(no subject)
"There should be a big hole in the ground straight north of here," Duster said as he, Kumatora, Boney, and Lucas headed to the Murasaki Forest, on their way to Unknown Valley. "I think I went through it and hid the egg somewhere on the other side. So let's head for that area first."
"Woof, woof," Boney complained from the back, still wearing Lucas's spare shirt and hat. "(I can go back to being a dog now, right?)"
"Of course you can, Boney," Lucas answered.
Shortly after Boney was naked once again, Duster stopped suddenly and approached a spot in the ground.
"Yeah, here we go," he said, pointing it out. "The hole looked just like this. ...But..."
He lifted his head up and Lucas noticed the problem: there were five identical holes in the nearby area.
"Were there this many last time...?" Duster asked himself.
Lucas turned to Duster with a shrug of his shoulders.
"Oh, well," the thief replied, shrugging back. "One of them's gotta be the right one. Let's just jump down them at random."
They picked a hole and jumped down into a cave.
**************************************
"So many chimeras..." Lucas mused as they fought off a reconstructed lion.
Boney whines.
"(I wouldn't want that to happen to me.)"
"I wonder if they even know what they're doing," Duster said thoughtfully. "Sure, plenty of animals are dangerous but I bet being a chimera's makin' them ornery."
"I'd probably be ornery if I was a chimera," the young boy answered.
"Me, too," Kumatora agreed.
Nobody made mention of Kumatora already being ornery.
**************************************
Once they made their way out of the cave, Lucas spied an old broken down clayman, the same sort he would look for at his part-time job at the factory.
"Hey Duster," he said, pointing it out. "Do you recognize that?"
They all stepped closer with Duster leading the way.
"Yeah..." Duster confirmed. "This is it. I hid the egg inside that mud figure."
The thief limped forward and dug into the clayman.
"Yes!" he cried out, turning around. "It's still here!"
The faces of the other three lit up to match Duster's expression.
Then Duster was literally lit up and tossed away from the clayman as it was electrocuted.
"Duster! Are you okay?!" Kumatora asked.
Duster picked himself up before Lucas or Kumatora could help him.
"Yeah... I-I'm fine... Was that lightning just now?! Whew, that was close...!"
He limped to the clayman again but Lucas stayed back. The boy remembered from the factory what happens when the claymen get electrocuted.
The reanimated clayman stood up and Duster stepped back, surprised. It then ran in a few circles before taking off backwards.
"It took off with the egg!" Duster cried out.
"We gotta go after it!" Kumatora added.
As they followed, the group found a sign at the foot of a tall tower, taller than any building Lucas had ever seen in his life. He didn't even know he could tilt his head that far back.
"Tower of Love and Peace," the sign read. "Stay away!"
"There's a good view of this tower from Club Titiboo," Kumatora commented. "I wonder what it's here for..."
Just then, they caught a glimpse of the running clayman.
"Anyways, never mind this crap! We hafta catch that thing, quick!" Kumatora shouted, leading the way.
They followed it down to what ended up being a clayman factory. As they entered, there were some Pigmasks having a conversation.
"Hey, do you take your mask off when you go to the bathroom?"
"No, I leave it on. Why? Do you take yours off? You go through all that trouble? In the bathroom? And then you go through all the trouble of putting it back on when you're done?"
"Yeah, I go through the trouble. I mean, there IS a place in there to hang your mask and all."
One Pigmask jumps in fury.
"Man, you're dumb! That's not for you to hang your mask! That's where you hang bags and umbrellas and stuff like that!"
"Oh..." piped up a third Pigmask. "I always thought it was for masks. So THAT'S why it's always been so hard to hang my mask there..."
"Why do I get the feeling this conversation has happened before?" Lucas muttered as they approached.
"Hey, you!" shouted the first mask-hanging Pigmask. "What's your guys' problem? What're you lookin' at?!"
The not-mask-hanging Pigmask reacted more than a little differently.
"Ahhh! He's...!"
He then ran off and a higher ranked Pigmask, this one in blue, showed up.
"What's all the ruckus?!" he shouted. "What in blazes are you..."
