Y2K, The Thread--Part 2 ----------------------- At the Coffeehouse... Kat, Psycoke, Logan, and Kurt were helping the Phamton Lord with his latest project. They're still in the Coffeehouse because they never left in the previous story & have been there since (Hey, you can't get food & coffee like -this- in the Lair ;) "Mind telling me, again, why this holosuite/Danger Room/whatever needs to be so -big-?" Psycoke asked Logan, who is wearing civillian dress instead of his costume. "So TPL can use it to train some of the dragons, darlin'." he replied in a 'this is so obvious' tone. Kat and Kurt (a.k.a. Nightcrawler) teleported up to the Control Room. They were both holding cables and various parts. TPL, who was in humanoid form at the moment, grabbed a part and comments, "This module is just what I needed." He then grabbed some tools and crawled into a shaft. Kat and Kurt teleported back to help Psycoke and Logan. Suddenly, there was an explosion in the Control Room. TPL's cursing could be heard in the distance. "What the?!?" exclaimed Logan An anthropomorphic Jaguar appeared near Kat. Kat noticed and asked, "Hey, how did -you- get here?!" Kat ------ [...unWARP!!!] Good evening. ************* [UNWARP!!!] The Jaguar stumbled a trifle, trying to remain upright. After assessing the situation, he said, "This isn't my CENOTE--What? Kat? How did *I* get here?" "That's what I asked." The Panther tried to assemble the past events into a coherent pattern, and then he replied, "Well, I remember coming home from school and wanting some catfish, so I warped to the pond, and suddenly I'm in the Coffeehouse?" "Did U warp wrong or something?" asked Kurt. "No, not at all. In fact, I distinctly remeber being in a wormhole, someone saying I was being diverted because someone needed help, and I think I saw Dyglo and Chris in the hole as well. Now, can any of you be so kind as to tell me what is [COUGH!] going on?" ************* Until next time, remember: I AM THE J.A.M. Good evening. [WARP!!!] The J.A.M. ------ Sorting out the situation "Wish I could, J.A.M." replied Kat. "We've been here helping TPL with his new, er, additions, to the Dragon Planet." "Hmmm...if you were diverted here to help someone, then something is about to happen here." reasoned Kurt. "But vat ist?" "You said ya saw Chris an' Dyglo, right bub?" asked Logan, who was pulling his costume out of a box. The Jaguar nodded. "Could be that they're on their way here. Maybe they know something about all this." reasoned Logan. "'X-cuse me; I need to put my costume on before they get here." Logan walks out of the large room. "Why wait?" asked Psycoke "Couldn't we just hop into the Magic School Bus (version 2) and pick them up?" "Dunno if TPL's finished rebuilding it yet." replied Kat. "But I could go get Gadget and Rotor to help in case he hasn't. Let me check with TPL first." Kat teleported away. Kat ------ The Jaguar thus waited patiently and decided he wanted a capuccino. The J.A.M. ------ And the capuccino was made by... Your humble coffeehouse manager Tim, purveyor of fine coffee drinks of all manner. Enjoy! (I think I cheated there, by not writing a whole thread to get myself into the story. But it seemed so appropriate since I work in a coffee house in real life; don't know if I'll have time to be an active character in this but at least I got to make a cameo) Your Redwall Mouse Who has come to the aid of the Rangerphiles Tim(ballisto) ------ Meanwhile Rudolph paused momentarily in his panic at the Hungry Blizzard to cast a look at the TV set. His show was on. "Oh NO!!!" he said, "my wife's name's not Bernice. It's Clarice!!! Just like that girl in the classic Chip 'n' Dale short, Two Chips and a Miss." "H*ck!" he added. "The Enduring Man-Child" ------- Meanwhile, at the Burger King... Having dined sumptuously, and collected another Pokemon action figure, Julie and Karl returned to his RV for the ride back to her dormitory. "It was nice meeting you, Julie. I'm sorry you lost your powers and your sword, though." Karl shook his head sadly at the unfairness of it all. "I can get along without them for a while, I think!" Julie replied in a suprisingly cheerful tone. "Hey, what's a student need with either one?" She went on, "After all, they won't let me take the sword into the cafeteria any more, since that ..er incident.." Karl glanced over, one eyebrow raised slightly, hoping