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You sit comfortably in your armchair watching Pinwheel on Nickelodeon. Its your favorite show. Suddenly you hear thunder and see a flash of light. You look outside to see the nearby nuclear power plant blown to smitherines.
You go outside to see if you can find anything radioactive to play with. Amidst the wreckage you find a silver rod with a red button on the end.
"Oh!", you exclaim," A D-Hopper! I haven't seen one of these in ...!"
SSSSLLLLLUUUUURRRRPPPP!
You appear in a restaraunt in the middle of a crowd of hungry gargoyles. They grab you and tie you to a nearby table. They seem to be chanting something like "Hoagie! Hoagie! Hoagie! Hoagie!"
Then you see Julia Childs walk up with a recipe book, mumbling something about Avatar in a Bunl You blink your eyes in horror. Cat calls! Jeers! Insulting remarks! Plutonium! E=mc^2! And out of the inevitable an impossibility emerges! Elvis is still alive! In fact, you see him behind the gargoyles! You're so surprised that you break out of your bonds, point, and scream, "Look! It's Elvis!"
Everyone looks. You get up and run through the exit. You hide inside a nearby dumpster filled with bones and moldy bread. You press the button on the D-Hopper. Suddenly a toothpasty slime oozes up from the ground. It forms into a standing door. You recognize it as a Colgate! Only, this one is cherry red instead of depressed blue. You step into it and get that minty-fresh feeling.
You find yourself looking at your old liege, Lord Pfoulkyn's throne. (The Pfaroah with the pfunny name). You don't see Lord Pfoulkyn anywhere, but you do see Elvis! You barely stutter out, "Elvis! You're here! I thought..."
You stop talking as Elvis pulls his face off. It's actually Lord Pfoulkyn in disguise. "But, why the disguise?", you ask.
"Oh, this?", he responds, "I just left a costume ball at Lord British's. Those Brittanians really know how to party!"
You tell Lord Pfoulkyn about what happened to you.
"I say.", he says, "They must not like you. I've heard rumors that they took over our Job Placement Centers. Now you can't get a decent job! They tell everyone to work at Joe's Diner. All Joe's makes is hoagies. Bad ones at that."
"How does this D-Hopper work?", you inquire, "Over the years, I forgot."
"Well," states Lord Pfoulkyn, "it's like a backwords Rubik Chain. You randomly slide the pieces of the rod in any direction, press the button, and wham-o, you find yourself somewhere you don't want to be."
"Sounds neat!" You promptly twist the rod and press the red button. The Colgate oozes up again like toothpaste from a tube. You step in. Wow! The minty sensation twice in one day!
The next thing you hear is a Scottish man yellin "Captain, she canna' take much more of this!"
"More energy to the shileds!", a voice responds. "Scotty, how's the engine coming?"
"The warp drive's nay functioning! I think someone straightened out the warp coil!"
You say, "Oh boy."
Just then you see a white rabbit. the rabbit is carrying a grandfather clock and wearing a polar fleece. He yells, "I'm early for a stupid date!" Then the rabbit runs off.
You steal a phaser from a passing guard, set it on stun, and chase after the rabbit. The rabbit runs through a Colgate as the Colgate starts dripping and falling apart. You make a quantum leap and reach the gate just in time. As you enter the Colgate, you say to yourself, "Too much more of this minty-fresh feeling and I'll never need to brush my teeth again!"
You notice you're back at Lord Pfoulkyn's throne room. Two men in blue coats are mopping the floor. Their coats have the words "Moe's Janitorial Service" written on them. Lord Pfoulkyn rises from his throne and yells at you. "Before I was so rudely cut off, I was about to tell you not to use the D-Hopper in my castle! It leaves a disgusting gooie mess on the floor, even if it does leave a nice minty aroma! The janitors cost me a fortune in gold!"
"Sorry, sir." you say in a meek voice. You leave the castle, carefully avoiding parts of the crumbling portcullis and holes in the drawbridge. As you pass two statues of skinny, hungry lions just outside the castle, a beggar comes by and asks for money. You drop a coin in his hands and walk past him. You look back to say bye when the beggar removes his face. It's Elvis! Before you can reach him, Elvis is surrounded by reporters and fans.
"Darn." you say. "I'll never be able to say hi." You notice it's getting towards dark. The planet's two moons, Trouble, and Pollution, are rising behind the castle dejectedly. As night surrounds you, skinny, glowing people circle you. They look as if they would fall apart if you breathed on them, so you hold your breath.
"Who are you?" you say.
"We are called wimps. We are the physical forms of people who are too scared to leave home. we rarely talk to people because they breath and blow us apart. You, though, are kind enough to hold your breath. Though we supposedly have met before, you really have never seen us. Have this scroll. We don't need it."
You unroll the scroll. It reads "Scroll of genocide. Press red button and call the name of the race to destroy." You get so excited that you forget to hold your breath when you say "Thanks!"
The wimps are blown to pieces and disappear. 'Now' you think, 'how do I find the gargoyles?' You decide to use the D-Hopper again. You set the D-Hopper to another random position and press the button. Another Colgate forms. You step into it and get that minty-fresh feeling.
You are now at a familiar restaraunt. Gargoyles wearing strange caps are handing Romanians in a Roll to other gargoyles. One gargoyle notices you. He yells to the others, "Hoagie!" All the nearby gargoyles pull out knives and forks and run at you. You run out of the restaraunt into broad daylight. 'This must be the other side of the world!', you finally notice.