He glared at the two mask-hanging Pigmasks, who went to stand at attention while the blue Pigmask approached Lucas. The boy cringed, expecting the worst, and was surprised to find the Pigmask saluting him.
"Sir! I wasn't aware you were here, sir!"
"What?" Lucas asked quietly.
"Please forgive my rudeness!" the blue Pigmask continued.
"Oh no, go ahead," the boy said, weirded out.
"Wearing such a shabby outfit will set a bad example to the men, Commander."
Lucas pulled at his striped shirt and looked it over. It didn't seem shabby to him.
"Here, I'll prepare a change of clothes for you. Please put them on right away, sir. Likewise to the folks accompanying you, too."
Once the Pigmasks left, Lucas asked, "Are my clothes really shabby?"
Duster and Kumatora both shrugged.
**************************************
"All right. That's better," the blue Pigmask said. "Well, I had better return to my duties!"
Once he left, Duster said, "Looks like there's been some sort of misunderstanding, but it's perfect for us. Now let's go find that thing before they figure out who we are."
They asked around until they found a Pigmask who had seen their broken clayman run through. They were too late to stop it from being put on the truck headed for the dump.
"Oh crap! We can't let it get away!" Kumatora said, muffled by the mask on her head.
They ran down the road after the truck until they nearly collided with a sort of hovering rocket.
Lucas had to swallow the question in his mouth, as the "Commander" is supposed to know what these things are, but he couldn't help how wide his eyes were as the Pigmask got out of the machine.
"Oh, I'm sorry," he said, saluting Lucas. "I didn't know it was you, Commander."
"It's all right," Lucas insisted.
The Pigmask glanced from the group to his transport.
"From the looks of it... It appears that you mistakenly threw something into the garbage. If you're headed for the garbage dump, please follow the truck in this."
"Oh, sure!" Lucas said as the others hopped in at the invitation. "Thank you very much."
The Pigmask nodded and, odd as it was, Lucas was sure the Pigmask was happy for the approval.
"The garbage dump is northeast of here," the Pigmask said, pointing the way. "Please hurry after it and retrieve whatever embarrassing thing it was that you accidentally threw away. Please be careful not to slip and get in an accident!"
"I'll be careful," Lucas said, getting into the ship.
"All right! Be careful!" the Pigmask said once again, waving goodbye to them.
"Wow, they really like their Commander," Lucas said as they cruised down the road.
The cruising didn't last very long, though, and they soon crashed, tossed right out of the transport.
"Okay," Lucas said, pulling himself up. "Let's never do that again."
"Oh, Commander!" he heard a familiar voice call out. "Are you all right?"
He turned his head to see the higher rank Pigmask from the DCMC concert.
"Yeah, I'm all right," the young boy answered.
"That damn Fassad's been tossing banana peels all over the place, so it's easy to slip on 'em," the higher rank Pigmask explained. "Here, you can take my pork bean, if you'd like."
"Oh!" Lucas said in surprise while his disguised friends had a conversation along the lines of, "This time, I'll drive."
The higher rank Pigmask was about to leave when he started sniffing.
"I'm not sure why, but you smell like a dog and a kid..."
"We do?" Lucas asked, trying to come up with a good story.
Fortunately, once recognition kicked in, the higher rank Pigmask was quick to figure it out.
"You're that kid from Club Titiboo! Maybe you think you can fool everyone else, but there's no fooling my wild nose! You sneaky piece of scum, pretending to be our commander!"
"Oh crap," Lucas said, arming himself with his stick.
**************************************
"N-not bad," the higher ranked Pigmask said after his defeat. "But don't think this is over just yet!"
The Pigmask then tried to run off but slipped on a banana peel on the way.
"I didn't know you had DCMC underwear, Duster," Lucas said.
"Oh sure; we gotta wear our merchandise to help promote it," Duster said.
"How'd you know showing it to that DCMC fan Pigmask would work?"
"...never mind that."
**************************************
"What's goin' on?" Kumatora asked when the pork bean began slowing down. "What're you doing, Duster? We need to hurry!"
