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It seemed like the start of a normal day at the Netsuoka National Zoo. The Giraffes were eating quietly. The Elephants were wading in their elephant-wading pool. The Casaran Red Tigers were messily devouring breakfast with feline efficency.
But the baboons had other plans that day. There was a spectacular amount of activity in the back of the baboon hut as they crowded around, smashing at something with a rock. Noone suspected anything, especally the handlers. After all, baboons are idiots.
The first one dived out the hole in the side of the building and let out a loud scream, climbing a tree on the edge of the walking path. Baboon after Baboon followed, swarming down the paths, flinging feces at all in their way. Security was hopeless in the face of this onslaught, and the humans occupying the zoo had to quickly fall back and regroup.
The horde breached the walls of the zoo quickly and began swarming the building next door- an unfortunately placed High-Tech University Testing Lab.
The troop ran up and down the deserted halls, looking for anything they could find to create more terror. They had almost passed lab 14 when one of the last ones looked in and shreaked.
Lab 14 had been the center of some very odd research- individual flying machines, particularly man-wearable ones.
If a horde of Baboons was already a horrible sight, then Baboons with Jetpacks didn't help the situation.
Twenty-three minutes after the initial breakout, the phone rang on the desk of the Prime Minister as he walked into the office. "Damn people, calling me this early." He dropped his bag next to his chair and picked up the phone, still standing. "What is it?"
The Prime Minister's personal secretary walked into the room just in time to see the leader of the nation turn pale and sink into his chair. "Dear God... what can we do?" |
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The top-secret strategy room had a nice stainless-steel-and-granite motif that made it look like it was really deep in a mountain someplace. In all actuality however, one of the former PMs insisted that a random room be decorated in this way for his strategy room, and it just kind of stuck.
The Prime Minister, who definately was in a lot of RPs lately, was seated at the table, surrounded by ministers and generals.
"So." Elisar said, trying to keep a straight face. "What can we do about these baboons?"
"Shoot them." some General said, spinning in his chair slowly.
"We can't just shoot them!" A minister cried, looking outraged.
"The hell we can't. We'll get some guns, go out, shoot them. Bam. Problem solved."
Ari nodded. "That's definately a viable option, but are there any that don't result in the slaughter of primates?"
The General stopped. "Shoot them... with... tranquilzer darts?"
"That's better. But who can we get to do it?"
"It'd have to be someone who knows something about a baboon." someone said from behind the Prime Minister.
"True. Which rules out everyone in Casari, pretty much."
"Definately." The minister said, yawning. "Hey! What about that one guy on TV late at night?"
"The guy with the nature show?" Elisar said, raising an eyebrow.
"Yeah! I dunno where he's from, but he's a good shot with a tranqulizer gun. We'll get him to shoot the baboons."
Ari thought for a second. "We're going to get some foriegn nature show personality to come to Casari and shoot a troop of jetpack-armed-baboons with tranqulizers."
"... well... -explicitive removed-."
"Well, it's not like we have any better ideas." Elisar said, standing up. "Like all problems in life, Television will solve all our problems." |
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"We're here in the Deepest Darkest Devonia. You know, the continent just below Bazalonia? We are here to find one of the rarest of the Bazalope's distant relations, the waffle , I'm here with natives of the region to help scout one out. We've been told that one has been spotted in this area not too long ago. Let's see if we can pick up it's trail."
"You see these, this are the droppings left by the waffle after they've eaten. Waffle scat, and it's fresh too, A waffle is nearby, we have to be extremely quiet."
"We're in luck, just up ahead through those trees we can see a waffle, it's stripes are un-mistakable, let's try and move to get a closer view."
"And there we go. The Waffle in all it's glory, These critters are really dangerous, if they hear a noise and get started watch out. They charge and withthose nasty horns do serious damage. Don't try and get this close to a waffle without a serious professional like myself."
"Okay..." and with that Irvin Stepherson's mobile phone went off mid-shot.
