"The partially, nearly Naked Gun 3 : 'They Saved Crumpf's Brain'..."
Summary: Frank Drebbin is out of retirement and on the case when he learns the fanatical former president and loser candidate Fred Crumpf may not be quite as dead as he left him and he and/or his crazies including his family threaten the newly elected President Woodrowmina Wilson.
Of course Nordberg is no longer on the squad because of, well, we never talk about that...
Part VIII...
"Can anyone tell me what the damned Hell is going on?!" Mayor Barkley, now, with her aides, moved by security, secret service, and those LAPD deemed trustworthy enough to enter the venue.
"Don't worry, Madam Mayor..." An aide spoke up. "I'm sure we're quite safe."
"How reassuring, Sydney. You're fired!" she glared at the stunned aide. "I need honest facts here, not happy talk."
"Madam Mayor?" Ms. Bailey had come over after speaking to various guards, agents, assorted VIPs including California's Senators.
See I'm rather low on the totem pole tonight, Barkley thought, frowning.
"Sorry for the little diversion, Madam Mayor." Ms. Bailey nodded to her. "Apparently someone tried to kill our guest of honor in the parkingway access." Drily.
Sounds about par for the course, Barkley nodded. With the exception it's nearly always Drebbin whose actions make the situation a hundred, even a thousand times worse.
Wait. Tried? As in...
"He's alive?" she eyed Ms. Bailey. "I mean...He managed to survive that?"
"Oh, yes and quite unharmed due I understand to fast thinking by his superior and partner, Captain Hocken."
"Fortunate..." the Mayor with a forced smile.
Just that a few severe injuries might have kept him sidelined a while...I'd really enjoyed that past year with him retired.
"Yes, they dodged quite a determined assassination attempt. I'm afraid we lost several officers of ours and yours. My people are surveying the area now, though the assassins escaped. Clearly top professionals."
"Oh...Well, I trust your people will share any data with our own police force?"
"As much as we deem safe, Madam Mayor. Sorry, I must be candid..." Ms. Bailey nodded. "Your department's much improved under your administration but there's still a considerable legacy of corruption, as well as brutality and racism."
"Thanks." The mayor, curtly. "We are aware of our forces' deficiencies and have been working diligently to correct them, Ms. Bailey."
"No offense intended, Madam Mayor. And I'll get a list of the personnel killed and wounded to your aides as soon as we can."
"Fine. Well, I assume the ceremony must now...Thank God...Be cancelled?" Barkley, hopefully.
"Well, actually..." Ms. Bailey, politic tone.
"Mayor Barkley! Great to see you again." Frank called from the elevator doorway he, and Hocken behind him, had just emerged from.
I can not catch a break...Barkley sighed.
...
"Honestly..." Mayor Barkley shook head. "After this attempt, with three officers dead, six severely wounded, the President wants to go through with this? It makes no sense to me."
"Well..." Ms. Bailey eyed her. "President Wilson feels this involves an attempt to intimidate the US government by terrorist groups. I'm rather inclined to agree as are the CIA, NSA, DOJ, and FBI. Understandably the Secret Service is concerned about the President's safety but that's their primary mission."
"So, they recommend cancellation?" Barkley, eagerly.
"They follow the side of caution, Madam Mayor. But the President has overruled them." Ms. Bailey noted quietly. "And in any case, they agree the security situation seems adequate. The ceremony will be kept simple and brief."
"I don't think we should give into terrorists, especially Nazis and those other guys." Frank nodded. "No way..." Hocken nodded firmly.
Barkley frowning...
"But these terrorists are affiliated with a candidate for President, Drebbin." Barkley noted. "And they've been all over the airwaves, claiming him to be a martyr, killed by none other than you! Every nutty fringe site in America is labeling you as his assassin with morons and maniacs lining up on the net, promising to kill you in his name, if they can. Ms. Bailey, surely given this outcry...? At least till the situation calms down...?"
"The President has made her decision, Madam Mayor." Firm tone.
"All right...Well, you have our full support, as you can see." Barkley indicated the large force of police and security about.
"Which is appreciated." Ms. Bailey nodded.
"We'll keep Frank safe and the President..." Hocken declared. "Well..." he eyed Ms. Bailey's stern look. "We'll help all we can."
"But more to the point..." Frank held up his sachel... "Here's all the information on their plot that that political advisor, Dr. Harold Jones, wrote about...Plus details of his sex life, his marriage to a shrew, his dabblings in bestiality..."