The gargoyles chase you through the streets of their town and towards the mouth of a cave. As you run into the cave you trip on a rock and fall into a pool of strange water. A man in a maintenance suit yells at you. "Get out, kid! We ain't got the lava's heater fixed yet!"
You climb out, shake yourself dry, and wander deeper into the cavern. 'Obviously,' you think, 'the gargoyles don't like this place.' You go deeper into the cavern and run into someone in the dark.
"Bless my soul!" the someone says. "A human! Now I can share what I learned of these gargoyles!"
"Just call me Somebody." Someone replies. "I've been studying the gargish language with the help of a gargoyle friend of mine. I feel I have to tell someone or else I might burst!" Indeed, it appears that Someguy's head is swollen and might burst. Somebody hands you a piece of paper. You take a look at the paper, but can't read the sloppy writing without a decoder ring.
You ask, "How do you say 'hello' in gargish?"
"Hoagie." Ahuman replies.
"What about 'food'?"
"Hoagie."
"How about 'You look like a turtle with mumps'?"
"Hoagie."
"Ok. How do you say my name in gargish?"
"Hoagie."
"You don't even know my name! Does this mean that no matter what you say, it is translated into 'Hoagie'?"
"You must be a genius! It took me years to figure their secret out!"
"I need to talk to the gargoyle king. Can you help me?"
"I can." responds Theguyyoufoundinthecave. "And for a genious like you I will! I have a friend outside who can take you to the King of Gargoyles. The king will hand you something that will allow you to pass freely among gargoyle kind. My friend is, of course, a gargoyle, but don't worry. He's on a diet."
"Thanks." you say, and rapidly leave the dungeon, carefully avoiding the maintenance workers. Outside of the cave you notice only one gargoyle is still around. He looks at you and licks his lips. Then he remebers something and looks downcast.
You test your new language knowledge. "Hoagie." you say, hoping you said "Hi. I'm not planning on being dinner. Can you show me to your leader?"
The gargoyle responds "Hoagie.". Either he said "Hi. I'm called Stale Bread. My leader is this way." or "You're not worthy of being a gargoyle meal, you ugly piece of orc puss."
You reply with "Hoagie." and follow the gargoyle. He takes you into the gargoyle town. Ther you enter the largest building with the largest statues of people in large rolls. Inside, on a large throne, sits a pot-bellied gargoyle stuffing his face with bread rolls so huge that you can't see what's in them. You kneel befor the larg mass and say "Hoagie."
The gargoyle king pauses from stuffing his face long enough to say "Hoag - urp - ie."
Soon you are knee-deep in a gargish conversation.
"Hoagie."
"Hoagie."
"Hoagie."
"Hoagie."
"Hoagie."
Don't ask for a translation. You'll wish you hadn't. The gargoyle hands you a nifty liver-and-onion necklace that doubles as a universal translater device (for ease of reading:)).
"So, why liver-and-onion, oh leader of all hungry and over-weight gargoyles?"
"Because everyone -urp- hates liver-and-onion. No gargoyle in their right mind would think of having you for lunch now. Go out among the gargoyles and try to solve our need for people at Joe's. If you're not done by Thanksgiving, your goose is cooked."
After hearing the gargoyle king's ultimatum, you talk to all the gargoyles to find a solution to their problem. They suggest such things as mass breeding of humans and starting hunting of 'wild humans'. After hours of this you realise that gargs just wanna have lunch(tm). You pull out the scroll of genocide, press the red button, and yell out "Gargoyles!" Nothing happens. You go back to Lord Pfoulkyn's only to find everyone missing.
'But,' you think 'the gargoyles are still around!' Then you realise what will happen now. Suddenly a guy named Al steps out of a blue door and says, "Alright Sam! Ziggy says you should leap at any moment!"
Then you leap. As you leap, you think 'Who's Sam?' You finish your leap and find yourself staring at a man wearing a black mask, holding a glowing red sword. He says "I've been waiting for you, Obi-Wan. We meet again, at last."
You say "Oh boy!"
You steel yourself for the journey and step toward the basement. You reach toward the door, grasp the handle, and slowly turn it. You pull the door open slowly, expecting anything, and stare down the long dark stairwell that leads into the basement and the pantry. You will yourself to step through the door. As you step beyound the portal, the door swings shut. You try frantically at the knob, but the door is locked. That's when you notice a glowing light deep down the stairwell.
You slowly descend the stairs, all the while searching for something to use as a weapon. Unfortunately you don't find anything. At the base of the stairs you see a place resembling a temple from Indiana Jones. In the center of the temple stands a demon, and behind the demon is a young woman tied to an altar. It looks like a human sacrifice is about to take place. You step on a twig that hadn't been there a moment ago, and the demon turns around.
"YOU!" The demon points at you. "I WANT YOUR SOUL!!!"
You're tired of the day's stress. You want this guy off your back. "I WANT SOME POPCORN!" you yell.
The demon cowers, then meekly hands you a large bucket of popcorn. "here." he wimpers, "you didn't have to yell..." You take the bucket, turn around, and walk up stairs. You remember the knob has always been stuck, so you just pull the door open. It opens easily, but the telebision just skipped to a commercial.