"****, everyone run back to the safety zone"
There was audible panic in his voice, the camera and everyone started running back to this vehicle that was parked 200m away. The Waffle was chasing after them. They entire crew managed to get into the vehicle and close the door before the waffle came. The waffle slowed down and started to make it's way around the vehicle sniffing and rubbing it's horns against the car. after a few minutes it went away.
"Few, that was close" said Irvin as the jungle around him disappeared and all that remained was a blue screen. "Wow, that simulation software is fantastic it felt real, now who the bloody **** rung me while filming."
Looking at the caller display it was a Casaran number, it seemed familiar but he couldn't place it.
He dialed the number only to be found he had been put in a queue for a Casaran government department. |
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Edward Losandros was the Casaran Minister of the Environment. It was a pretty useless job and had him at just about the bottom of the totem pole minister-wise.
Until, of course, everyone looks to him for some kind of solution to flying monkies.
And that solution was possibly going to be the host of a Bazalonian Television Nature Show.
Aye, it was just a fantastic day.
"Hello, Mr. Stepherson. I'm sorry about the delay, let me introduce myself." he said, holding onto the phone with most of the rest of the cabinet stuffed in his small office. "I'm Edward Losandros, the Minister for the Environment for the Elisar Administration in Casari." Some chattering in the back of the room left Edward to glare and cover the reciever. "Shut up, you communists, I'm on the phone with the guy!" Edward listened and took his hand off the reciever again. "Yes, I understand that your schedule is rather busy. However, we felt that you would be the most experienced person to deal with this particular situation."
"Well, we had some baboons escape from a zoo. Next to that zoo, there was a research lab... No, not animal research... that's right. Oh, so you've heard about this problem?" Edward said, nodding along.
"What would we want you to do? Why, capture them, of course. We can't have some bloody baboons flinging their waste around a city of 5 million." From one of the corners, the Deputy Prime Minister and former PM Meia Winter gave a snort.
"Flying baboons. You really know how to run the country, Ari."
"Shut up, Winter. You showed up for work at 9:30 every morning, what would you know about it."
Edward covered the phone again. "Damn, you guys! Didn't you graduate from Middle school?" Edward sighed and uncovered the phone. "That's great. We'll have a car waiting for you at the airport to pick you up." Edward said, hanging up the phone.
"He'll do it." |
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The Casaran government vehicle had sat at the airport for almost an hour. Some bad weather had managed to back up landings, but seeing the private jet descend from the sky and touch down on the runway gave Winter a sense of relief. Before even making a full stop, peeling away onto the tarmac. The door to the car swung open just as the ladder was driven up the to door of the jet, and Winter stood, wearing a long jacket and watching as Irvin Stepherson descended the stairs.
"Irvin Stepherson." She said, standing. "A pleasure to meet you, I am Meia Winter." She said, offering a hand. "We should get going, the problem seems to be... getting a bit worse." she said, gesturing in the direction of the car.
Stepherson got in the car, Winter followed, and the car quickly got on the #1 Expressway south to Netsuoka.
"What exactly is your position, Miss Winter?"
"Well... that's a bit up in the air at the moment."
-----
"How bad is it." Elisar said, looking out the window as rain continued to fall on the City of Tyrellia.
"... we're boned." Erik Skeli said, sitting in a chair and staring at the Prime Minister's desk.
"How can you boil it down to that!" Elisar said, spinning.
"It's only been with the grace of the Populists that we've held the position this long. The only reason that we haven't lost it by election is because they'll shoot down any vote against you."
Elisar turned to look back out the window.
"There were protests in fourteen cities today. You're not a popular person, Ari. Joining ASPIRE, calling out a bunch of other nations, this totally pointless baboon thing. We're isolationists. We always were. And, to be frank, you just don't have the charisma."
"... we are boned."
"Winter, she has the charisma."
"Whose side are you on?"
"Whatever one won't get you hung in a square. There's pro-Populist protests in the streets. They could march in here and put her in charge for however long as they want. Particularly after today."
"How bad was it today, anyway?"
"The Liberals pretty much fell apart once she went to work on them. Some came to us, some went to the Populists, but there's 14 red seats left in the assembly now. Down from 134."
