>>He took a second to gather his wits about him,
CROW: Not having many of them to gather to begin with.
MIKE: Crow...
>>then tried to observe his surroundings more carefully.
TOM: The last time he tried to observe his surroundings without proper preparation, his gaze had accidentally tipped over a vital experiment resulting in the death of some 40 lab rats and most of Driftwood, Maine.
>>He now realized that he must use his intelligence training to help him
>>concentrate his eyes on the strange sights and sounds around him.
TOM: Ah yes. The vast military intelligence training that completely failed to cover things like moving silently, working out security systems, noticing vital pieces of information on critical maps, how to gain the physical fortitude to survive a light bruising, and knowledge of the common habits of reptiles.
CROW: He'll be lucky to even notice the 50 armed guards on the other side of the room if his past military performance is any indication.
>>There were all sorts of plain, glowing, and blinking buttons, knobs,
>>handles, meters, futuristic-looking machines, and tables with large bottles
>>that were filled with strange-looking chemicals.
MIKE: <Shatner> The lights! They keep blinking and flashing and blinking and flashing and blinking!
TOM: Uh, this is a secret lab dedicated to the research of alien life-forms. Futuristic-looking machines are to be expected.
CROW: Ah, but what futuristic machines? Are we talking Jetsons ring motif, or lots of plastic and blinking lights, or stainless steel and push-buttons, or curving lines and touch-pad interfaces, or big hair and mini-skirts, or skintight leather, or Barbarella's tiny, itsy-bitsy bikini, or...
MIKE: That's enough out of you, young man.
>>He stepped back toward one of the non-glowing control panels and tried
>>to avoid looking at the Rockoids.
CROW: <Perkins> All this time and the woman of my dreams looks like a huge bloated fetus. I think I'm impotent for life.
>>They were dead all right,
TOM: Deader than a doornail.
CROW: Hey, look! It's the Rockoid of Crappy Writing Past, the Rockoid of Crappy Writing Present, and the Rockoid of Crappy Writing Future!
MIKE: <Perkins> What's this? A rejection letter? And that name, that's my name... No, Spirit! Say this won't be, say that I may change what is to come! I'll keep the basic rules of grammar and English in my heart, I swear it! Please don't let Tiny Manny die.
TOM: <pause> Well, that was surreal.
>>but so well preserved it was as if they'd come alive at any moment.
>>Part of him urged him to go on, and part of him said, Get the hell out of
>>here before someone finds you here and arrests you!
TOM: Another part of him was busy leafing through the magazines in the rack while another part browsed the pictures. A third part was trying to strike up a conversation with one of the alien corpses while the last part was playing a rousing game of "Which Red Button is the Self-Destruct?"
MIKE: But in the end, nine out of ten Perkins parts surveyed recommended sugar-free Dentyne gun.
>>Unfortunately, Perkins spent too much time examining the Rockoid
>>bodies, and not on what was emanating from the ventilation chamber in
>>that large laboratory.
CROW: Tons of fat-free vanilla pudding. To this day, we don't know why.
>>Soon he was aware of the return of that awful, gaseous smell,
TOM: Ah yes, the unadulterated stench that is oxygen.
CROW: Carbon Dioxide. Nothing reeks worse.
>>only this time it was more intense than ever.
TOM: What's this? No exclamation point to demonstrate just how intense! it! was!!?
>>He was caught off guard and became so dizzy that he stumbled back and
>>bumped his shoulder on a switch that was attached to one of those
>>strange machines.
MIKE: I will like to take this opportunity to retract my earlier statement about Perkins and Gilligan. I have too much respect for the Little Buddy to leave his good name tarnished in such a fashion.
CROW: Thrill to the adventures of Faints at a Whiff of Ozone Man!
>>He heard a click, and then suddenly,
TOM: And without warning.
CROW: Are you going to do that every single time you see that word?
TOM: Yes.
CROW: Don't make me hurt you...
>>the machines began flashing several
>>different colors at once in a pattern. Suddenly
TOM: And without warning.
CROW: Erg.
>>he began seeing a yellowish gas floating all around him.
CROW: Alright. Quick review. Wonder nerd smells a nasty funk.
MIKE: Right.
CROW: Then stumbles backwards, as is expected given he has the manual dexterity of a lump of concrete.
MIKE: Right.
CROW: Just happens to stumble back against the one control panel and the one button that would turn everything on without triggering the "Activate Death Lasers" button right next to it.