"Damn," Duster replied. "It's no use! It won't go! Looks like it's out of power. I guess all we can do now is walk."
After a bit of running on the Pigmasks' highways, they found the dump just as the truck dropped the broken clayman.
"Finally! It's about time!" Kumatora said, tired and clearly agitated.
"I just hope the egg's all right," Duster added.
They climbed down into the dump and looked around.
"What is THAT?!" Duster suddenly exclaimed.
A different broken clayman approached, covered in mechanical debris, and trapped them in the pit.
"At least this guy shouldn't be as tough as that Pigmask," Lucas commented.
**************************************
One broken down clayman later and Duster had the egg.
"Here it is!"
The egg softly glowed in Duster's hands.
"Now I see," the thief said with mounting recognition and excitement. "I really am Duster. I'm Duster. Guys! I'm Duster! I remember now! I really am Duster! Yahoooo! I finally have my memory back!"
Lucas and Boney cheered while Kumatora gave him a pat on his shoulder.
"Awesome! We did it!" she exclaimed. "Yep! You're Duster! Duster! Duster! I'll keep calling you that, as many times as you want! Now don't you dare lose that egg again!"
"Woof woof woof!" Boney said. "(You've always been Duster! You just forgot!)"
Their celebration was soon cut off by an approaching pork bean.
"Commander!" the emerging Pigmask called. "What are you doing, goofing around in a place like this?!"
"Oh, sorry," Lucas called. "I lost something in the garbage and had to get it back. Would you mind giving us a ride?"
"OF course, sir!" the Pigmask answered.
Once they all boarded the pork bean, the Pigmask said, "We're heading straight to Thunder Tower. If anyone needs to use the restroom on the way there, please hold it in! Now to hit the pedal to the metal!"
Lucas mused on the name Thunder Tower. If it's the same place as before, it would explain a lot about that sinister looking Tower of Love and Peace.
"Pretty sweet piloting, if I do say so myself!" the Pigmask bragged once they arrived.
"Yes, good work," Lucas told him, his little piggy heart swelling with pride.
"Well, here we are!" the Pigmask continued. "Thunder Tower! Please hurry to the generator room post-haste!"
"Woof, woof," Boney complained from the back, still wearing Lucas's spare shirt and hat. "(I can go back to being a dog now, right?)"
"Of course you can, Boney," Lucas answered.
Shortly after Boney was naked once again, Duster stopped suddenly and approached a spot in the ground.
"Yeah, here we go," he said, pointing it out. "The hole looked just like this. ...But..."
He lifted his head up and Lucas noticed the problem: there were five identical holes in the nearby area.
"Were there this many last time...?" Duster asked himself.
Lucas turned to Duster with a shrug of his shoulders.
"Oh, well," the thief replied, shrugging back. "One of them's gotta be the right one. Let's just jump down them at random."
They picked a hole and jumped down into a cave.
**************************************
"So many chimeras..." Lucas mused as they fought off a reconstructed lion.
Boney whines.
"(I wouldn't want that to happen to me.)"
"I wonder if they even know what they're doing," Duster said thoughtfully. "Sure, plenty of animals are dangerous but I bet being a chimera's makin' them ornery."
"I'd probably be ornery if I was a chimera," the young boy answered.
"Me, too," Kumatora agreed.
Nobody made mention of Kumatora already being ornery.
**************************************
Once they made their way out of the cave, Lucas spied an old broken down clayman, the same sort he would look for at his part-time job at the factory.
"Hey Duster," he said, pointing it out. "Do you recognize that?"
They all stepped closer with Duster leading the way.
"Yeah..." Duster confirmed. "This is it. I hid the egg inside that mud figure."
The thief limped forward and dug into the clayman.
"Yes!" he cried out, turning around. "It's still here!"
The faces of the other three lit up to match Duster's expression.
Then Duster was literally lit up and tossed away from the clayman as it was electrocuted.
"Duster! Are you okay?!" Kumatora asked.
Duster picked himself up before Lucas or Kumatora could help him.
"Yeah... I-I'm fine... Was that lightning just now?! Whew, that was close...!"
