Prologue Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Epilogue

DAY OF THE TENTACLE

PART I: CHEAP MAIL-ORDER JEWELS

Bernard, normally a careful driver, fairly roared in his pickup, Laverne and Hoagie in tow. They ran red lights, screamed round corners at full acceleration, drove up high mountain passes and under shallow overpasses. Once, Bernard got lost, so he simply pulled a hard left and drove through a farm paddock and a chicken barn.
It had to come to an end, and finally they crashed head on into a tree. They got out, everybody unhurt. They were at the base of a hill, and Bernard looked up to the house on its crest. Yellow light came from every window, and in one he fancied he could see the silhouette of an old lady.
Nurse Edna. Bernard shivered - they were back in Maniac Mansion. He led them up the hill, past a nearly empty car park, along the porch, and into the reception area.
Bernard was moving quickly, not bothering much with stealth. He remembered how cautiously he'd crept into the place those years ago, terrified out of his mind. All those tales of the crazy Edisons revolving in his head. Well, now those stories were still there, but so much fainter. He felt a lot more confident. After all, this place was a motel now. Open to the public.
He gathered everybody together in the reception area. No-one was behind the desk, or in the office. A staircase led up, past a grandfather clock, to the units. On their left, two large double doors were shut on the convention centre and dining area.
"Okay," said Bernard, to Hoagie and Laverne. They didn't know much about Maniac Mansion's violent, seedy past, nor of its present-day commercialised identity. So they weren't much concerned. "We'll spread out, commando-style. Laverne, you go secure the area behind those double doors. Hoagie, you take care of upstairs reconnaissance. I'll maintain Command HQ here, in the lobby."
Laverne had already opened the doors. "What are we looking for?" she asked.
"We've got to find where Doctor Fred is holding the tentacles!" said Bernard.
"This better not take too long," muttered Laverne. "I've got an anatomy final tomorrow." She disappeared into the convention centre.
"And I've got a show to set up later tonight," said Hoagie as he walked up the stairs, his hands in his pockets. "If I'm late I don't get to test the drums."
Bernard thought. "If I know Doctor Fred, he's got the tentacles tied up in his secret lab. Question is, where's his secret lab?"
He paced along the tiled floor (red, orange and beige tiles - horrendous), and tried to remember the layout. Around him all was still, excepting the steady tick-tock that came from the grandfather clock. It soon started to seriously annoy Bernard.
Bernard came and stood in front of the wooden clock. He did remember a grandfather clock, now. And there was something funny about this clock in front of him - something about the way the pendulum moved.
He reached out and opened the front panel of the clock. With it came the pendulum, and now Bernard, looking down, saw the space widen out below as stairs led down.
"Aha! A secret passage!" He climbed into the clock. "This is all too easy!"
Almost immediately he whacked his head into the top of the opening.

Hoagie was walking along the second floor. There were motel rooms on his left side, but he didn't feel like taking a look. He passed an ice bucket, and a candy machine, and now here was Laverne, bounding around with a confused expression on her face.
"Laverne! How'd you get upstairs?"
"Am I upstairs?" said Laverne. "I got lost."
"Seen any tentacles?"
"What's a tentacle?" said Laverne.
A voice, behind them - behind Hoagie, at least. An old and wizened voice, a voice with crackles in it, a voice that leered, a voice that could have auditioned for any mad scientist role and taken it easily. "Oh, just something I whipped up in my spare time!" it said.
Hoagie turned. Standing there was a bald guy about four feet tall, wearing a lab coat and some kind of reflective lamp on his forehead. He looked a lot like a doctor, although not one you'd take your appendicitis to. Judging by what Bernard had said, this was Doctor Fred. "Make good pets actually," continued Doctor Fred. Then he frowned. "Until one of them tried to take over the world," he said darkly. "Had to tie the little buggers up in the basement!" Doctor Fred rubbed his hands together, a nervous expression he'd never really gotten rid of. Lately, he did it all the time.
"Good thing you told us that, Doc," said Laverne.
"Yeah," agreed Hoagie. "Bernard wanted us to set them free."
"Thank God you weren't that stupid!" said Doctor Fred. He paused. The rubbing motion of his hands ceased.
He turned to face them. "Did you say Bernard?"

