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

PART III: FUTURE SHOCK

Laverne was not having a good time.
She was furious at these tentacles. How dare they lock her up? And what was more galling was that they hadn't locked her up at all. The kennel, despite holding Laverne and these three other humans, was not caged or barred. There didn't seem to be anything between her, the bored. guard and the door.
Laverne strode forward, determinedly. She had only gone several feet forward, however, when she ran into an invisible, electric wall. Yellow light sparked noisily. Laverne jumped back, her hair smoking. The tentacle guard didn't even look up.
She looked down, and saw a row of pulsing lights on the floor. Above them were a line of halogen lamps, or something that looked like halogen lamps. Force field.
"Get me out of here!" Laverne yelled to the guard. "This is a violation of my rights!"
"Rights!?!" said the guard. "You're a human, you don't have any rights!" He looked back down at his book.
Laverne walked over to the Edison lookalikes. If these were the inmates she was spending the rest of her life with, Laverne felt she could have done a bit better. The old woman and the young, clumsy man didn't look up from their cards. The old man just stared forward glumly.
Laverne spoke to him. "Doctor Fred? Is that you?"
He looked at her. "What? Yer nuts! There hasn't been a Fred in the Edison family for two hundred years! The last Fred was such a shame to the whole family... not to mention the whole human race!"
"Well, who are you then?" asked Laverne crossly. He sure looked like Doctor Fred. He even spoke like Doctor Fred.
"I'm Zed Edison," said Zed. He pointed to his fellow inmates. "That's my wife Zedna, and my son Ved."
"Hmmf."
"Ymmp."
"Nice to meet you," said Laverne politely, then turned to Zed. "Where am I?" she asked.
"You're in the ancestral home of the once-proud Edison family," said Zed. "We were once the masters of this house, just as humans were once the masters of Earth. Now we are the servants... the pets!" he moaned.
"And not very good at either one, I might add!" said the tentacle guard.
"Oh, get bent, you overdressed nightcrawler," said Zed.
"How do I get out of here?" asked Laverne.
Zed was not helpful. "If I knew that, do you think I'd be here?"
Laverne said, "Well, I've got a lot of rotting in jail to do, so-"
"I'm tired of talking now," said Zed. "It's been a long day, and I'm only..." he shuddered, realising what the sentence was coming to, "...human."
Laverne was not put to despair by Zed's words. She was just getting angrier. No slug was going to keep her in prison. The anger churned in her stomach, like a glut of bilious fluid.
She spoke up. "Yoo-hoo! Mr. Tentacle Guy!"
The guard looked up. "What?"
"Oooh... I don't feel so good," moaned Laverne, suddenly sickly. Her face went a pale grey colour. "I think I'm going to throw up-" her throat hitched "-all over."
The performance completely took in the guard. "Uh, oh," he said. "Time to visit Doctor Tentacle."

Laverne was led through several doors, and finally into a bare medical office.
She got to see some of the futuristic Mansion. Bare walls, all grey metal, and pictures of tentacles. No pictures of humans. The doorways were no longer rectangular, but the shape of an organic pyramid, or tentacle. They rolled up with a hydraulic whoosh whenever somebody approached.
The doctor's office was darker, and anatomical charts hung on the wall. The doctor himself was another purple tentacle, wearing a white med coat. A stethoscope hung from his ears.
Laverne was ushered inside, and the guard left. The doctor turned around. "Well, well, what have we here?" he said, with the comforting voice of a professional.
"I feel pukey," said Laverne, coming over.
"Indeed? OK, now, hold still."
"Are you gonna use your scalpel?" asked Laverne hopefully.
"No, of course not," said the doctor.
"Darn," said Laverne. She had a thought. "Do you wanna use mine?" she asked.
"Er... no." The doctor listened to her heart for a while with his stethoscope. "Hmmm," he said finally.
"What?" Laverne was ignored. The doctor hopped past her, to a human chart on the wall.
"Hmmmm," he said again.
The tension was getting to Laverne. "What? What?"
"Just as I suspected," he announced.
"What!?"