"One hundred and twenty seats in one day. That's never happened before."
Skeli shrugged. "It should have never happened, ever. She has these people high on something."
"She's off with that bat-explicitive removed- crazy Bazalonian nature show guy right now." Elisar said, clonking his head against the window glass. "I suppose there's nothing left to do but one, eh? Unless we want to tear the country apart, that is."
"That's always an option."
Elisar spun around again. "What?"
"Well, just a hypothetical. You take a stand, you call the psycho out, you both get into one of the most brutal campaign fights in the history of the planet, you drain all the party coffers for one election, maybe we tap a slightly less legal overseas bank account for some extra cash, and whoever wins, wins the whole damn thing."
Elisar tilted his head ever so slightly and glanced up at a small crack in the ceiling. "... There's a reason I kept you around."
"Wait, wait. That's a hypothetical, that doesn't mean that it's anything approching a good idea."
"Well, it's the one way we could go through this without losing face. We won the last election, there's still plenty of Labor voters out there."
"You'd never win. We don't have the canadates that the Populists do. We can win 150, maybe, on strong canadates, but without the other parties clawing at each other, we wouldn't get a majority."
"We change the laws."
Skeri stood up. "Change the election laws. To what, exactly?"
"A direct vote for Prime Minister. Then, we don't have to bother with getting quality canadates at the county level to get votes."
"... Well, noone can fault us for trying, I suppose."
Elisar laughed. "No, I suppose they can't."
-----
In the car, Winter's cellphone rang. Blinking, she reached over and grabbed it from a pocket in the side of the car. "Winter."
A hurried voice quickly started jabbering in her ear. Something about a mass exodus of Liberals, something else about Conservative support, then something about election law.
Winter stared out of the back window of the car as it rolled down Exit 261 off the expressway. "He can't be serious about this. It'd be a slaughter." Winter said quietly back into the phone.
"It has to be a bluff." an aide said on the other side of the phone.
"... No, this is too desperate to be a bluff. This is some serious, serious stuff going down now." |
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When Miss Winter said "It's a bit up in the air at the moment" only she and Irvin Stepherson knew how right she was a number of the Jet-pack wearing Baboons descended from te sky onto the government car.
Inside the car. "Crickey, when I thought you said these Babboons had jet packs I thought they had digestive problems... But these Babboons actually have jet packs."
He pulled out his Mobile phone and called his crew. They where already at the zoo ready to show IRvin do his life saving Magic on a babboon with the runs. Not as exciting as they'd want but it's a chance for Irvin to actually increase his viksibility in Casari and his Casaran TV rankings.
The call was received by the crew and they where soon on their way, they where told that they would know it when they saw it and headed out on the number 1 espressway...
The saw the Car floating in the air, supported by the flying Babboons and quickly set up a shot filming the car.
"Where's Irv?" asked one of the cinematographers with them not actually knowing where Ircin was. |
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Winter stared across the car coldly. "How the hell can you confuse that? Shouldn't you have some kind of tranqulizer gun or something?" Hill said, listening to the car creek under the stress of baboon-provided lift. "Seriously, a monkey with the runs. For crying out loud." she said. Security personnel arrayed on the ground were standing, guns aimed, unsure whether to fire or not.
"You know, Irvin, this is one of those days that just gets worse and worse every way I seem to turn." |
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"oh, yes, I always have my tranq gun but if we shppt at them with the gun now. They'll either get in the car and start attacking or fling us to the ground and hard. What we need now is something that will interest the Babboons more than playing with the car. That way they'll put us down and start playing with something else and I can then start Tranqing them.... I got an idea. Dial someone in the military and give the phone to me. Someone wike a general or something."
Irvin had his plan and told the military person exactly what he needed before ringing his crew and telling them what's happenening.
It was not long until the equipment started to arrive. |
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Winter handed off the phone and looked out the window idley. Before long, a few military trucks rumbled down the road towards their location. "I didn't know baboons were so suseptable to shiny things." She said, leaning back against the seat. "At least this will get some decent ratings for your show. Being held hostage by flying primates with an official from a foriegn government should be a bit more exciting than treating a monkey with pooping problems." Winter continued, watching the baboons screw around with the car. Outside, a bunch of military men were messing around with a couple of mirrors and spotlights.