Down in the darkness, the Sludge-O-Matic� bubbled away. Tied to it by many rounds of tight rope were Purple and Green Tentacle, or at least they were until Bernard pulled away the final one. "There, you're free to go," he said.
"Thanks, Bernard!" said Green gratefully.
"Yes," agreed Purple. "Thank you, naive human. Now, I can finish taking over the world!" He bounded noisily away, laughing maniacally. Soon he was lost in the basement darkness.
"Wait!" cried Green.
"Oh yeah," said Bernard, suddenly contrite. "Now I remember. He's incredibly evil, isn't he?"
"Uhhh... I'll try to talk him out of it," said Green. He bounded away after Purple.
Bernard stayed behind. "Well," he said, trying to look on the bright side, "what possible harm could one insane mutant tentacle do?"
The lights were switched on. Bernard looked around, at a space much larger than he first thought. It was certainly more cluttered than he ever could have imagined. Machines, half-made machines, rubbish, even a beat up car and three portable toilets. Walking among them with an exasperated expression on his face was Doctor Fred.
He saw Bernard, and beside him the coils of rope lying uselessly on the floor. "Leaping labrats!" he exclaimed.
"Doctor Fred!" said Bernard guiltily.
"What have you done this time, you meddling milquetoast?" wailed Doctor Fred. "Now Purple Tentacle is free to use his evil mutant powers to take over the world, and enslave all humanity!!"
"Whoops," said Bernard.
"Our only hope now," said Doctor Fred, coming toward the Sludge-O-Matic� with an intent expression on his face, "is to turn off my Sludge-O-Matic� machine, and prevent the toxic mutagen from entering the river!"
"Isn't it a little late for that, Doctor?"
"Of course! That's why I'll have to do it... YESTERDAY! To the time machine!"

A damaged blue Buick, connected by metal pipes to three portable toilets - this wasn't some bit of garbage, but Doctor Fred's time machine.
The toilets weren't your regulation standard issue toilets. They were bright green, with go-faster stripes. On the top of each toilet was a light bulb, and an electric fan. The bottom seemed to have some kind of bumper bar installed.
Laverne stood in one toilet, Bernard in another, Hoagie in the last. The doors had a small inset at head height which could be shut for privacy, but which now afforded their view of the situation.
The situation consisted of Doctor Fred, standing on a stepladder next to the Buick and rubbing his hands together. Beside him was a large lever extending into the Buick, an even larger diamond, and an orphaned pair of traffic lights.
"This is all your fault, Bernard," moaned Laverne.
"Behold, children!" shouted Doctor Fred behind them. "The Chron-O-John!"
"Doc, can't you just send Bernard?" said Hoagie.
"No," said Doctor Fred, "you must all go to increase the odds that one of you will make it there alive!"
"Have any people ever been hurt in this thing?" asked Bernard.
"Of course not!" said Doctor Fred dismissively. The three students cheered up. "This is the first time I've ever tried it on people!"
He pushed a button and the Chron-O-John windows shut on their shocked expressions. Then he pulled the large lever. It cranked into the ON position.
Bolts of electricity crackled around the diamond. On the Chron-O-Johns, the light bulbs glowed and the fans started to whirr, at first misfiring before smoothing out.
The Chron-O-Johns leapt into the air, at the same time squashing vertically. With a sound like a manuscript unrolling they vanished in a tinkle of light. Then, there was just the electric hum of the Buick machinery. Even Doctor Fred was impressed. "Well, I'll be," he said.

Hoagie opened his window, and peered out.
He was floating in a huge tunnel, whose surface was alternately ringed with blue and black. It whirled past at astonishing speed, but the Chron-O-John itself seemed stationary. It was the tunnel that moved.
Hoagie looked left. There, floating alongside, were Bernard and Laverne, staring around in horror. "Bernard," said Hoagie slowly and deliberately, "float over here so I can punch you."
Suddenly, an huge eyeball appeared. It seemed stuck to the wall of the tunnel, and whirled past them in a corkscrew pattern.
"This must be that Woodstock place Mom and Dad are always talking about," said Laverne wonderingly.
Mathematical formulae materialised in front of them. A black, curious looking cat with a white stripe up its back floated past. "What could it all mean?" said Hoagie.
"I don't know," said Bernard. "I don't want to know." A crazy woman in a chair span around them, cackling. A watch zoomed past, ticking. And now an extremely old, bearded Purple Tentacle appeared, with a green gun in its right hand. It aimed it at an unseen target. "Die!" it screamed, laughing. "Die! Die!"
"We may not live to see yesterday," said Hoagie.
"I'm sure Doctor Fred wouldn't have done this if it weren't safe," said Bernard, trying to convince himself as much as them.
"After all, he is a doctor," said Laverne.