"There's nothing wrong with you, human," said the doctor.
Laverne turned away, disgusted. "What a letdown."
"Well, I'm late for the show," said the doctor. "I'll send your keeper back for you." He hopped out, but paused at the door. "Oh. Sit. Stay. Good boy."
He left. Laverne was a little confused that the doctor would leave her alone, a tentacle prisoner, like this. She looked around the office, at a loss. An anatomical chart, of a human, caught her eye. She chuckled - they'd gotten the liver and the spleen mixed up.
Another, larger anatomical chart was stuck to the opposite wall. It outlined a tentacle's anatomy, and Laverne's medical curiosity got the better of her. She studied the lines. To a layman it might look like a paint-by-numbers picture of sushi, but Laverne had specialised knowledge.
Even she was confused by this comprehensive if poorly-rendered diagram of the working parts of a tentacle. "I still don't understand how they can eat through a sucker," she muttered.
Laverne came to a decision. She looked around - the doctor had still not returned - then pulled the chart from the wall. She folded it up and hid it in a pocket. Furtively carrying her stolen cargo, Laverne left the office.
Outside, she took a moment to get her bearings.
She was in a long, wide room. In front of her were several tentacle-shaped windows, revealing the rolling hills outside. And between them, a tentacle-shaped door. The door to outside - which meant she was now in what once had been the lobby.
Behind her, the door whooshed shut. It prompted Laverne to action, and she stumbled forward. And pulled up sharply.
The room to her left had opened up considerably. She now saw, on the far wall, a set of curved metal stairs leading up to the next floor. In the space in front of these stairs was a futuristic couch, on which sat three humans, looking away from her. At least Laverne supposed they were humans. With all the frizzy hair and psychedelic colours, it was hard to tell.
Watching over these humans, and periodically glancing up at Laverne, was a purple tentacle wearing a safari hat and holding a butterfly in one net. The tentacle that had captured her earlier. Beside him was a grandfather clock.
Laverne froze. She had been spotted for sure. Seconds passed, but the tentacle didn't hop toward her, shouting angrily. He just stood there, not paying much attention to her at all. After a while, Laverne realised she wasn't going to be seized.
She stood there, still and smiling faintly for the benefit of the guard, and thought. What to do now? That outside door still beckoned, but if she tried it the tentacle guard would probably be spurred to action. There was another door, on her right, that led deeper into the mansion. Taking that might make her seem furtive. Finally Laverne just gave up and walked toward the cluster of humans.
On second thought, she decided to be even bolder and walked up to the tentacle guard. "Hi, I'm Laverne," she said.
"That's regrettable," said the tentacle guard. "Perhaps you should see the doctor." He sounded impatient.
"What's upstairs?" Laverne asked.
"Nothing that you need to worry about," said the tentacle. "An old time capsule and some worthless human relics. And, of course, the showroom. Off limits to humans, naturally, except for the showroom."
"Nice clock," said Laverne. She'd gotten a good look at it, close up, and she was pretty sure this was the same grandfather clock that had once led down to Doctor Fred's old lab. A nearby plaque just about confirmed this: 'This four-hundred-year-old clock is an amusing example of primitive human timekeeping.'
"Rather. No one is to touch it, especially humans. Now, be off with you!" said the tentacle irritably.
Dismissed, Laverne turned away. The three humans were seated right in front of her. Seen from behind and far away, she hadn't known what to make of them. She still didn't.
The three humans were eached dressed as brightly and gaudily as possible. Laverne was reminded of prize-winning dogs, dolled up for a show.
Two of the humans, sitting up straight on the far end of the couch, looked straight ahead with wide eyes and frozen smiles. One wore a green satiny dress, the other some mock Napoleonic uniform. Veterans of the human show circuit, their eyelids did not blink, at all. Laverne tried to get their attention, but it was useless.
The third human sat slightly apart, and was the most striking of the three. Tall and thin, he was dressed in skin-tight purple tights, a tutu and a low-cut sweater. He had an enormous tornado of soft blue-green hair, whirled up in a cone around his head, in which were hung gold tinsel decorations. He did not smile inanely like the other two people. His long, perfect face held an expression of confidence and readiness.
