid shouted with glee. "Boss, you're alive!"
"What are you all squawking about? I'm fine…" he began, climbing down from the rostrum camera. All of a sudden, the memories flashed before his eyes, and he remembered the fateful events of that night.
"Valiant! Where is he?" he reached into his coat pocket for a gun that wasn't there. Greasy ran forward. "Cool it, boss, that's all over now."
"What do you mean?" Smart Ass shouted. "Toontown faces certain 'reduction' at Doom's hands, and we need to make sure that nothing gets in his way, especially not us."
Greasy walked over to his boss.
"Doom's dead." Greasy said.
Smart Ass looked as if he'd been punched in the gut. "What?"
"Valiant got the slip on him, and he was melted with his own dip," he affirmed. Although Greasy had perished by the time Doom had met his end, that hadn't stopped him and the other weasel's spirits from watching the final events from the warehouse's rafters, before heading on up to Cloud Nine.
"Dip?" Smart Ass stuttered. "Wha…he was a Toon? What happened? How did you…?" he lamely finished, unable to comprehend these new circumstances.
Greasy cleared his breath. "Well, boss, it's sort of like this. You remember that night at the Acme Factory?"
"This might take a while," Wheezy sighed, placing the lantern on the ground to better illuminate the area.
Smart Ass nodded angrily, the memory was fresh enough in his head. "Well? What happened?"
Greasy continued. "Well, right after Doom left, Valiant flipped the switch and…"
"So wait, all of you 'crumbs' have been dead for the last sixty years?"
The weasels all stared downward, as if they were being reprimanded by a grumpy teacher.
"And all this time, I've been…" he struggled to find the right words. "…a…puddle?!"
The other weasels still didn't meet his glare. Smart Ass looked at them in anger.
"See? I told you this would happen!" he bellowed at them. "You couldn't stop laughing, and you all died! And now Doom's gone, and all our hopes with it."
"Does anyone remember exactly what we were gonna get once we'd destroyed Toontown?" Stupid said from behind Psycho. Smart Ass opened his mouth to say something, and then stopped. He didn't recall what Doom had promised them himself, but he remembered the shady actions of his own boss, and with a sense of betrayal, knew that one way or another, he and his team would probably have all ended up ink stains in the end.
His sulky thoughts were suddenly interrupted by a voice breaking through the silence.
"It's good to see you again." Psycho said, without giggling for once. Smart Ass was amazed. He wouldn't have expected any sorrow towards his own demise from any member of his team, much less from Psycho. Evidently his team cared about him more than he thought.
In the silence that followed, Greasy walked back into the dim light of the lantern. "Hey, boss?"
"What?" Smart Ass grumbled.
"I've been thinking. Maybe we should go straight for a while."
"What?" Smart Ass snapped at him.
Greasy leapt back. "Just for a little while, I meant. Just until we're back on our feet."
Smart Ass looked at his old gang of mobsters. Were they going soft? Certainly something was a bit different about them. For one, Wheezy was less raspy, and almost coherent. Even Psycho seemed slightly less…psychotic than usual. Sixty years of plucking harp strings must have done wonders for his old platoon, he sarcastically thought.
But even he had his limits. Smart Ass and his team had technically been criminals for a long time now, but it wasn't his idea of a living. He didn't like the idea of being constantly on the run. He missed the good old days, before they'd worked for Doom, when he and the rest of his boys could waltz into any old club in Toontown and be the bell of the ball, at least until Greasy got them kicked out.
He sighed. This was no time for reminiscing. He and his old platoon were in dangerous waters. "So what can we do now?" he said, sitting on an old Acme crate.
Stupid suddenly spoke. "There's our police job!"
Smart Ass was confused. "Police job? What do you mean, Stupid?" he said, moving towards the jumpy weasel.
Greasy moved closer. "It's what I was saying, boss. Remember I told you we visited the police station? The commissioner said we could have our old jobs back."
Smart Ass nearly choked. "What?" he said, incredulously. "You just walked in and the 'practitioner' gave you your old job back?"
"Yeah, just like that," Greasy answered. "He said he was short of recruits or something."
Smart Ass couldn't believe what he was hearing. He assumed that the commissioner didn't know about some of the more "unfriendly" things that he and his group had gotten up to.
"That, or he'd throw us in jail," Stupid added. Well, that explained that, Smart Ass thought. He sat there and considered his options, the other weasels tensely watching him, simultaneously curious and afraid as to what their next move would be.
On the one hand, Smart Guy mused, now that Doom was gone, there was little chance that they'd ever reach the heights he'd claimed they would if they worked for him. But on the other, with Doom no longer their leader, they were free to do whatever they liked, and best of all, thanks to that policeman, it sounded like they were going to get to keep the status they had occupied as Doom's henchmen.
He got up, and straightened his hat.
"Well boys, I guess there's no other 'adoption' for us," he said sombrely, picking his hat off the floor. The weasels worriedly watched him, prepared for whatever his order was and how terrible it might be.
Smart Ass suddenly grinned at them all. "I guess the old Toon Patrol is back in business!" he said, placing his hat on his head. The other weasels looked at him in shock, and then similar smiles lit their faces. This was the Smart Ass they knew.
Greasy stepped forward. "So, boss, what should we do next?"
Smart Ass scratched his chin. "Depends. What's the current state of our sleeping 'estrangements'?
"The commissioner said our old house hasn't been inhabited since we last were there, so we could probably head back there."
"Great," Smart Ass said. "Have we got a cab?
"Our old paddy-wagon; it was rusting away in a storage locker," Wheezy told him. "I'd better drive," He quickly added. "Toontown's changed a bit since you were last there, boss."
"Ehh, whatever. I'll adapt soon enough. Let's am-scray." He turned and made for the exit, stopping in the doorway. He suddenly looked at the sleeve of his shirt. "What happened to my suit? Why am I wearing pink?"
Wheezy groaned, and hit his head with his hand. Greasy snickered at him, much to the confusion of Smart Ass. Greasy turned back to face Smart Ass. "Never mind boss, we'll find you a replacement at home."
That was good enough for Smart Ass, and he turned back towards the door, the others following him down the hallway to the main doors of the studios. Before long, the entire pack of Toon weasels had left Maroon Cartoon Studios far behind them, and they and their ancient paddy-wagon disappeared into the old Toontown entrance tunnel.