He limped to the clayman again but Lucas stayed back. The boy remembered from the factory what happens when the claymen get electrocuted.
The reanimated clayman stood up and Duster stepped back, surprised. It then ran in a few circles before taking off backwards.
"It took off with the egg!" Duster cried out.
"We gotta go after it!" Kumatora added.
As they followed, the group found a sign at the foot of a tall tower, taller than any building Lucas had ever seen in his life. He didn't even know he could tilt his head that far back.
"Tower of Love and Peace," the sign read. "Stay away!"
"There's a good view of this tower from Club Titiboo," Kumatora commented. "I wonder what it's here for..."
Just then, they caught a glimpse of the running clayman.
"Anyways, never mind this crap! We hafta catch that thing, quick!" Kumatora shouted, leading the way.
They followed it down to what ended up being a clayman factory. As they entered, there were some Pigmasks having a conversation.
"Hey, do you take your mask off when you go to the bathroom?"
"No, I leave it on. Why? Do you take yours off? You go through all that trouble? In the bathroom? And then you go through all the trouble of putting it back on when you're done?"
"Yeah, I go through the trouble. I mean, there IS a place in there to hang your mask and all."
One Pigmask jumps in fury.
"Man, you're dumb! That's not for you to hang your mask! That's where you hang bags and umbrellas and stuff like that!"
"Oh..." piped up a third Pigmask. "I always thought it was for masks. So THAT'S why it's always been so hard to hang my mask there..."
"Why do I get the feeling this conversation has happened before?" Lucas muttered as they approached.
"Hey, you!" shouted the first mask-hanging Pigmask. "What's your guys' problem? What're you lookin' at?!"
The not-mask-hanging Pigmask reacted more than a little differently.
"Ahhh! He's...!"
He then ran off and a higher ranked Pigmask, this one in blue, showed up.
"What's all the ruckus?!" he shouted. "What in blazes are you..."
He glared at the two mask-hanging Pigmasks, who went to stand at attention while the blue Pigmask approached Lucas. The boy cringed, expecting the worst, and was surprised to find the Pigmask saluting him.
"Sir! I wasn't aware you were here, sir!"
"What?" Lucas asked quietly.
"Please forgive my rudeness!" the blue Pigmask continued.
"Oh no, go ahead," the boy said, weirded out.
"Wearing such a shabby outfit will set a bad example to the men, Commander."
Lucas pulled at his striped shirt and looked it over. It didn't seem shabby to him.
"Here, I'll prepare a change of clothes for you. Please put them on right away, sir. Likewise to the folks accompanying you, too."
Once the Pigmasks left, Lucas asked, "Are my clothes really shabby?"
Duster and Kumatora both shrugged.
**************************************
"All right. That's better," the blue Pigmask said. "Well, I had better return to my duties!"
Once he left, Duster said, "Looks like there's been some sort of misunderstanding, but it's perfect for us. Now let's go find that thing before they figure out who we are."
They asked around until they found a Pigmask who had seen their broken clayman run through. They were too late to stop it from being put on the truck headed for the dump.
"Oh crap! We can't let it get away!" Kumatora said, muffled by the mask on her head.
They ran down the road after the truck until they nearly collided with a sort of hovering rocket.
Lucas had to swallow the question in his mouth, as the "Commander" is supposed to know what these things are, but he couldn't help how wide his eyes were as the Pigmask got out of the machine.
"Oh, I'm sorry," he said, saluting Lucas. "I didn't know it was you, Commander."
"It's all right," Lucas insisted.
The Pigmask glanced from the group to his transport.
"From the looks of it... It appears that you mistakenly threw something into the garbage. If you're headed for the garbage dump, please follow the truck in this."
"Oh, sure!" Lucas said as the others hopped in at the invitation. "Thank you very much."
The Pigmask nodded and, odd as it was, Lucas was sure the Pigmask was happy for the approval.
"The garbage dump is northeast of here," the Pigmask said, pointing the way. "Please hurry after it and retrieve whatever embarrassing thing it was that you accidentally threw away. Please be careful not to slip and get in an accident!"