He was totally unlike any human Laverne had ever seen, but in this tentacle-dominated world she was glad for any contact. "Hi," she said. "My name's Laverne. I'm a sophomore."
"My name's Harold," said Harold, in his effeminate voice. "I'm a thoroughbred."
Laverne looked around. "What are you, uh, guys waiting for?"
"We're all waiting for the human show to begin, of course," said Harold. "If your owner's going to enter you, they'd better get you some name tags, quick. But then again, why bother? My owner says I'm going to win. I'm the most beautiful human there is." He ruffled the back of his bouffant hair, smiling like the cat with the cream.
"That's quite a tutu you've got there," said Laverne.
"Thank you," said Harold. "My owner paid quite a lot of money for it. My owner buys me anything I want." Harold sounded most pleased about this.
"Where is your owner?" asked Laverne.
"He's not here right now: but he would be, if he in any way possibly could. His bus broke down in Pittsburgh, so he's stuck there with the other owners. This is the first show I've ever done... alone."
"Is your hair naturally blue?" asked Laverne.
"Natural? How gauche! This took several very expensive sessions at a posh grooming salon! I've got the hair competition in the bag!"
"Well, then, good luck," said Laverne.
"Who needs luck when you've got beauty?" said Harold.
Laverne walked away. Not toward the front door, or the stairs (both being guarded), but to the double doors at the far end of the lobby. She was going deeper into the mansion.

The double doors whooshed up as she approached. Once, this area had been the conference room of the Maniac Mansion hotel. Now, it was a curving, metallic corridor. Two doorways, nearby, led off the passage. One, Laverne remembered, led straight back to the kennel. She was not going that way.
Neither did Laverne want to try the second door, just yet. Instead, she followed the passageway. On her left was a wide, open fireplace, jutting out slightly from the wall. It was built from metal, and its sides were completely bare of soot. What the purpose of this fireplace was Laverne could not guess at (it looked more like the end of a huge vacuum hose), but the chimney still led straight up to the roof - she could see faint daylight, reflected down the bore.
The curving passage led her around the fireplace, and here was a blue tentacle, sitting at a desk and looking away from her, to a tiny tentacle-shaped window in the wall.
Laverne stopped, but didn't slink back the way she came. This tentacle didn't look that threatening - in fact, from behind, he looked a little bit like her Uncle Reggie. Even the tentacle guard at the clock had let her be, so maybe she should find out what this tentacle was doing here.
So Laverne stepped forward. "Hi," she said, "I'm La-"
The tentacle turned, and his eyebrows literally jumped. "Woo-ee!" he said loudly. "You are one ugly human!"
"Excuse me?" said Laverne.
"Man, I'm not kidding. You are just about the homeliest homo sapien I've ever seen!"
Laverne's initial fear was slowly turning into embarrassment and anger. "Are you trying to tell me something?" she said.
"Yeah. You're a real woof," said the tentacle emphatically. "I mean, your hair alone is going to give me nightmares. Not to mention your teeth, your clothes, your one eye that's bigger than the other..."
"Gee, how much worse could I get?" said Laverne. This deluge of insults was most unsettling.
"Not much, unless there were two of you," said the tentacle.
"Thanks. You ain't so hot yourself," said Laverne, trying to redress the balance.
The tentacle was equal to the task. "I never said I was, but sheesh! Have you taken a look at yourself lately?" His nose literally wrinkled with distaste.
"I guess I'd better just go shoot myself, then," said Laverne glumly.
"Oh, you don't have to do that!" the tentacle assured her. "We have staff here that can do that for you. The doctor monitoring the human show, in fact, is a specialist in the field."
That was gratifying to know. "Where I come from, I happen to be quite the babe," said Laverne. This wasn't strictly true, but this tentacle had gotten her back up.
"You mean the kennel?" scoffed the tentacle. "That doesn't say much. Everyone in there is a human show reject!"
"I think I'm going to kill you," said Laverne slowly.