All looking at him...
"Chapter three...It's all there. Anyway, this needs to get to the President and her top advisors at once. These maniacs have a horrible scheme in mind to take over the government."
"Crumpf's had several such..." Barkley noted. "Claim election fraud, try to overthrow the election, try to use the courts he packed with his sycophants, bribe everyone he could, put a couple of his nuts in as military chiefs, attorney general, FBI director."
"But this one's the weirdest yet..." Hocken nodded. "I've read just a little of the cliff notes and I can tell you...100% Nazi sci-fi weird."
"I see." Ms. Bailey nodded. "Well...Thanks, Lieutenant Drebbin, Captain Hocken...Your service and efforts will be rewarded. And you've got this to one of the President's top advisors." Smile. "Are there, by any chance...Other copies of this?"
Uh...Hocken...
"That's it..." Frank beamed. "The original and only...Plus Jones' Cliff notes."
"Great. I'll see this gets to President Wilson." Nod. "Just a second...I have my assistant on earbud here. Let me talk to him while you all have a seat. And get this material to the President." She nodded. "We'll be getting underway in just a few moments once we finish security sweeps."
Hocken eyeing Frank briefly...What was that?
Frank, slight raise of hand...Hold on that for...
"What's the problem, Lieutenant?" Ms. Bailey eyed him, pausing.
"Hmmn?" Frank smiled. "No problem at all, ma'am."
"Then why were you signalling Captain Hocken just now?" she asked, stern expression. "Captain?"
Uh...Hocken stared.
"Gentlemen if there's anything you're keeping from me, I need to know it." She insisted. "I appreciate any concerns you may have but as head of Presidential Security I need access to all intelligence."
"Drebbin? Is there anything else?" Barkley asked.
"Uh, the Nazis have been experimenting on Americans...Patients in hospitals. Including my wife." Hocken cut in, hurriedly. "Edna's picture is in Jones' files and book as one of them, but it wasn't spelled out. Frank just wanted to give me a chance to do my own investigating, starting tomorrow." Hurriedly.
"I see." Ms. Bailey nodded. "I'm sorry, Captain. That's awful. How is she?"
"Well...It seems like it's been going on for eight years or more, now...Her brain's been pretty seriously affected." Hocken began.
"Pretty much brain mush." Frank agreed.
"Really?" Barkley blinked at him, then the sighing Hocken. "So that's why she's been so..."
"Batshit crazy..." Frank nodded. "Not to mention jumping almost anything male that moved."
"Really?" Ms. Bailey eyed Hocken. "As a result of their medical experiments...Done here, in the US?"
"In American hospitals, by American and naturalized American doctors..." Frank shook head. "It's pure Nazi treachery and a degree of hee-hawing, no doubt."
"But, why?" Barkley stared.
"All in 'The Plot'." Frank nodded. "But it seems they were trying to find ways to transfer brains. And they needed test subjects. Poor Edna and others were simple victims."
"Are you saying your wife's brain was replaced?" Ms. Bailey eyed Hocken.
"No, not quite..." Hocken shook head. "But we think those Nazi/fascist/Klansmen/racist sobs were putting pieces in and out, with her and others, tryin' to figure out how to do it. At least that's how it seems, right, Frank?" Hocken turned to him.
"That's what the notes seem to suggest and what Dr. Jones told me." Frank noted.
"But they haven't succeeded, according to what you've found out?" Ms Bailey eyed him.
"Dr. Jones thought they were close, but not quite there. But they could be ready any time. And now they have a reason to hurry things along." Shrewd nod.
"Why? The upcoming election?" Mayor Barkley stared. "But you've killed Crumpf. Do they have someone else or can they...What? Use computer chips or something?" shrugging.
"Well, actually Mayor Barkley." Frank, shaking head. "I may not have completely killed Fred Crumpf. Jones was pretty sure...They'd had a contingency plan, based on their knowing...Even expecting...That Crumpf would lose again."
"Well? Then what was..." Barkley blinked. "Interesting, Mr. Drebbin." Ms. Bailey nodded.
"Drebbin? Are you saying these Nazi lunatics...?"
"Saved Crumpf's Brain, Madam Mayor? Well, I can't be sure but Dr. Jones seemed pretty sure of it." Drebbin nodded.
