They arrived back at the Galloping Centipede Inn without incident. Dr. Octavius excused himself as he had some matters to attend to in preparation for his speech. He assured them he'd talk to them afterwards and rode off down the street and disappeared from view.
Sarah and Max locked up their unicycles at a nearby rack and entered the lobby.
"I've got some extra floss up in the room," Sarah explained. "I'll pay you whatever I owe you and then you can go get drunk or whatever it is that you do in your free time."
"You're making a big mistake," Max said as he followed her into the elevator tube. She made her way down to her room and unlocked the door. She stopped dead in her tracks as she entered the room and her jaw fell open.
Vance was frolicking in the bed with four giggling naked women. He was wearing his shirt but was bare assed naked from the waist down. He paused in mid-thrust as he turned and stared at her in surprise. "Sarah, baby, what are you doing here?"
Max followed in behind and bumped into her. A big smile spread across his face as he peered over Sarah's shoulder. "Whoah, Nellie! Now this is good!"
"What the fuck is going on here?" Sarah fumed. Her face turned deep red and she clenched her fists tightly, digging her fingernails into her palms in the process.
"This isn't what it looks like," Vance said lamely as he pulled the blanket over himself.
"Vance, you fucking asshole!" she shrieked. "We've been together for almost seven years! How could you do this to me?"
"You ladies better split," Vance said sheepishly to his bedmates. They hastily pulled on their clothes and slipped carefully past Sarah and Max on their way out the door. It was all Sarah could do to keep herself from smacking each of the filthy whores as they went by. Max, in the meantime, smirked as he enjoyed the view.
"Well?" Sarah blinked back tears. "What the fuck do you have to say for yourself?"
"Uh, I'm sorry?" Vance asked.
"I can't believe this," Sarah's lower lip quivered. "I'm getting out of here. You'd better not be here when I come back or I swear to God I'll cut your fucking nuts off!" She turned and stormed furiously out of the room.
"But baby doll!" Vance whined. "They didn't mean anything to me! It was just sex!"
"You're in big trouble, mister!" Max wagged his finger at Vance, twirled around gleefully, and marched out of the room, slamming the door behind him.
* * *
Bruce the monster whistled a merry little tune to himself as he walked up the front path of the small house and rang the doorbell. He turned around and admired the front lawn as he waited for somebody to answer the door.
Since being sent away from Dr. Wentworth's laboratory he had been going door to door through the neighborhood offering up his redecorating services. So far he hadn't had any takers, but he remained optimistic nonetheless.
After a few minutes the doorknob turned and a middle-aged woman greeted him.
"Good evening, madam," Bruce said cheerfully. "My, that's a lovely blouse you're wearing. It matches your hair. Very chic, if I do say so myself."
The woman took one look at the giant beast on her front porch with its mismatched bits of skin and fur and glowing yellow eyes and let out a shrill scream before passing out in a dead faint.
"Oh, poop," Bruce said as he caught her in his arms. "That's the third one in a row. Oh well, I suppose I'd better lay her down on her sofa." He made sure she was comfortable and then let himself out. "What a pity, I could have worked miracles with that place."
He walked down the street until he came to a dirty one story building with a ramshackle sign that read "Dr. Octavius' Laboratory: Experiment in Process. Proceed With Caution."
"Ooh, this place looks like it could use a little tender loving care," Bruce said to himself excitedly. He walked up to the door and knocked. It swung open revealing a messy room with overturned tables and papers scattered everywhere.
"Hello?" Bruce called out. "Anybody home?" There was no response. He licked his lips a few times and decided to head on in.
* * *
Max didn't see Sarah out in the hallway so he decided to head back down to the lobby. It was almost completely empty, but he noticed a sizable crowd gathering outside so he decided to go investigate.
He cocked his head in the direction the crowd was facing. It appeared a large stage had been erected against one of the walls of the hotel and numerous animals were busy setting up equipment, but he didn't have a very good view.
Max walked up to a horse that was taller than most of the creatures around him and could probably see the stage fairly well. "Hey buddy, what's going on here?"
The horse measured him with its eyes. "The renowned Dr. Octavius is due to give his speech on toenails in about thirty minutes."
"Oh yeah?" Max rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "What do you suppose he's going to say?"
"I don't know," the horse shrugged. "I don't really follow current events. My wife dragged me down here."
"Women," Max shook his head. "Well, thanks for your help, buddy. I think I'm going to try to maneuver my way closer." With that he took a deep breath and jostled his way into the crowd.
He pushed on through, shoving and elbowing none too politely when necessary. His forearm connected with the back of somebody's head and they seemed to take exception.
"Hey watch where you're going, jerk!" an ugly blue creature with a long schnoz and two eye patches shouted.
"Hazim?" Max asked. "What are you doing here?"
"Maximillian? Is that you?"
"It sure is, you old dog, you. So, really, what brings you here?"
"Well, I have to admit after you came by the other day asking about Dr. Octavius, my interest became peaked. I thought I'd come down here and check out his speech."
"Yeah, me too," Max said. "So what's the latest news?"
"Did you catch the Gravity Ball championship last night?" Hazim asked.