Winter made a note for later to hide her new pro-stance on animal testing of products on primates. |
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"We get more than you'd think... only a fraction of our viewers watch because they are truly interested in nature, around 30% of the rest would watch to see the poop flying around and the rest would watch to see me getting hit by the flying manure."
"Well, it's more a distraction than an actual succeptibilty. It allows me to do this.. oh by the way stay inside. I am a trained profesional don't do this at home, or anywhere else."
And without speaking further he pulled out the tranquilliser gun that he had hidden in his bag. He had to get into the boot through the back seat, opening the window he leaned out of the window with his tranquiliser gun aimed at one of the Babboons. He fired a shot and quickly ducked in the window and wound it up.
One of the Babboons started to fall to the ground... |
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"Ahh, but don't underestimate the power of the shiny. it works wonders on my neighbors dog." Winter said, watching with facination as the Bazalonian began shooting at baboons.
"That's quite a good shot, you know. Out the window of a flying car at a hovering baboon." Winter said, thinking to herself. "It's like some kind of bizzare military marksmanship trial."
Winter's comments seemed mostly pointless until a single baboon moved towards the window, the rage evident in it's empty, dark baboon eyes, it's single intent being to get inside the car and attack the evil, dispicable humans inside.
Winter slid away from the window slowly, reaching under the seat and feeling around for something. "I sure hope you have a decent way to deal with this, Irvin, or this could get a tad more violent." |
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"I was expecting more..." said Irvin as he fiddled with the radio station. "Funny thing about babboons, given the right visual cues from something let's say as shiny as what we've got down there, and the right combination of beats from something like... let's say pop music and the creatures brains seem to just shut down and become putty in your hands, but it has to be the exact right beat and also the right level of annoying as well."
Just as he finished saying that he came onto a Casaran pop-teen sensation Bethany Fork and her song "Opps, it happened again".
"Ah there we go.... block you ears to keep your sanity." Irvin turns up the music to the loudest setting the car radio can go. His face wracked with pain as he submitted himself to the greatest turture that a man could put himself through. Listening to Bethany at top volume. A number of metres that he didn't want to know how many. He looked up to see how the Babboon reacted. |
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Meia Winter watched Irvin react, raising an eyebrow quietly and shrugging. Clearly he was not aware of women's immunity to truly horrible pop music and the horrible effects it can have on the internal organs of one when they're driven to the edge of sanity by it.
However, it did leave her a clear view of the baboon out the window, who had adopted a slack-jawed facial expression and was kind of wobbling back and forth in the air.
"Well, this works for now, but as soon as the song is over, they're going to snap out of it. You'll only have two minutes to put them all down... are you going to be able to stand the strain?" |
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Irvin still had a weird face on from the music but he answered Meia
"This was never meant to be a permanent solution", He said as he pulled out a rope and found a place to tie it too. It was a stong knot that tightened itself the more pressure was put on it.
"We're getting down from here in a generally unusual way." said Irvin as he opened the door and tossed the rope down. "Hurry, We only have about a minute and a half left. Just slide down the rope everything will be just fine. I'll be right after you." |
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Winter snorted. "pfft. I still say we should have just shot them." she said, grabbing the rope, wrapping her legs around it, and sliding down. From the ground below, the yell of "Ouch, damnit! Ropeburn!" she said, cursing as she moved towards the military blockade. She quickly got into an argument on why they hadn't just shot the baboons out of the sky, but the Colonel on the scene managed to overpower her in sheer volume and both looked back up at the car to watch the continuing action.
One Baboon was standing on the ground, weaving back and forth in a drunk fashion. Quickly, a soldier threw a burlap sack over the primate, zip-tied it shut, and pushed it onto the back of the truck, ignoring the monkey's screams. "Well, that's one down."
This post has been edited by Casari on Aug 21 2006, 12:35 PM |
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