to be filled in on the details of that "incident", but Julie was very obviously unwilling to discuss it further. "Well, I wonder where I'll go next." He said, changing the subject. "I'd really like to go back to the Coffeehouse, but with Boz gone.." Julie shrugged and sighed. Karl wondered how that I had suddenly become WE, but considered her comment for a few minutes. He'd enjoyed the last year's trip greatly. "You're a writer, and to some degree so am I." He wondered out loud. "What would happen if I wrote something like 'The RV Magic Bus II suddenly appeared at the Ranger Coffeehouse'? Do you think it might work?" Julie seemed sceptical, but shrugged again and replied, "Couldn't hurt to try." After pulling into the dorm parking lot, Karl shut off the engine, set the brakes, and pulled out a worn-looking notepad. He wrote: "The RV Magic Bus II suddenly appeared in front of the Ranger Coffeehouse." At the moment he finished, there was a blurring and a lurch, but the RV had not moved. "Well, that didn't work, why didn't it work? It should have worked.." "Quiet, Karl." "Sorry, Julie." He winked, "I got a little upset." "Are you still being Monty, or are you channeling Gadget now?" "I'll leave that to you." "Hmmph!!" "No offence intended." "Be that as it may," Julie muttered darkly, "I was wondering what might happen if two writers wrote the same words at the same time." "Oooh, I like that!" They both wrote the same phrase as before, adding the final period, "On my mark - dot!! The RV seemed to flicker out of existance for a moment, and there was a feeling of movement, but afterward, it remained as it was. "I have an idea!" They both exclaimed. "What if we found some more fanfic writers, we could have them all write together and..." Karl and Julie shook hands on the bold beginning of a new adventure. "See ya tomorrow morning!" She called, walking back to her room. "You got it!" He replied, already racking his brain as to the whereabouts of any Rescue Ranger fanfic writers who might assist. "Good thing I saved up enough money for the gasoline, he chuckled." Karl ------ Meanwhile, at some Biker Bar A flah of bright light appears in the alley way behing the bar and John D drops from it and hits the ground on his back. He gets up and brushed the dirt off of himself. It's only then he realizes that he is naked. After the initial shock he knows there is only one thing to do. "Heck, If Arnold can do it I can do." He thinks to himself as he heads towards the back door of the Biker bar. Ten minute later he returns from the bar wearing some clother from the lost and found bin. After all he wasn;t dumb enough to demand the clothes off of a biker's back. He heads to the highway and starts to walk John D ------ From here to insanity [delete as per request] ------ Meanwhile, at teh other side of world... A man in his thirties was sitting down at this desk and thinking... The thoughts werent the cheerest ones, and the time was late, and he was still sitting at his job place. "Maybe i really should go home..." he thought. But there was bad weather outside, home was far, and he had at least twenty mins left before he really shout start to turn all the hi-tech gadgetry off and go home. "Guess, one more check on whats new and cool wont he a bad to call a day," he guessed and typed in the search words "ranger caffeehouse". After all, even that he had never been there personally, he knew two people who had expressed wish to hang out there regularly. Two mice. Only this time, something went wrong. Two pairs of the eyes were watching him intensely from the crack intot eh fake wall that divided his room from the main corridor. "Do you think we cut the nails enough?" whispered male voice. "Bah! We go this far, and you chicken out in tha least moment! We HAVE to do this for our and his good. Now!" female voice ordered. The man was patiently waiting while teh geocities server wa presenting the requested page, and not payng big attention to teh sounds from surrounding room. He could go for hours completely concentrating ont eh task at hand and ignoring the rest of the world. This time, the world decided not to ignore him. With crash, the wall came down and hit the man on the head. He was tossed forward, hit the screen of his computer and with white flash disappeared. "Told you it shoud work!" female voice shouted. "And now for the