"Now, now," chided the tentacle. "You're never going to get into the human show with that attitude. Not to mention that face," he added.
A sudden determination hardened within Laverne. She was going to enter this human show. And she was going to win it. And when she'd won it, she'd come back to this tentacle and rub his face in the certificate.
She grinned at the tentacle, showing slightly too many teeth. "Human show!?! Hot dang! Sign me up!"
"Sorry, humans can't sign themselves up, no matter how ugly they are," said the tentacle. "Go ask your owner to sign you up. Ask them to sign you up for a haircut while they're at it. The winner gets dinner for two at Club Tentacle."
"Why would I want to go there?"
"Not you," said the tentacle despairingly. "Your owner! Oh, forget it."
Laverne could not take any more of this. "Well, I gotta go arrange your death now," she said.
"You really should get some professional help," said the tentacle evenly.
"I already have a therapist."
"I was thinking more like a beautician."
Laverne walked away, her right hand holding the handle of her scalpel, in her pocket. She was sorely tempted to whip it out then and there and do something grievous to the tentacle, but this wasn't the place to cause a scene. Besides which, she and her therapist had an agreement.
She went through the second doorway, the one next to the kennel door. It brought her into a gloomy room of high-tech equipment.
By the door, on her right, was a huge cubic machine with a familiar red triangle logo on its side. This was the Recyclatron. They might be oppressive and power-mad, but at least the tentacles recycled stuff.
Near the Recyclatron was the largest microwave Laverne had ever seen. It had three settings: Cook, Jet Defrost, and Mutilate Beyond Recognition.
And then Laverne came to the most interesting machine of all. She saw three circular holes, set into the wall, and a green monochrome monitor. The labels were intriguing. One hole was labelled "Opener." The one next to it said "Remove specimen here." And the top hole, although hard to read, definitely said something about a rhesus monkey.
Laverne, her interest piqued, looked at the changing display of the monitor. It was labelled "Medula-oblongator." Jagged lines jumped up and down on the monitor, like an EKG reading.
There was no further clue as to how to operate the machine, however, and reluctantly Laverne moved on.
Here was a small door. Laverne tried it.
Instantly, she was out of the world of metal, and in a small, warm laundry room. A tiny forty-watt globe gave what little illumination there was, the rest coming from between the lattices of a nearby window.
It was like entering a time warp. There was a laundry machine, a plain recognisable human laundry machine. It was busted up good. Above the broken laundry machine were some empty washing powder boxes. The floor was that hideous orange and white tiling pattern Laverne remembered from the present-day Mansion, albeit thick with dirt.
In one corner was a pink storage cabinet. Laverne looked inside, but it was empty. Next to the cabinet was a dryer, which looked to be in working condition. It, too, was empty.
Laverne couldn't work out what was going on here. It was as if the room hadn't been used in two hundred years. But no dust, and no smell.
Eventually, she realised the importance of the window. An escape route! She came to the window, and looked for a latch. None. Frustrated, Laverne pounded on the glass. It hardly shook. She even tried making a discreet hole with her scalpel, but the glass was seemingly bulletproof.
Laverne sighed. She was out of options. She sat down on the dryer (in defiance of a yellowing sign) and thought about things. Eventually, she came to a decision, and stood up. Slowly, she walked back to the kennel.

The kennel guard was most surprised to see her at his door. "Hey!" he said sharply. "How did you get out?"
He flipped the switch on the electric barrier. "Get back in there!" Obediently, Laverne walked into her cell. Not much had changed in here. Zedna and Ved were still gloomily playing cards, and Zed sat on his own, not doing much.
"I wish Dr. Tentacle would stop losing patients!" muttered the guard. To Laverne, he said, "Don't escape again!" He hit the switch, and the barrier was restored.
Laverne waited a few minutes. The guard flipped through his book. Zed stared at nothing. The only sound was the flip of cards, and the occasional grunt, as Zedna and Ved each cheated at poker.
After five minutes, Laverne spoke up, feeling confident enough to talk at ordinary volume. To Zed, she said, "What's this about a human show?"
