WAR!


Chapter Nine

 

A Friend in Need- by Jeff Claunch

Todd felt himself slipping into a state of complete disarray. Almost as if he had drank one too many bottles of a good, strong Russian Vodka. Todd was able to stand, but he knew he didn't have much time till he was flat out dead from the Denebian Slime Devil venom. Strangely, the thought really pleased Todd. After all, he knew he was meant to die. He held the disrupter, set to wide-angle vaporization and maximum power, aimed at his head. Todd's index finger jiggled violently on the trigger of the disrupter. After much effort, he realized that the disrupter's safety lock had been left on. Todd worked furiously trying to get the safety off. He stuttered to himself, "Ttttthese dddang sssafety lllllocks. Ttttthis ttthing is worse than a bbbbottle of Ttttylenol Gel-Tabs."

Greg, watching Todd with great amusement, laughed. "Ahh yes, the safety lock. Read the directions, then do what you know you must do!" Greg shouted, relieved that his plans weren't being destroyed, only delayed.

Todd became quite desperate and panic stricken, trying to remove the safety lock from the disrupter. Sweat beaded on Todd's forehead. "I must die, I must die, I must die, I must die." Todd mumbled over and over through his trembling lips. "Please uuuuunnnnnllllock!" Todd screamed at the disrupter half expecting it to talk back. When the disrupter did not respond he gave it a dirty look and continued with his task.

The venom continued to cause Todd to behave in a drunken state and he continued to work on the safety, which was quite obviously stuck, for another two minutes. Greg realized that Todd's drunken state was aggravating the situation, and that his enemy didn't have much time left. Soon Todd would fall victim of the Denebian Slime Devil venom, and when he fell he would be literally cut to bits by the knives surrounding him. These thoughts made Greg feel very comfortable about the situation. There was no way his nemesis was getting out of this one. Greg again leaned back, relaxed, and chuckled under his breath as he watched Todd struggling to fulfill his death wish. -----

Meanwhile-------

Jeff was sitting at his desk at the University of Venture, on the planet Dorksinthehall. He was trying to comprehend a major economic problem in his Macroeconomics class.

"How? How? How is this possible! There is no way that Sam Walton of Wal-Mart could possibly net this much money legally! I just don't see any way he could do it. But, according to my teacher, he did it. Wow. It's just unbelievable." Jeff said talking to himself as usual.

"Man, Jeff! Don't you ever quit talking to yourself? I'm trying to study over here and all you do is talk, talk, talk." Brian complained, wishing that he had a different roommate.

Irritated, Jeff idly replied to his once friendly roommate. "Opps. Was I talking to myself? Well if you'd turn that crazy music off I could actually hear myself think! Then maybe I wouldn't talk to myself so much. Sheesh!"

Brian gave Jeff the 'Stare of Death' and left the room in a huff.

"Ahhhhhhhh alone at last!" Jeff muttered to himself.

As Jeff sat in the dark dorm room he began to feel lonely. He continued to talk to himself to try and make himself feel better, but he didn't know what else he could do.

"Man, I am sure miserable. Nothing to do except study, study, study."

Jeff began to think back to days of the past. It all came back to him in a flash. He could remember all of his friends from Aeronot High School. Jeff met his girlfriend, Stephanie, there. "Ahhhhhhhhhh those were the days," he mumbled pleasantly.

As Jeff sat there thinking, he also remembered Todd. Todd the cable man.

"What a great guy. I sure do miss him."

Jeff walked over to his computer terminal and punched a few keys in memory of Todd. The screen flashed a few times., beeped, and then went dead. "What in the world?" Jeff was stunned, his computer wouldn't work. He felt almost woozy as he sat in front of the computer. He felt worn out with all his problems. Jeff leaned back in his chair, passed out, and began dreaming..................................

Jeff awoke quite violently from his dream.........

"Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!" Jeff screamed, nearly falling out of his '1970's' hard wooden chair. (Pretty old chair eh? Must be at least 1000 years old!) Of course, the scream was in vain because there was no one around, but Jeff was used to that.

Surprisingly the vid-phone rang sitting atop of Jeff's desk.

"Now, I wonder who that could be?"

Ring.......

Ring.......

Ring......

"Hello?"

"Hello. This is Sam Walton I have a favor to ask of you."

"Ummmm....errrr.....ahh.....Are you sure you have the right number?"

"784-555-2639?"

"Yep, that's what this is.......But how do you know who I am? What do you want? I thought you died!"

"Jeff, hang the vid-phone up and please come with me......."

"But, but, but....hooooooowwwwwwww..................................."-----

Meanwhile-------

Two more minutes had passed in what was left of Todd's life. Greg found that Todd had quite a good ability to stand up to the Denebian Slime Devil venom.

"Amazing.....Simply amazing," Greg thought.-----

Meanwhile (again)-------

zzzzzzziiiiiiinnnnnggggggggg.......

"Where am I?" Jeff asked quietly.

"You're in a secret hiding place in the Wal-mart headquarters building." Sam replied. "Now Jeff, here's what I need from you. I think you have a friend by the name of Todd, am I right?"

"Yes."

"He's in some trouble. A man by the name of Greg has him captive. We gave Todd to him in return for a cable descrambler."

"YOU WHAT?!?!?!?!"

"Yes that's correct we gave Todd to Greg in return for a cable descrambler."

"Is Greg in anther one of those War!s and on the opposite side from Todd?"

"Yes, how did you know?"

"I've been there, done that!"