part B of our plan!" Two mice run over the ruined wall and too disappeared into the computer screen. (Ok, i had to give it a teast, and i reallly had 20 mins to kill ;-) ) Aivars ------ eep In Karl's motorhome headed to whoever-the-heck-writes-fanfics-and-wants-to-be-picked-up, Julie suddenly started crying uncontrollably. "Hey, Julie-luv, you okay?" Karl asked. "It's not some female problem, is it?" She continued weeping, and wailed, "I just got this awful feeling.....that James likes JESSIE more than ME..." Karl said nothing. "...and that someone's turning Jessie and James and Meowth EVIL...and they just the other day said they wanted to open a business instead of STEALING, especially James, so he'd never KILL anyone, right?" Karl started to wonder if Julie was doped up on Mentos (except those are anti-depressants, probably)...or possibly that strange substance labelled "Botan Rice Candy" he had seen in her room... "...and I feel like someone's turning everybody violent when really they're kind of gentle, unless they go crazy in "Dirty Rotten Diapers" or something, which I kind of enjoyed, but that's because it was CLEAR that she was going over the deep end, and wouldn't being scorched hurt more than Vinewhip (he could've at LEAST used Razor Leaf!) so why'd they have to hurt Dale more than Chip??????" Karl scratched his head. "Touring the world by Burger Kings must've finally got to her," he muttered. "And I don't have my sword!!!!" Julie moaned. "Or your MFP (tm)," Karl added pleasantly. "Yeah, yeah, but I want my sword!!!" Karl looked in Julie's backpack. "Hey, what are these?" he asked, pulling out a pair of clear 45-45-90 triangles. "Oh, those? I use those so I can draw straight panel lines for my comics...." "They're kinda pointy and sharp, though," Karl mused. Julie's face lit up. "My triangles of doom! Maybe..." -------- Everybody wants to be a cowboy ::yodels:: "Well, the first thing you need to know about Green is he's a control freak." "How so?" asked Monty. J.T. continued, "The bosses are always getting on his case to show the new guys around. They know he's a loose cannon, so they want to keep him off heists as much as possible. Problem is, he's not as professional as the rest of us. He's a bad influence on virgins. That's why I'm worried about these kids from Team Rocket. They've just got that one pokemon that knows how to do a job right, and he can't stop his partners from screwing up." "Meowth's their best hope? They do have problems." "Yeah. Usually, Glen's cool. He's got people who've grown up in the system and he starts them out small. But he's really on edge lately. This is the millennium, he thinks he's got to show off. When that happens, he turns into a cowboy. On a job like this, Green doesn't tolerate failure. And you can only imagine how these new kids might try his patience." "So you're saying they might not survive the trip out 'ere? "Yeah, if Jessie's all they say she is, she might take care of Green himself. And if that happens, I don't know if Joseph will celebrate or go crazy himself." Donny ------ In a land of ancient name..... ::Beyond the reaches of the normal civilized world, where the prairie winds blow, desert mesas rise in colors ranging from startling reds to gentle yellows and the new and the old mix in the strangest ways lies the land of Chateau Pax. This town, now the habitation of several Rangerphiles, was once an all-but-forgotten ghost town. Now it stands as a home and place of adventure. The largest building in the small town is the Chateau Pax Hotel, a three-story edifice that houses those who have chosen to reside there. And out on the front porch, made of redwood, sits Indy in a rocking chair. His feet are up on a railing and he slowly plays his guitar, a long-time favorite slowly filling the empty spaces of the town with his reverberating notes. Then Indy gets up and heads across the street. There are many buildings in town, but Indy only has the Sazerac Saloon in mind. The old saloon was once the haunt of many a cowboy and dance hall girl. Now, it's been renovated as the new headquarters for Vic Fontaine. Indy met the holographic crooner after his last coffeehouse adventure and decided to buy his contract when DS9 no longer needed him. Now the Sazerac was a mix of the old and new--Vic's flashy background mixed with the old bar, tables and surroundings of the