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Chapter 11 - Episode 10: The Ancient! - Part 2

ECLIPSO: "Last time, on Eclipse City of Chaos! Our heroes were trapped in the past, a robot was sacrificed to a monument, and a giant stone cat was very, very cross. Let's rejoin the chaos, already in progress!"

The Great Sphinx's eyes glow menacingly. Its stone mouth grinds open.

THE SPHINX: "YOU HAVE DISTURBED MY ETERNAL REST. ANSWER MY RIDDLE, OR BE CRUSHED INTO THE SANDS OF TIME!"

JESTER: (Hands on hips) "Fine! But make it a good one! None of that 'what walks on four legs in the morning' junk, I've heard it!"

THE SPHINX: "VERY WELL. WHAT IS... THE AIR-SPEED VELOCITY OF AN UNLADEN SWALLOW?"

Jester blinks. Comet Girl facepalms.

JESTER: "What? African or European?"

The Sphinx freezes. Its stone face seems to glitch. The grinding sound stops. The glowing eyes flicker.

THE SPHINX: "...ERROR. DATA NOT FOUND. PARADOX DETECTED. SYSTEMS OVERLOADING."

Smoke pours from its nostrils. The giant statue begins to shudder violently.

JESTER: "Ha! Classic! Never fails! Now, let's get my robot!"

He waddles over and kicks the base of the Sphinx. A small, previously hidden door pops open. SCRUB-BOT zooms out, covered in cobwebs and beeping hysterically. Behind him, the Sphinx lets out a final, frustrated roar and then... deflates like a balloon, crumbling into a harmless pile of sand and loose rocks.

The Pharaoh and laborers stare in awe.

PHARAOH: "He has defeated the Guardian of the Sands with his infinite wisdom! All hail the Mighty, Round Bes!"

JESTER: "See? Being a nerd pays off!"

ECLIPSO: "A stunning victory achieved not through strength, but through pedantic knowledge of obscure cinematic references. The timeline may never recover."

You: "He beat the Sphinx with a movie quote!" [You laugh so hard you snort.]

Now hailed as a god, Jester is carried through the desert on a luxurious litter held by a dozen straining laborers. He's being fed grapes.

JESTER: "You know, this time travel thing isn't so bad. I could get used to this whole 'deity' gig."

COMET GIRL: "Jester! We can't stay here! We're changing history! Look!"

She points. The laborers are building a new hieroglyphic wall. It depicts a giant, round, jester-hat-wearing god (Jester) defeating a Sphinx by yelling at it.

JESTER: "Hey, they got my good side!"

Suddenly, the litter breaks under his weight with a loud CRACK! Jester tumbles out and lands on a steep, dune. His well-oiled, grape-juice-covered body has no friction. He starts rolling.

JESTER: "WHOAH! NOT AGAIN!"

He picks up speed, collecting sand and momentum, until he becomes a giant, screaming, human-sized beach ball careening through the desert.

COMET GIRL: "Oh, for the love of-" She takes off after him.

ECLIPSO: "The Mighty Bes has achieved a new form of locomotion: the 'Fat-Roll.' A truly majestic sight."

Jester bounces over camels, rolls through a market stall selling clay pots (CRASH!), and bowls over a line of slaves building a pyramid, causing the stones to tumble down in a perfect domino effect.

COMET GIRL: (Flying desperately, trying to contain the damage) "S.A.R.A., damage report!"

S.A.R.A. : "Calculating... Historical accuracy has decreased by 87%. The future textbook industry will be very confused. Also, you have a sunburn."

Jester finally comes to a stop at the bottom of a dune, dizzy and covered in sand, honey, and broken pottery. He's also... noticeably less round. All the rolling and chaos has literally shaken the weight off.

JESTER: (Staggering to his feet, patting his stomach) "Hey! I'm... I'm me again! The 'Fat-B-Gone' 9000 worked! Just... not how I planned!"

He spots the remains of his time machine scattered nearby-the disco ball, the salad spinner, a single toaster. It's all buried in the sand where they first arrived.

JESTER: "The machine! I can rebuild it! SCRUB-BOT! Get over here!"

Meanwhile, Comet Girl is using her cosmic energy to reassemble the pyramid brick-by-brick at super-speed, a look of intense concentration on her face.

COMET GIRL: "Almost... got it... just need to put this capstone on..."

JESTER: (Frantically wiring the toaster to the disco ball) "Who cares about the pyramid? I've got a toaster to overclock! This is science!"