MIKE: Right.
CROW: Well, at least the Miraculous Door of Intermittent Jamming is no longer the most contrived sequence in this story.
>>Before he could decide what he must do next,
TOM: Panic.
>>he began to get really dizzy, and almost fainted again.
MIKE: I'm sorry, but there is just no way that I can possibly see this guy in any sort of combat situation that doesn't involve him trying to hide under a table. I just can't.
>>Finally, after much struggling, he managed to fight the waves of
>>unconsciousness that seemed about to overwhelm him and hurried back
>>toward the entrance of the room.
CROW: Screw uncovering the greatest mystery that mankind has ever faced. There's no way I'm staying in a room that smells like rotten eggs. Eeewie!
>>However, as soon as he began running, he heard a deep rumbling sound.
CROW: <ahem> Nasty smell. Rumbling noises. Make up your own joke if your mind is twisted enough.
>>"Oh no! The elevator door must be closing!" he exclaimed to himself.
TOM: Once again, our hero demonstrates his amazing ability to come to the most obvious conclusion after having the facts rammed down his throat with a giant 2x4.
MIKE: You would think he'd be able to actually see the elevator by this point and be able to tell for certain.
CROW: <Author> I refuse to acknowledge whether it is in fact the elevator door closing, massive flatulence, or the giant bolder from Indiana Jones. In fact, I refuse to acknowledge any concrete fact up to and including the existence of this story. So there.
>>He ran faster and faster until finally he stood before the closing door.
TOM: Why he stopped before the doors to stand is beyond us, we have to admit.
CROW: Maybe the magical Rockoid pixies distracted him and he ran into the wall.
>>Just as he was about to attempt to squeeze himself between the
>>narrowing crack of the door, it closed with a resounding clang.
>>He was trapped inside the room!
MIKE: Three days latter, exhausted and massively dehydrated, Perkins tried pressing the 'up' key by the elevator. Boy, did he feel like a massive idiot when the door opened.
CROW: Moreso, when he read Gonzales's map and discovered that the side door lead out into the secret Area 51 foodcourt.
>>Now the terror of being stranded in the room made him breathe deeply
>>and rapidly,
CROW: <ragged heavy breathing>
TOM: Hello? Who's there? I'll hang up, I swear I'll hang up!
>>and he began to cough out loud as he inhaled the strange gas.
CROW: As opposed to hacking out a lung in perfect silence.
TOM: Well, I must say that, thanks to the liberal use of exclamation points and the heavily-detailed and smooth-flowing descriptions, I have a clear sense of the deep urgency and tension that surrounds this pivotal scene, as well as a deep caring and concern for our hero and his fate.
MIKE: Really?
TOM: Most certainly. If he dies from this, we'll be free to run screaming from the theater.
>>Soon it was thick around him, and he could hardly see.
>>He struggled to hold his breath,
MIKE: His breath was too strong for him however and finally managed to escape his clutches to scamper off into the depths of the laboratory, yapping excitedly at it's new-found freedom.
CROW: Two days latter, it's body was discovered drained of blood and with all it's bodily organs turned inside out.
TOM: <alien> Oh, that's Ed's fault. He's new.
MIKE: <Ed> My bad.
>>but the intense odor had already
>>weakened him, so he found himself breathing in fitful gasps.
MIKE: For some, it's Kryptonite. For others, the color yellow. For Perkins, a trip to a natural hot-spring is enough to do him in.
TOM: With a hero like him, no wonder the Rockoids are attacking.
CROW: <snortle> Rockoids...
MIKE: <alien> We're Rockoid humanoids living on planetoids. Is there any way they can make it any dopier?
>>Within
>>a minute or two, he had become so dizzy that he felt as if he was
>>about to die,
MIKE: <TV magazine reporter> Across the country, thousands die each year at amusement parks as they're over-come with the horrid affliction of pure vertigo. Children perish in untold numbers as they attempt to spin around as fast as they're able.
CROW: <same> Talk to your children about the dangers of feeling like the room is spinning slightly, or this tragedy may happen to you.
TOM: <same> Coming up next, we'll talk about the deadly infestations of dust-mites that even now swarm in your house by the millions. But first, these messages.
>>so once again he tried to fight it.
CROW: Beginning to sound like the author's getting as tired of all of this as we are.
>>He wondered if he wasn't breathing the same sort of air that those
>>Rockoids might breathe, and he struggled to see through the gas.