Max smacked his head. "Damn! I completely forgot about it! Did we win?"
"We sure did! And that's not the half of it! Some guy named Zeke scored the winning points off his face as the buzzer sounded. Then he took off with the trophy. Nobody knows who the hell this guy is, where he came from, or where he went. It's all very mysterious."
"I know a guy named Zeke," Max said thoughtfully. "But he's dead. I wouldn't think there'd be two of them running around, but then I knew another guy named Hazim back in college."
"Anyway, I've got my feelers out. I'm trying to get to the bottom of that scoop. Oh yeah, word on the street has it Trevor Mastodon may be planning a bold move of some sort during Octavius' speech. I haven't heard anything definite, but there's a strong buzz going around."
"Well, if he tries anything while I'm on the case, I'll... um, complain loudly or something. Hmm. I thought I'd have a better plan of action than that, but I guess not."
A squirrel in a yellow Hawaiian shirt took to the stage and began talking in a slow monotonous voice, which echoed over the loud speakers.
"Who the hell is this guy?" Max asked.
"I think he's another scientist type. I guess there's going to be a couple speakers before Octavius, but he's the main draw."
"Boring," Max yawned loudly. Somebody nearby shushed him. "Yeah?" he responded. "Why don't you shut up? I can hardly hear myself think with your infernal shushing going on!" He turned to Hazim and shook his head. "Some people are jerks, you know?" He exhaled loudly and began twiddling his thumbs as he waited for Dr. Octavius to take the stage.
* * *
Vance pulled his pants on quickly and ran out the door in an attempt to catch up with Sarah. He got down to the lobby and found it surprisingly empty. Noticing the crowd of people outside he went to investigate. As he stepped outside he felt a tingling in his spine and a sharp jolt in his head. He instantly forgot about Sarah as a much stronger urge suddenly grasped him. He turned around, went back up to his room, and gathered up all of the items he had purchased over the last couple days.
Once he was sure he had everything he went back downstairs and walked purposefully towards the stage. Some squirrel was giving a droning speech, but he didn't care as he had much more important matters to attend to. He climbed on the stage to the surprise of the speaker who paused in mid-sentence.
"Who are you?" the squirrel sputtered.
Vance didn't answer but instead pushed the squirrel off the stage and grabbed the circular device that served as some sort of microphone. "Without any further ado, let the restoration rituals begin!" he screamed into it. The creatures in the audience looked around at each other with puzzled expressions on their faces.
Vance dropped to his hands and knees and pulled out his can of glow paint. He painted a large circle around himself and then tossed the can aside. Next he fashioned a necklace out of the yarn and feathers and placed it around his neck. He pulled out the can of black eyes peas, set it on the ground in front of him and began beating at it with the tennis racket until it exploded, sending its contents splattering out into the audience. He jumped up and down three times and pulled the sexy black underwear over his head. He tucked his hands into his armpits and flapped his elbows like wings, bobbing his head back and forth and performing a chicken dance. Then he put one hand on his hip and twirled the string of garlic cloves over his head while he gyrated around spastically. After that he tore the underwear off his head, stuffed it into his pipe along with the feather necklace. He lit the pipe and took a big puff, then grabbed the snorkel and exhaled through it. Next he grabbed his tuba and played a polka. Once that was finished he tossed the tuba aside, grabbed his buttocks with both hands and began chanting into the microphone "Wubba wubba wubba whoop whoop!"
There was a loud noise accompanied by a flash of smoke and suddenly Vance's shirt vanished. In its place was a skinny naked man wrapped around Vance's bare chest.
The audience howled as Prince Grover, finally returned to his normal form, let go and dropped to the stage. "To the spaceship!" he shouted and ran off the stage.
Vance continued to stand there shirtless with a dumb look on his face as the audience ridiculed him mercilessly. "What the fuck just happened?" He felt oddly as if a great weight had been removed from his brain.
Looking around, he suddenly spotted Sarah a few rows back in the audience with a look of disbelief on her face. "Sarah!" Vance shouted. He leaped off stage, dragging the microphone with him as he ran up to her.
"What in God's name was that all about?" Sarah momentarily forgot her anger.
"Uh, I was proving my love to you, baby?" his voice reverberated through the loud speakers, although he didn't notice.
"That's a weird way of going about it," Sarah shook her head.
"Yeah, well love makes you do crazy things. And that's the point. I love you, lambikins."
"Don't call me lambikins, you jerk," Sarah said, suddenly remembering her feelings of rage.
"Come on, baby," Vance whined. "You've gotta give me a second chance! Please? I swear I'll try to be good this time."
Sarah rolled her eyes. "Be honest with me. Is this the first time you've cheated on me?"
"Well, uh, no. Not exactly," Vance shrugged sheepishly.
"Who else have you slept with? I want names."
"Hmm. You remember that girl Gina who worked at the coffee shop?"
"You slept with her?" Sarah asked incredulously.
"Yeah. Numerous times. Man, she couldn't get enough. Then there was Suzie Johnson, the prom queen. I did her in the restroom right after she got crowned. Let's see, then there was the cheerleading squad."