"What? You mean he was sucked into that plane window and..." Barkley stared.
"There have been some experiments in our CIA and NSA and some funded start-ups that do suggest it's not utterly mad, Madam Mayor." Ms. Bailey noted.
"Scoop out the brain the right way, stuff a new one in, sounds plausible to me." Hocken noted. "I mean if you know what you're doing. And they used my Edna and other innocent folks to learn how."
"Eehew..." Barkley shook head. "So you're saying they saved Fred Crumpf's brain after his plane went down in the Pacific? In the middle of nowhere?"
"Jones thought so. That they were more or less prepared for it." Frank noted. "Though perhaps they weren't expecting to have to do it in quite that way. Must've have been rather difficult, really."
"And if they did, it's sitting or whatever a brain does after you yank it...On a bench or in a jar at their top secret base. Where I had planned to go with Jones, before he got eaten." he concluded.
"What? Why?" Barkley stared. "Shouldn't we just bomb the place to hell and take seize the stinking, smoking remains with 10,000 Marines?"
"Jones felt the Nazis, etc would be ready for any attack like that." Frank noted. "But the two of us, with his knowledge of the Lair and my skills..."
Barkley rolling her eyes...
"Very brave, Mr. Drebbin..." Ms. Bailey eyed him. "Tell me, are you still willing to try it?" she asked. "Though perhaps with more than two. An elite force? Once we've had the chance to digest Professor Jones' info?"
"You bet." Frank nodded. "Especially if that would give me a few days to help Ed here interrogate Edna's doctors and separate the Nazis, etc...From the quacks and incompetent. I mean the ones who are innocent quacks and incompetents."
"Might be hard to tell." Barkley shook head. "Does the President seriously mean not to send a large force against these lunatics?" she asked Ms. Bailey.
"The Crumpf people still have supporters here, Madam Mayor. Fewer than in the last two lost elections of course but they're the most fanatical. We need to handle this without a huge display of force. Penetrate this base and find out what's real and what's just crazy sci-fi." Ms. Bailey nodded.
"Sounds foolish to me..." Barkley frowned. "I'd just bomb it back into the Pacific."
"The technology could be valuable and it could be deployed elsewhere. We need to capture the place and their leaders and find out all we can."
"One of them is Steve Banner, Crumpf's top aide..." Frank noted. "But as I noted in my report, he admitted to me he's the natural grandson of..."
"Joseph Goebbels, yes we know." Ms. Bailey nodded.
"Goebbels?" Barkley stared.
"Lots of mistress and rape victims." Frank noted. "There were bound to be one or two..."
"Excuse me..." Ms. Bailey pressed earbud. "I've got to go for a moment, I'm told the President is here and we can start immediately. Shall we all take a seat?" she indicated a table set apart from the others. "Just one moment and I'll be back..."
"I can't believe this crap...Nazi plots? Goebbels? Saved brains? Crumpf's saved brain?" Barkley shook head as she, various aides, Frank, and Ed took seats. "Hocken? You believe this crap?"
"Edna's life may depend on it...At least her dignity, if we can't save her." He sighed. "Though I want to believe there might be a chance for her, even just proving this was done to her..." shaking head.
"I suppose..." Barkley sighed. "I hope so. Well, anything I can do. Just make sure any Nazis, etc you find here you handle properly." she nodded.
"Yeah, Frank'll make me follow procedure."
"I mean croak the sobs...If they're Nazis." Barkley shook head. "But just don't harm or kill anyone innocent, please?"
"Do our best, ma'am." Hocken nodded.
"Ok...All set. Mr. Drebbin?" the returned Ms. Bailey eyed him as she took seat, smiling shrewdly at Frank. "I passed your little test. The President and our people have Professor Jones' materials." She nodded to him. "But it was wise of you to do so and to hold back whatever else you have." Nod.
Barkley eyeing Frank...Drebbin?
"Just a precaution." He nodded.
"Yeah, see...Ow!" Ed groaned as Frank kicked him under the table.
"Drebbin is right, Captain." Ms. Bailey nodded, slight smile. "Till we know how far these people have gotten, we need to be extra cautious. Whatever else you have, keep it concealed. And trust no one." Stern nod.
"Ladies and gentlemen, please rise for the President of the United States...Woodrowmina Wilson!" the loudspeakers blared. "Hail to the Chief" playing...All rising as more agents, aides and guards came into the center of the room...