'Doctor' Fred was beside himself with joy. "It worked! I can't believe it! And they said imitation diamond wasn't good enough!"
Spoke too soon. Cracks appeared in one corner of the diamond, and sped across the surface. With the barest of sounds, the diamond shattered into tiny fragments and fell to the floor. Doctor Fred gasped, and cranked the lever back OFF. "Oh, oh," he said.

Bernard's Chron-O-John was plummeting at insane speeds through a tunnel that twisted and turned, throbbing at stroboscopic intensity. The other Chron-O-Johns were gone from sight. Everything was gone from sight. He fell, and he screamed.

In a separate tunnel, Laverne's Chron-O-John was just as out of control. Bulleting downward, her hair was nearly pulled out of its roots by the time wind. Her eyes bulged and she held onto the corners of the window with shaking, clammy hands.

Unlike the others, Hoagie was enjoying his whirling ride through the time tunnel of Hell. He sat up, riding the buffeting waves of wind like the most unflappable surfer in history. Mauna Loa, eat your heart out.
A black spot appeared, far below. He was falling so fast that in a second it had blown up to loom all around, a massive black disc that marked the end of the tunnel.
He crashed into it head on.

Maniac Mansion, two hundred years ago on a fine sunny day.
Of course, two hundred years ago it wasn't known as Maniac Mansion. In fact, it was a recently built, and mostly respected place. Indeed, something important was going on in there, right now, something that would shape the future of America.
But it wasn't inside that the Chron-O-John landed. Instead, somewhere beside the house, on a patch of lawn by a kumquat tree, in front of a pair of outhouses, it suddenly appeared, six feet up in the air, and crashed into the earth. The door swung open, revealing the squashed figure of Hoagie. No longer supported by the door, he fell facedown in the grass, landing with a thump.

Maniac Mansion, two hundred years hence.
It was another fine, sunny day. The new, metal surface of the Mansion gleamed in the sunlight. A rather extensive redesign had been carried out on the place, as befits a place so important to the recent history of the world.
The world as seen by Tentacles, that is.
One of the few areas left untouched by the tentacles held a large, ancient kumquat tree. From a sapling four hundred years ago, it had grown enormously, both in height and in breadth. So whereas Hoagie's Chron-O-John fell onto an empty patch of grass, Laverne's materialised right above the tree.
And it got caught by the tree twelve feet above the ground , on a thick and sturdy branch. The branch shook violently with the impact of the Chron-O-John, but held.
The door swung open and Laverne tottered out. A nasty fall to the concrete path below was averted by a protruding twig, which snagged her skirt. She hung there, all four limbs pointing downward like a cat caught around the middle, and looked around.