"It's a degrading farce!" said Zed violently. "That's what it is! These slimy tentacles put humans in humiliating little costumes... do sickening things to their hair... and then force them to parade their ridiculous 'talents' in front of unqualified judges who were paid off weeks in advance!"
"Didn't get in, eh?" said Laverne slyly.
"They said macramé wasn't a talent... pointy-headed goons," muttered Zed.
"I heard that," said the kennel guard, looking up.
"Yeah, me too," said Zed.
Laverne stood up, and came as close as she dared to the barrier. This was a gamble, but it might just work. "Yoo-hoo! Mr. Tentacle Guy!" she said.
"What?"
"I have to go to the bathroom!" said Laverne.
The guard laughed. "Ha, that's a good one! Imagine, a human using a bathroom!" He jumped down from his chair, flipping the barrier switch. "Come on, let's take a walk."

Laverne was led outside, to the lawn area in front of the Mansion. The tentacle guard sat nearby, on a chair he'd brought with him. "Okay, human - do your business," he said, then returned to his novel.
She looked around, at the gentle curves of the surrounding hillside. There were no fences or barriers in sight. She could run for it. Maybe. It didn't much matter, anyway. She didn't want to be stuck two hundred years in the future, in a world dominated by tentacles.
Laverne walked away, anyway, along the concrete path leading around the side of the Mansion. She was heading for the Chron-O-John.
And here it was, in a tiny cul-de-sac of lawn, fenced on three sides. Now that the cherry tree was gone (Laverne still didn't know how this had come about), the yard was a little bare. There was just the Chron-O-John, that squat machine, bastard offspring of a jukebox, refrigerator and outdoor latrine, its power-in cord coiled up on the lawn.
Laverne looked down at that cord, and felt a dull thump of unease. It was short. The Mansion was at least five metres away, at its closest point. And the Chron-O-John was far too heavy to move.
Which meant Laverne was stuck here, for the foreseeable future.
Not very hopeful, Laverne looked at the Mansion. She was around the side, well away from the front door, and there were no other entrances. Just those ubiquitous tentacle-shaped windows.
Then she saw something unusual. Down at ground level was a plain ordinary rectangular window. Laverne bent down and peered through.
Her pulse quickened. She could see Doctor Fred's old lab! And his generator was still there!
Laverne whispered, "Hello? Anybody there?" There was no reply.
She got up and brushed her knees. Boy, could I use that power, thought Laverne. But I'd never get through this window.
Another thing became clear. The grandfather clock being guarded inside still led down to the old lab. That was why it was being guarded!
Still standing by the window, Laverne looked back at the Chron-O-John. Yes, the cord was far too short. So she'd need an extension... A plan was starting to form in Laverne's mind. Well, not really a plan: more a set of goals she had to achieve.
But if this was going to work, she'd need absolute freedom to roam the Mansion.
Laverne remembered now why she'd come out here in the first place. She went and stood in front of the Chron-O-John. From one pocket came the tentacle diagram. She knew, from what she'd overheard of Doctor Fred, that Hoagie was stuck four hundred years in the past. It was time to see if she knew her history.
Through the streams of time, Laverne flushed it.

For ten minutes Hoagie had stood patiently by the Chron-O-John, when it suddenly glowed. Hoagie came forward and looked inside. There was a piece of paper in there, all folded up. Hoagie took it, slightly curious, and unfolded the paper. "Looks like a paint-by-numbers picture of sushi," he said critically.
From the Chron-O-John came the voice of Laverne, disconnected from her body and given an ethereal, floaty quality. "Hoagie."
Hoagie immediately forgot the paper. "Laverne? Is that you?"
"Yes. Hoagie, I want you to get that chart used as the flag design."
Hoagie remembered the paper. "This thing?"
The voice of Laverne had fallen silent.
"Uh, Laverne?" said Hoagie quickly. "I, uh, need you to open a time capsule and flush the stuff to me. You can probably use this or something." He flushed her the can opener. Laverne took it without comment.
After a moment, Hoagie started off for the Mansion.