TOM: No, you're not. This is, in fact, all an elaborate scheme by the Southern Baptist Coalition to execute you in retribution for the deaths of four kids at the hands of a boy who happened to have once past by the box of your game in a computer store and remarked on how cool the illustration was.
CROW: He had it coming.
MIKE: Because, as we all know, there's no better training on how to fire a weapon then pressing mouse buttons all day long.
>>Maybe there was a gas mask somewhere.
CROW: Oh, of course there's a gas mask somewhere. I'd be more concerned about finding one in this room though, bub.
>>As he grew weaker, he stumbled around the room, bumping into tables,
>>stumbling over chairs, knocking over chemical bottles, and making a
>>big mess all over the room.
ALL: <dully> Ha ha ha ha
TOM: <monotone> Pratfalls are funny. Look, he tips things over. Ha ha ha.
CROW: <Jar-Jar> Missa thinks that yousa need to die now.
>>He could hear things dropping,
MIKE: <Author> Things. You know; things. Just use your imagination, mine is still worn out with the cool alien description up above.
>>liquids and glass, and wondered if he wouldn't just collapse after severe
>>loss of blood from the cuts and bruises he was sure to sustain any
>>time now from all that broken glass.
TOM: Funny, we were just wondering the same thing.
CROW: I'm sorry, but if I'm trapped in the pits of Area 51 with a bunch of alien corpses, unknown machinery, locked in, and with a mysterious gas searing my lungs, broken glass is not going to be high on my list of concerns.
>>In moments, he had the vague sense that he'd turned the room into a
>>disaster area.
TOM: A vague sense? You'd think that the spontaneous explosions and bubbling pools of mysterious chemicals would've been a subtle hint.
CROW: If he destroys the alien menace by accidentally pressing the wrong button and firing a weapon into the ship's generators that leads to a chain reaction and the destruction of an entire army, I am going to be very upset.
MIKE: Oh, come on now, who could possibly believe a cop-out like that?
TOM: <Anikan> Yippee!
>>He nearly overturned the transparent tanks holding the Rockoids as
>>he staggered about.
CROW: There's a way to initiate first contact. Tip over the ambassador's chambers and spill him out onto the shattered-glass strewn floor.
MIKE: Dear all powerful Lord above us, what have we, or our poorly named brothers of the stars, done to deserve a hero like this? Is it the whole Halloween thing? Because we can change that if you want us to.
>>He just couldn't take it anymore and tried to
>>scream out for help (as if anyone could hear him).
TOM: Well, we would, but personally I'm rooting for the gas.
CROW: Gas gas, he's our man, if he can't do it gravel can!
MIKE: Plus one has to wonder whether calling in the secret government agents would really be much of an improvement over this.
CROW: Choking to death and slashing your wrists with shattered jars, or being subjected to mind control experiments and doomed to spend the rest of your days posting to alt.conspiracies about how your microwave is looking at you funny. Tough choice.
>>However, his
>>efforts were useless.
TOM: Big surprise here.
MIKE: No matter what he did, the aliens were still dialing 0 to call collect despite the fact that they could save 50% by using 1-800-Collect.
CROW: <rapid announcer voice> offer-void-in-all-states-that-have-a-capital-only-applies-to-single-white-men-between-the-ages-of-35-and-36-on-every-alternit-Tuesday-unless-the-sun-is-in-the-house-of-Cancer-in-which-case-you're-screwed.
>>The words never left his mouth.
TOM: They instead set up a camp just inside, using the shelter of his molars to protect themselves from the elements as they prepared themselves for the coming storm.
>>They just stuck in his throat, and although he tried to swallow, that effort
>>just ended up making it sore.
CROW: Never realized that words were such a tough culinary challenge for humans.
MIKE: Oh yeah. Once my aunt tried to hold back a comment and wound up choking on it. Took two hours before the doctors were able to remove the "I told you so" from where it had lodged in her throat.
>>Just then, to his surprise, the gaseous cloud cleared away.
TOM: And the never-ending stream of shear impossibilities continues without fail.
CROW: Any moment now he's going to be attacked by guards, only to have all their guns suddenly jam, a wall falling over to crush them, and the Second Coming scrambling all of the electrical systems long enough for him to attempt an escape.
MIKE: Too bad he's going to crash into the case of Fragile Glass Globes and knock himself back into la-la land.