past. Vic could see at once that Indy was there for advice, and he brought him a lemonade (no alcohol is allowed in the Sazerac):: Vic: Hey, pallie! I see you took my advice and got into the Coffeehouse thread. Indy: Yep, but look at all this! The story's going every which way. How can we possibly get everyone together at the Coffeehouse in time? Vic: Hey, listen to your Uncle Vic. It'll happen. Remember the Law of Ironic Convenience? Indy: Sure. That's the one that allows for the bending of reality and for things to work out. Vic: Well, it'll work here too. Don't you worry. ::E-Man enters the Sazerac via his transgalactic E-Portal:: Indy: James, what is it? E-Man: What do you think? Magical Female Powers (TM) are being pilfered, someone's created an evil duplicate of Man-Child, and James--uh, the other James--may like Jessie better then Julie! We've got to do something! Indy: Well, what did you have in mind? ::At that moment, E-Man receives an emergency communication:: ------ Rachel sniffs delicately . . . Rachel tried to figure out where the syrupy smell is coming from, but didn't have any luck, since the room she was enclosed in was pretty much dark. "Man-Child?" she called. "Why are you laughing?" Coughing is heard after the seemingly maniacal laugh. "Oh, nothing. Just thought of a-- a joke, that's all." "Oh? What joke? I need one to cheer me up right now. And why am I locked in this dark, funny smelling room?" The imposter moved closer to the door in order for Rachel to hear him better. "Aren't you supposed to be doing some kind of paper? I allowed you a computer. Don't you see it?" "I thought -I- was the one asking questions!" Rachel was frustrated, but did look for the computer. Sure enough, it was lodged in a corner amidst several dusty record books and papers. She turned it on and coughed. Her sinuses were seriously suffering. She turned it on, and the computer flared to life. It was a refreshing light in the little room. "Roy Neal? Why did you say I needed this computer?" However, the poser had moved away down the hall, still giggling to himself. Piles of gold shone briliantly around him. Rachel sighed, realizing she was alone again. This was so unlike the Man Child. How odd. Oh, well, she resigned. She explored the computer to see if there was Internet capability or any games. "Not even Minesweeper?! This is cruel and unusual punishment." She searched again, and all she could find was a version of Microsoft Word. "Curse you, Bill Gates," she muttered. She then proceeded to work on a paper that was supposed to be due the next day. Much love, Rachel ------ Two figures dust themselves off. Other than a few scrapes and bruises, they are miraculously okay. Chris turned to his draconic friend. "I still say that this is your fault. Where are we anyways?" "I have no idea. Say, how did you get your eyes to change shape?" "What are you talking about? Speaking of which, you look different too..." As Chris began to ponder where they might be, Dyglo catches scent of something. He goes into a take. "Hmm, I've never seen that one before," Chris commented to himself. Before Chris could do anything else, Dyglo began floating towards the source of the scent and uttered a single word... "Fish..." "Uh-oh. I guess I'll have to follow him." Chris followed Dyglo at a safe distance. _________________________________________________ When Chris caught up with Dyglo, the dragon was looking into a pond, poised as if to pounce. Chris heard something, and it wasn't Dyglo. "Karp! Karp! Karp! Karp! Karp! Magikarp! Karp! Karp!" "Where have I heard that before?" Chris thought to himself. As Dyglo sprang into the air, it suddenly came to him. "Pokémon! I think I know where we are now... in the most general sense." Dyglo emerged from the lake holding a orangeish fish. "Ah... lunch is served!" "Um, Dyglo, I don't think it would be a good idea to eat that fish..." "Nonsense! That's what they're here for!" Dyglo opened his mouth, and chomped down hard on the fish. It let out a loud, "KAAAAARRRPPPP!!!" but wasn't affected any other way. Dyglo, on the other hand, was barely keeping a scream of pain from escaping his throat. Chris shook his head and matter-of-factly said, "I warned you not to try to eat it. That isn't a normal fish. It's a pokémon. I would bet that the reason we look different is because we're in an anime universe." Dyglo ------