Soon he was at the door of the hard-working Betsy Ross. She seemed to be in an even blacker mood. "Those founding fathers are driving me nuts!" she raved. "Flag design changes every five minutes! I'll never get out of here. At this point, I don't care what the flag looks like."
The treadle clattered up and down. "Well, as soon as I'm done with this, I'm making them a flag, ready or not! Then it's, 'Bye-bye Betsy!'"
Hoagie didn't even want to announce his presence. He walked carefully to the table, bowing down under its load of designs, and placed the tentacle chart on the very top. Hoagie started to walk toward Betsy Ross, to alert her to the new design.
"Back off or get stitched!" yelled Betsy Ross. Hoagie quickly stepped back and left the room.
Downstairs, the hard work of drafting the Constitution continued apace:
John Hancock had come up with an idea. "How about an amendment that the president has to be a human being?" he suggested.
"Please, this is serious business," said Jefferson.
Hancock thought for a moment. "You're right."

Laverne, her work done, returned to the guard. "Yoo-hoo, Mr. Tentacle Guy," she said, getting his attention.
"It's about time!"
Not too much later, she was safely ensconced back in the kennel. Now, she again spoke up. Coming forward, she looked at the guard with bloodshot eyes. "Oooh... I don't feel too good..." she moaned.
"Again?" said the guard dubiously. But he still allowed her to be taken to Doctor Tentacle. After a brief examination, in which the Doctor could find nothing wrong, Laverne was left alone in his examination room.
She waited precisely one minute, then walked out and turned right. She was back in the passage, those two doors at one end, the fireplace in the middle, and Uncle Reggie on the far side.
Seeing that tentacle again, the blood rose to her head and she forgot her purpose for the moment. Laverne stepped forward.
"Is it too late to register for the human show?" she asked innocently.
The tentacle turned and saw her. "For you? Much, much too late. Why don't you beat it now? I've got a lot of standing around to do."
Laverne eyed the sheets of paper in front of him. "Uh, the guard-guy wants to see you in the kennel. He said to just leave all your stuff here." She waited.
The tentacle was suspicious. "Which guard? What's his name?"
"Just get your butt in there," said Laverne. "That's his name."
"What a coincidence - that's my name!"
"Really?"
"Of course not! Now, beat it."
Laverne was not giving up. She was going to be in this human show. "Could I register another human for the show?" she asked.
The tentacle was getting more and more exasperated. "You can't do anything! You are a human! This is a tentacle's world! Don't you get it? Only tentacles can own property, only tentacles can vote, and only tentacles can register humans in the show!"
"I'll ruin the show for everybody if you don't let me in," Laverne threatened.
"You'd ruin it for everybody if I did," said the tentacle.
"When's the show going to start?"
"We're still waiting for one more human to fill the last stall," said the tentacle.
"I'll fill it!" said Laverne eagerly.
"With what? Don't answer that."
Laverne gave up. She backed away, outwardly looking disappointed, inwardly feeling hopeful. Reggie didn't know it, but very soon the tables would be turned.
She stood in front of the fireplace. It had a huge opening, nearly five feet high. She looked up and saw a similarly voluminous chimney. It all looked pretty good. She stepped forward, ducking her head into the fireplace, and scrambled up the chimney.
Carried upward by sheer energy rather than careful ascent, seconds later Laverne poked her head out into the clear sunshine. Cool breaths of air floated past her face. She wriggled out of the chimney, which seemed to bend and curve around her like rubber, despite being made of metal.
Above was the blue sky; below the verdant green of the Mansion surrounds; all around was the ring of hills and, far off, purple mountains. For someone with a fear of heights, the view would have brought on a fierce attack of vertigo - fortunately Laverne wasn't afraid of heights.
She still had to be careful, though, for the Mansion's roof was a sloping, multi-peaked thing on which you could easily lose your footing if you weren't careful. Around here, however, the sloping was minimal, and she could stand with some confidence. On her left the roof did jut up, sloping sharply, and in this slope were two tentacle-shaped windows. On her right was a ten metre drop to the ground. The space between was nearly flat, and about a metre wide.