"Who on the cheerleading squad?" Sarah demanded.
"All of them," Vance replied. "Well, all except for that overweight one with the bad complexion. I don't know why they let her on the squad in the first place. Then there was your best friend Mindy. Oh man, did I fuck the shit out of her. I've never seen a girl want me so bad. There were also a whole bunch of chicks at parties whose names I didn't catch. Probably like twenty or thirty of those. Then there was my math teacher..."
"Mrs. Hartley?" Sarah gasped.
"What can I say? She had a nice ass for an old chick. Let's see, who else? Damn, I know there's a ton of these bitches. It's hard to keep track after awhile."
"I've heard enough," Sarah said with an eerie air of calmness. "You're a fucking asshole, Vance. I don't know why I didn't see that before, but now that my eyes are opened I don't ever want to see you again. If you come anywhere near me, I swear to fucking God, you're going to wake up in the hospital. Am I clear?"
"You don't mean that, baby," Vance smiled. "Come on, let's go up to the room and I'll make it all better." He reached forward to rub her shoulders.
She punched him in the stomach as hard as she could and stormed off, leaving him doubled over and gasping for breath.
"Nice show, dickhead," a nearby koala jeered at him. Somebody else threw a cup at his head.
"Fine!" Vance shouted after her. "I don't need you! I've got plenty of other bitches that want to get with me!" Looking around he spotted the girl from the music store he'd had a tryst with earlier. "Come on Tanya, what do you say we blow this joint?"
"Get away from me, loser," she turned up her nose at him.
"Put on a shirt, moron!" a turtle shouted at him. More debris rained down on Vance's head.
Vance looked around in bewilderment. He couldn't fathom what was happening. Finally he dropped the microphone and ran away as fast as he could.
The squirrel retrieved the microphone and climbed on stage again. "Now I believe I was talking about toenails," it droned on in its monotonous voice. "Let's begin with a little history..."
The crowd collectively quieted down and assumed a bored look as the squirrel chatted on for endless minutes.
At length he finished his speech and announced that Dr. Octavius would be the next speaker. This caused a bit of a stir to go through the audience who were anxious for the main event.
A few rows from the front Max stood and chuckled to himself as he thought about Vance's public humiliation. The entertainment value there had certainly been worth the boredom of sitting through the squirrel's speech. He hoped Dr. Octavius would prove a bit more lively of a speaker.
"Well, that whole public breakup certainly seemed to be a juicy affair," Hazim commented. "I wish I could have seen that poor sap's face. Who was he anyway?"
"None other than that moron who was with me earlier when I came and visited you," Max laughed again.
"Really? What was his name again? Vince or something?"
"Ah, I don't know," Max sniffed. "Just some meathead. Who cares really?"
"You know me, I just like being in the know," Hazim said.
"Looks like Dr. Octavius is stepping up on the stage," Max said and stood on his tiptoes to get a better view.
Dr. Octavius stepped up to the podium and grabbed the microphone. "Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you for coming out. Now many of you may be interested in toenails for various reasons, but I for one have a certain metaphysical interest. You see, my colleagues and I have come to believe that our entire universe exists inside a toenail. The toenail of a single man in another universe, which itself is contained inside this one."
"Aw, this is the same crap he was talking about last night," Max groaned. "Boring."
"Shh," Hazim said. "I want to hear this."
"Oh, don't you be shushing me now," Max flung up his hands in exasperation. "I already heard this stuff. I think it's a load of bullshit myself."
"Max, you know I love you, but would you shut up?" Hazim growled at him.
"Fine," Max folded his arms across his chest and sulked. He soon became bored with this and began ogling random women who stood in his vicinity.
Dr. Octavius spoke for about twenty minutes when he was suddenly interrupted by a loud commotion arising from the crowd. A group of creatures led by a large pink blob were booing at the top of their lungs.
"Pardon me," Dr. Octavius looked over his glasses. "Is there some problem here?"
"The problem is you," the pink blob sneered. "You're no local. You're an outworlder tourist scum. You want to preserve that guy's toenail so more tourists can come here."
Dr. Octavius smiled. "If you'd been paying attention to my speech you'd see I have absolutely no interest in bringing any more outsiders here. My colleagues and I are simply concerned that destroying the toenail may, in fact, bring on the end of the universe."
"He's lying!" the blob screamed. "He wants to flood this place with outsiders! Soon they'll take over and destroy our fair town as we know it."
"Now come on," Dr. Octavius shook his head. "A little tourism never hurt anyone. And besides, that's the least of our concerns right now."
Unnoticed to Dr. Octavius as he sparred with the blob, Trevor Mastodon had snuck up on the stage and maneuvered near the podium. He opened his mouth to its full width and suddenly swallowed Dr. Octavius whole.
The audience let out a collective gasp pierced by a particularly shrill scream from Sarah who tried to fight her way to the stage but found her way blocked by an increasingly panicked crowd.
Trevor Mastodon lifted the microphone and laughed evilly for a minute. "This speech is officially over," he said coldly. "Please join us at City Hall at sunset tomorrow for an important announcement. That will be all for now." He dropped the microphone and walked purposefully off the stage.