The Pharaoh approaches, looking furious. "Mighty Bes! You have destroyed a market, delayed the pyramid, and your spherical form flattened my favorite camel! I name you... FALSE GOD! Seize them!"

The Egyptian guards advance.

JESTER: "Okay, almost got it... need a power source..." His eyes land on the Pharaoh's ornate, jeweled staff. "Ooh, shiny!"

He snatches the staff and jams it into the mess of wires. The disco ball flickers to life, spinning and casting sparkly lights. The toaster glows red hot.

PHARAOH: "MY STAFF! THAT HAS MY WI-FI PASSWORD CARVED ON IT!"

The machine whirs, creating a wobbly, unstable time vortex.

JESTER: "It's working! It's working! Get in, get in!"

He grabs SCRUB-BOT and dives for the vortex.

COMET GIRL: (Placing the final brick) "Done! History is sa- JESTER, WAIT!"

She zooms towards the vortex just as Jester disappears into it. She manages to grab onto his foot as she's pulled in after him.

The Pharaoh and his guards are left staring at the empty spot. The only thing left behind is the Pharaoh's staff, now slightly melted, and a single piece of perfectly toasted bread that pops out of the toaster.

The Pharaoh picks up the toast. He stares at the image of a cartoon mouse burned onto it- a permanent reminder of the "god" who visited.

PHARAOH: (Holding the toast aloft) "Behold! A sign from the Gods! From this day forth, we shall worship... the Holy Toast!"

The Egyptians all bow to the toast.

ECLIPSO: "And so, the course of history was forever altered, not by a grand event, but by a malfunctioning kitchen appliance. Archaeologists will be baffled for centuries."

Jester, Comet Girl, and SCRUB-BOT are dumped unceremoniously back onto the floor of Jester's lair. They're covered in sand and smelling of ancient history.

The lair is exactly as they left it: a trash-filled disaster zone.

JESTER: (Standing up, admiring his slim figure in a reflective surface) "Yes! Success! I'm gorgeous again! And I didn't have to do a single squat!"

COMET GIRL: (Brushing sand out of her hair) "Jester! Do you have any idea what you've done? You introduced toast-based religion to Ancient Egypt!"

JESTER: "Pfft. Details. The point is, I'm no longer a walking beanbag chair. Mission accomplished."

He looks at the mountain of junk food with disgust.

JESTER: "Ugh. The sight of all that grease is making me sick. SCRUB-BOT, dispose of it. I think I'll have a salad."

SCRUB-BOT, who has seen the birth of civilizations and the wrath of stone monsters, just lets out a tired, staticy beep and starts slowly vacuuming up a cheese puff.

ECLIPSO: "A journey through time, culminating in... a slight dietary change. The character growth is staggering."

Later that day, a news report is on TV.

NEWS ANCHOR: "...and in a bizarre discovery, Egyptologists have uncovered a previously unknown chamber within the Great Pyramid. It appears to contain... a single, robotic cleaning tool and a perfectly preserved pizza box from 'Tony's.' Scientists are calling it the greatest mystery of the 21st century."

Jester and Comet Girl are both watching, frozen.

Jester has a mouthful of lettuce.

COMET GIRL: (Eyes wide) "Jester... your pizza box... it's in a pyramid."

JESTER: (Chewing thoughtfully) "Huh. So that's where I left it. And hey, they found SCRUB-BOT's cousin! I wondered where he'd gone."

He shrugs and goes back to his salad.

Comet Girl stares at the screen, then at Jester, then back at the screen. She slowly raises her hands to her head.

COMET GIRL: "My brain hurts."

S.A.R.A. : "Rebooting. The concept of 'salad' is now associated with 'temporal crimes.' My world view is shattered."

Eclipso appears on screen. He's wearing a t-shirt that says "I Went to 2500 B.C. and All I Got Was This Lousy Sunburn."

ECLIPSO: "Well, viewers, the timeline is officially a mess. But hey, at least his pants fit again! What will our slimmed-down villain do next? Steal the Declaration of Independence? Crash a Renaissance Faire? Whatever it is, you know it'll be historically inaccurate! So stay tuned!"

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Post-Credit Scene

The screen is black. Two glowing, sinister eyes open. They look exhausted.

MYSTERIOUS VILLAIN (V.O.): (Voice is flat, drained of all emotion)

"He went to the past... and his greatest achievement was... going on a diet."

"I have no words. I am... empty."

The eyes just stare into the void for a full ten seconds before the screen cuts to black.

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You: "That was the best episode EVER!" you yell, jumping up and down. You can't wait to see what anachronistic mess Jester gets into next.

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