Maniac Mansion, the present.
Bernard's Chron-O-John crashed into its landing pad. The door swung open. Bernard didn't fall out - rather, he climbed out of the hole in the bottom of the Chron-O-John, dripping wet. Standing up, he wrung himself dry, grimacing slightly. It seemed to be just water down there, which was just as well.
"Cheap mail-order jewels!" ranted Doctor Fred, glaring at his invention.
Bernard looked around. Hoagie and Laverne, and their Chron-O-Johns, were nowhere to be seen! "What happened to Hoagie and Laverne?!" he said.
"I knew I should have bought a real diamond!" wailed Doctor Fred, ignoring him.
"Are they alive?"
Doctor Fred turned to his machine. "My dials say that the larger specimen landed two hundred years in the past - and the other is stuck two hundred years in the future!"
"Well, hurry up and bring them back!" urged Bernard.
"I will," promised Doctor Fred, "as soon as I get a new diamond! Then all your buddies have to do is plug in their respective Chron-O-Johns and-"
"Plug them in!?" said Bernard, interrupting him. "Where is Hoagie going to find an electrical outlet two hundred years in the past?!?"
Doctor Fred was unfazed. "Yes... well... he'll be needing my patented super-battery then, won't he?" He started rubbing his hands together. "Now, where did I put those patented super-battery plans of mine?"
"Plans? How are we going to get Hoagie plans?"
Doctor Fred waved the objection aside. "Don't worry me with details, boy! Just help me find the plans!" He scuttled past Bernard, looking around. "They're in this house somewhere!"
"Now what am I going to do?" wailed Bernard.
Doctor Fred stopped, turned around, and stared fiercely at him. He came back. "I think I made myself perfectly clear. Step One: Find plans. Step Two: Save world. Step Three: Get out of my house! Let's get cracking!" He immediately got cracking, walking swiftly up the basement stairs. "Maybe I put them upstairs," he wondered aloud. "That's got to be it! Upstairs!"
Bernard was more circumspect. He took a good look around the basement, walking slowly. He came to the Sludge-O-Matic�, and pulled the lever back. Now it was off, but it was too late now.
In the far corner was a complicated generator, seemingly driven by a treadmill. A small wheel-shaped treadmill, such as a mouse or hamster might run on. Beside it a bulletin board had been hung on the wall. Just the single piece of paper was tacked to the board.
Bernard read it. Doctor Fred's design for a super battery! Apparently, the battery was capable of storing one gigavolt with a charging time of just .01 seconds. Wow! thought Bernard.
He snatched up the paper. "I've got the plans!" he called out.
Doctor Fred appeared behind him. "Quick! We have to flush them to Hoagie!"
"How did you get over there?" said Bernard. He was sure Doctor Fred hadn't come down the stairs.
Together, they walked to the front of the Chron-O-John. "My ingenious super-battery design, please," said Doctor Fred, holding out a hand. Bernard gave it to him. Doctor Fred studied it, and nodded in approval. He rolled it into a tight scroll, then flung it into the Chron-O-John, right into the central hole in the floor.
The plans disappeared in the water. It swirled momentarily, accompanied by a flushing sound, then was still. There was a light grey glow emerging from the hole, but the plans did not reappear.
"You really flushed them!" said Bernard wonderingly.
"Yes!!"
"Down the toilet!"
"No!" said Doctor Fred. "Through time! Using the highly sophisticated Time-Flux Hydraulic Vortex Chamber I've installed in each Chron-O-John you can flush small, inanimate objects to each other through time!"

Laverne had not freed herself. Mainly because, a) when freeing yourself meant a twelve foot fall to a concrete path, freedom started to lose some of its appeal, and b) the branch which snagged her and amazingly held her weight was caught right in the small of her back, that place you just can't reach with your hands.
Nothing much had happened around her, except just these last few seconds the Chron-O-John had started to glow with a pale grey light. Now, she could just hear tiny voices coming from that gap in the floor.
Laverne craned her head as close as possible. The voice was that of Doctor Fred's, just coming to the end of a long speech. "...flush small inanimate objects to each other through time!" it said.
"Hello?" said Laverne. "Doctor Fred? Can you hear me?"
No response from the Chron-O-John.
"Drat," said Laverne.

"Did you hear something?" said Bernard.
"No!" said Doctor Fred. "Let's see if what's-his-name catches on." They crowded around the still-glowing Chron-O-John.

Hoagie was somewhat recovered. But now his Chron-O-John was starting to glow with grey light. "Oh, great," said Hoagie wearily. "I'm stuck in colonial times, tentacles are taking over the world, and now the toilet's backed up."
Doctor Fred's voice wafted out of the Chron-O-John. "Hoagie... come over here..."
Hoagie walked over, obediently.
"It's your old pal Doctor Fred," said Doctor Fred's disembodied voice.
"Doctor Fred?" said Hoagie. "How'd you get in there?"
"I want you to pick up those plans you see in the Chron-O-John, Hoagie," said Doctor Fred. "Bring them to Red Edison! He's my great, great, great, great, great, great, great-"

"-great, great, great grandfather," finished Doctor Fred. "He'll know what to do."
Beside him, Bernard spoke up. "You need the plans to make a super-battery, so you can plug in your Chron-O-John!"
"Okay, if you say so, Bernard," said Hoagie's voice, from its vantage point two hundred years ago. The grey glow disappeared from the Chron-O-John. Hoagie must have picked up the plans.
"Good boy," said Doctor Fred approvingly. He turned to Bernard. "Does he have any experience with electronics?"
"Uh..." Bernard thought. "I once saw him take three thousand volts directly through his head without batting an eye."
"Didn't he pass out?" said Doctor Fred.
"Well, he was already passed out when it happened!"

Hoagie stuffed the patent application into his jeans. "Well, time for me to save the world, I guess," he said.

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