Along this narrow path Laverne walked, finally coming to a sturdy metal stand, a pole about two metres long, and hanging at the end of it, blowing in the slight breeze, the American flag.
Not the American flag you or I or the whole world knows so well. Betsy Ross had done her job very well, and what fluttered before Laverne resembled nothing so much as a red and white windsock, over a metre long. Three blue felt circles were arranged in a line - the suckers.
Laverne cranked the flag down from the top of the pole and pulled it off. Just her size. Tentacle disguise in hand, she jumped up and pulled herself into the chimney. The downward journey was as easy as the upward one - easier, even, as all she had to do this time was fall. Laverne thumped to ground in the bottom of the fireplace, and yanked herself out.
She furtively looked left and right. Nobody in sight except for Reggie, who was looking in the other direction. Satisfied she was not being watched, Laverne pulled the tentacle flag over her head.
There was no opening for the head. Laverne solved this by straining upward, and finally breaking off the top blue felt circle. Her head, unkempt blonde hair and all, poked out from the top sucker.
It was not the perfect disguise. Her arms were visible from the shoulder down. Her bony legs could also be seen, below the bottom of the flag. And of course the prominence of the head spoke for itself. But it would have to do.
Feeling very pleased at her ingenuity, Laverne approached the tentacle. He turned, and boggled as he had before. This time, however, the expression on his face was quite different.
"Hello," said Laverne. Maintaining a sober face, she nevertheless could barely keep herself from giggling. "I'm a tentacle. I'd like to enter my insignificant human in the show."
The tentacle just about fell over himself to agree. "Oh, my. Yes, yes. Of course. Take these tags, put them on your human, and have them wait on the bench in the lobby. Entrants will be judged in three categories: Best smile, best hair, and best laugh."
Laverne took the tags, a large smile on her face. "Thank you, fellow tentacle," she said expansively. "Unlike humans, you have been very useful."
The tentacle grew flustered. "Oh, uh, thank you. Believe me, it was my pleasure."
Laverne walked away, clutching the entrance tag defiantly. Behind her, the tentacle wiped his brow. "Yowza! That was one good lookin' tentacle!"
The tentacle disguise had worked beyond all expectations. Buoyed, Laverne entered the lobby. She crossed to the tentacle guard, still standing patiently by the clock. "Hi, I'm Laverne," said Laverne.
"'Laverne', eh?" said the guard. "Curious name for a tentacle, I must say. Are you here for the show?"
"Yes, that's right," agreed Laverne.
"It's the big event of the day," said the guard enthusiastically. "There are some jolly good prizes to be won. Why, the grand prize is a dinner for two at Club Tentacle!"
"Nice clock," said Laverne, looking rather unsubtly at it.
"Yes, it's a valuable antique. I'd like to show it to you, but I'm presently charged with the task of guarding it. No one will get near it while I'm here!"
The first rip appeared in Laverne's balloon of good spirit. "Couldn't I please touch the clock?" she pleaded.
"Sorry, no. No one touches the clock while I'm on duty. I'm under strict orders from tentacle number one... the almighty elder... the grand poobah, Purple Tentacle, not to let anyone near this clock."
"But I have rights! I'm a tentacle!"
"And a darned attractive one, I might add. I'm sorry. But no one gets to this clock while I'm here, and unless I have to go chase down some escaped humans, I'm glued to this spot!" He stood there, implacable.
"Rats!" said Laverne. She turned to the three humans, still sitting patiently on their couch. "You heard the man! Escape!" she urged.
"You're talking to the wrong people," said Harold complacently. "We like it here. We're celebrities."
Behind her, the guard suddenly piped up. "I say, have I told you about the time I tracked an escaped human to Madagascar?" he said. "He had stowed away aboard a tuna boat you see, and I narrowly missed stopping it leaving port. Unfortunately, the only other available transport was a rowboat, so I-"
Laverne broke off the story as diplomatically as possible. "Aren't you curious about what's inside the clock?" she asked.