"Ah, so you are familiar with the situation, then."

"GREG WILL KILL HIM!!!!!!" Jeff shouted at the top of his lungs.

"I am quite aware of that, but he was of no value to us. Anyway, the problem lies with the cable descrambler. It doesn't work. It's broken beyond repair. Greg gave us a faulty descrambler and now he must pay," Sam said with vengeance. "We would like you to help us get Greg and you can save your friend Todd.....If you want."

"ug........."

"Do you agree to this? If you help, you and Todd are free to go." The old man paused for dramatic effect, "JUST GET ME GREG!!!!!"

"errr......ummmmm.....wellllll......ummm....yeah. I guess you leave me no choice."

"I thought you would see it my way," explained Mr. Walton. "Please step on that platform over there and we will have you transported to the place the cable descrambler came from. If Greg is not there, locate him and send him my way. Or simply call me."

Hesitantly Jeff walked over to the small transport platform and dissolved into a pattern of swirling energy beams.........----------------------------



"Where am I?" Jeff asked himself again.

"AHHHHHH, where did you come from?" Greg exclaimed aloud.

Jeff looked around and spotted Todd immediately. Todd appeared somewhat drunk. He could barely stand, and was about to fall upon a bed of shining knives! "Poor Todd," Jeff thought as he ran to his friend and removed the knives from around him. Greg, meanwhile, tried attacking Jeff to get him to stop undoing his handiwork. Jeff managed to remove the knives around Todd. It was a terrible struggle, but thanks to Jeff's small size he was agile enough to avoid Greg and keep Todd from killing himself.

Now that his friend was safe, Jeff's main priority was to deal with Greg. Although it looked like Todd would drop dead at any moment from whatever the vile on the floor had contained. Jeff saw a disrupter laying on the floor. Jeff did a Captain Kirk shoulder roll, scooped it up, put the disrupter on knock out power and pulled the safety. Greg cringed with fear as the safety clicked off.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!" Greg screamed in midair as he was zapped unconscious by the disrupter, which caused him to fall rather hard to the floor.

"Ow. That looked like it hurt," Jeff mumbled to himself.

Todd was lying on the floor with his lips still trembling. He seemed to have an itch on his back and was trying to scratch, but he couldn't get there in his condition. Jeff picked up one of the vile's of what appeared to be Denebian Slime Devil venom.

"Wow. There is no antidote for this stuff," Jeff thought. "There is only one thing that can cure Todd. According to my last class in chemocalvinism he must drink more Denebian Slime Devil venom." Unlike most poisons, the more you drink of this stuff, the less intoxicating and poisonous it is. Gradually, after the 11th drink Todd awoke from his drunken state.

"Ohhhhh.....mmm......Mmmmmmman am I glad to see you..........owwwww.......I feel terrible. What's going on?" Todd wanted to know.

"Well, let me 'splain.........................."

And Jeff summed up what had happened, they were beamed back to Jeff's Dorm at the University of Venture.-------------------------



Greg lay unconscious at the feet of Sam Walton. He awoke from his unconsciousness and jumped with a start. Sam looked at Greg in a funny sort of way and snickered. The room they were in was decorated in stainless steel and had thousands of televisions mounted in racks for walls. It looked like a circular master control room at NASA. Sam had cable channels for all of the TV's, but none of the channels had any violence on them! "It's all you're fault, you know." Sam stated with utter hatred. In fact, he only had soap operas to watch. Greg hated soap operas, but not as much as Sam hated them. Greg hated them so much he couldn't stand to watch one for more than 10 minutes at a time. Day's of our Lives came on and Greg screamed at the top of his lungs.

"What's wrong bucko?" Sam said in a sarcastic voice while smiling.

Greg tried to get up out of the dental chair he was in, but found that he was tied down with thick CABLE!!!! Greg slowly realized what was wrong. The descrambler that Todd had in his briefcase was one that he was repairing, and obviously Todd never got it to work. "Shoot," Greg thought, "now what am I going to do?" Greg was inevitably going to go insane and finally die, tied down in this chair. The master remote for all the TV's was in front of him on a table, but Greg couldn't get to the remote as a result of the black cable holding him down. Greg whimpered.

Sam glared at Greg after picking up the remote and removing the batteries, "Now you must die!"

Sam obviously wasn't going to take any chances losing Greg. He wanted him deader than a doornail. He new Greg knew nothing of cable descramblers and couldn't fix them. He realized he was stupid for ever trusting such a man as Greg.

Sam left the room and Greg could hear him shut and lock the door behind him. His evil footsteps could be heard echoing down a long hallway, and then another door opened, then shut.

Suddenly, huge spotlights illuminated Greg. He began to sweat as he sat in the chair with the hot spotlights, soap operas, and an unreachable remote in front of him. The dentist chair Greg sat in began spinning like a great centrifuge. The cable was stronger than anything Greg had ever seen. In an amazing feat of quick thinking, he realized it was not cutable or burnable. "Probably that new anti-theft non-spliceable type Todd was telling me about way back when" Greg said to the room full of spinning televisions. No matter what he tried, he could not break free. He could feel the blood draining from his face and rushing to his feet. Finally, Greg passed out from the dizziness.......................

Meanwhile, Sam watched from the control room. Greg kept spinning and spinning, faster and faster. Then, he pressed down on a big Red button marked "Electromatic Brain-Descrambler", and began to laugh uncontrollably.

Greg had maybe one second of sentient life left to himself, before his brains would be scrambled beyond repair.

Continues



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