"I'll be careful," Lucas said, getting into the ship.
"All right! Be careful!" the Pigmask said once again, waving goodbye to them.
"Wow, they really like their Commander," Lucas said as they cruised down the road.
The cruising didn't last very long, though, and they soon crashed, tossed right out of the transport.
"Okay," Lucas said, pulling himself up. "Let's never do that again."
"Oh, Commander!" he heard a familiar voice call out. "Are you all right?"
He turned his head to see the higher rank Pigmask from the DCMC concert.
"Yeah, I'm all right," the young boy answered.
"That damn Fassad's been tossing banana peels all over the place, so it's easy to slip on 'em," the higher rank Pigmask explained. "Here, you can take my pork bean, if you'd like."
"Oh!" Lucas said in surprise while his disguised friends had a conversation along the lines of, "This time, I'll drive."
The higher rank Pigmask was about to leave when he started sniffing.
"I'm not sure why, but you smell like a dog and a kid..."
"We do?" Lucas asked, trying to come up with a good story.
Fortunately, once recognition kicked in, the higher rank Pigmask was quick to figure it out.
"You're that kid from Club Titiboo! Maybe you think you can fool everyone else, but there's no fooling my wild nose! You sneaky piece of scum, pretending to be our commander!"
"Oh crap," Lucas said, arming himself with his stick.
**************************************
"N-not bad," the higher ranked Pigmask said after his defeat. "But don't think this is over just yet!"
The Pigmask then tried to run off but slipped on a banana peel on the way.
"I didn't know you had DCMC underwear, Duster," Lucas said.
"Oh sure; we gotta wear our merchandise to help promote it," Duster said.
"How'd you know showing it to that DCMC fan Pigmask would work?"
"...never mind that."
**************************************
"What's goin' on?" Kumatora asked when the pork bean began slowing down. "What're you doing, Duster? We need to hurry!"
"Damn," Duster replied. "It's no use! It won't go! Looks like it's out of power. I guess all we can do now is walk."
After a bit of running on the Pigmasks' highways, they found the dump just as the truck dropped the broken clayman.
"Finally! It's about time!" Kumatora said, tired and clearly agitated.
"I just hope the egg's all right," Duster added.
They climbed down into the dump and looked around.
"What is THAT?!" Duster suddenly exclaimed.
A different broken clayman approached, covered in mechanical debris, and trapped them in the pit.
"At least this guy shouldn't be as tough as that Pigmask," Lucas commented.
**************************************
One broken down clayman later and Duster had the egg.
"Here it is!"
The egg softly glowed in Duster's hands.
"Now I see," the thief said with mounting recognition and excitement. "I really am Duster. I'm Duster. Guys! I'm Duster! I remember now! I really am Duster! Yahoooo! I finally have my memory back!"
Lucas and Boney cheered while Kumatora gave him a pat on his shoulder.
"Awesome! We did it!" she exclaimed. "Yep! You're Duster! Duster! Duster! I'll keep calling you that, as many times as you want! Now don't you dare lose that egg again!"
"Woof woof woof!" Boney said. "(You've always been Duster! You just forgot!)"
Their celebration was soon cut off by an approaching pork bean.
"Commander!" the emerging Pigmask called. "What are you doing, goofing around in a place like this?!"
"Oh, sorry," Lucas called. "I lost something in the garbage and had to get it back. Would you mind giving us a ride?"
"OF course, sir!" the Pigmask answered.
Once they all boarded the pork bean, the Pigmask said, "We're heading straight to Thunder Tower. If anyone needs to use the restroom on the way there, please hold it in! Now to hit the pedal to the metal!"
Lucas mused on the name Thunder Tower. If it's the same place as before, it would explain a lot about that sinister looking Tower of Love and Peace.
"Pretty sweet piloting, if I do say so myself!" the Pigmask bragged once they arrived.
"Yes, good work," Lucas told him, his little piggy heart swelling with pride.
"Well, here we are!" the Pigmask continued. "Thunder Tower! Please hurry to the generator room post-haste!"