"Not really," said the guard. "Guarding it is more or less the same no matter what's inside. I say, have I told you about the time I was nearly caught in a wheat thresher? I had tracked a renegade human to a farm in Iowa. There was a dummy in the field which was presumably meant to scare away crows or thieves. Anyway, the amusing bit is that-"
Laverne interrupted. "You're quite a tracker, aren't you?"
"Rather," said the guard. "I always get my man, no matter how long it takes. Like the time I tracked a human all the way to the North Pole. He was a short one, I remember, with curiously pointed ears. I had to eat my sled dogs by the time I caught up with him. He had holed up in a workshop there, and there was a fat human in a rather garish red suit who-"
Laverne just wanted to know one thing. Despite the setback, she already had the glimmerings of a plan in mind. "Has anybody ever escaped from this place?" she asked.
"Some try once in a while, but I always fetch them back," said the guard confidently. "That's my primary duty here, and I take it very seriously. I always get my man, no matter how long it takes. Why, I once trailed a renegade human for six days. He led me clear through the hills and up to the top of those mountains to the west. You couldn't possibly imagine the horrible things I had to eat to survive!"
"Grub and maggot salad?" suggested Laverne. "Putrefied squirrel intestines? Pieces of your own body?" She wasn't really paying attention.
The guard was horrified. "Good heavens!" Shocked, he broke off the conversation. Laverne's further attempts to get his attention had no success. She looked around, but those three relentlessly cheery humans on the couch were just too depressing to talk to. How could they just sit there? Why weren't they rushing as one to kick the tentacles out? Laverne didn't understand.
All of a sudden, she got angry. Laverne strode forward and stood in front of the woman in the satiny green dress. Laverne shoved her hand into the coiffured mess of the woman's hair and rubbed it around, ruining the style. Then she stood back. The woman just sat there, smiling vacantly, not even bothering to fix the mess. "Come on!" raved Laverne. "Get insulted! Aren't you gonna punch me in the face?"
She turned her attention to the human on the right, the Napoleonic figure. Laverne stepped forward and tweaked his military decorations around. "How d'ya like that, eh? Going to do something about it?"
Laverne stood back and waited. Neither human moved.
"I thought not," she said, grimly satisfied. What has become of humanity? she wondered, as she headed for the kennel.

The lonely, bored guard on kennel duty was very surprised to have a visitor. He nearly flipped out of his chair as Laverne, now disguised as a tentacle, appeared in the doorway.
"Say, cutie!" he said.
"How's it going, Mr. Tentacle Guy?" asked Laverne. She was here mainly because of something the tentacle guard outside had said - that his main job was to capture escaped humans. Now maybe she, in her tentacle disguise, could persuade the kennel guard to leave his post.
"Oh, same as ever," said the guard, in his can't-really-complain-but-I'd-sure-like-to voice. "I'm broke, hate my job, etc."
Laverne looked at him, a little puzzled. "Don't you recognise me?"
"Uh... no... I- Hey! Aren't you the waitress from Club Tentacle? I love that place! I'd be there right now if I weren't flat broke. What brings a hot tentacle babe like you to a dump like this?"
Laverne swallowed her pride. Putting on her best sultry voice, she said, "I'm, uh, here to see you, big boy."
The guard's eyes jumped. "Really?!? Well, what are you doing for dinner? How about Club Tentacle?" Suddenly the light went out of his face. "Oh, what am I saying... I can't afford to take out the trash, let alone a classy babe like you." He sighed.
This was all very off-putting for Laverne. It was pretty hard just to get fellow humans interested in her, but here in the future tentacles seemed to be falling over themselves for her favours. Which raised the question... actually, Laverne didn't want to know what questions it raised. Let alone the answers.
All this aside, the guard was still at his post. Fortunately, Laverne had a backup plan. She looked at the Edisons and said, "I'm looking for a pet." Zed looked back at her and Laverne thought she saw him recognise her.
The guard's voice was laced with regret - he didn't want to turn this beautiful tentacle down twice. "Sorry, honey. You came to the wrong place. These three are problem humans: disobedient, downright surly."
Zed spoke up. "He's just jealous 'cause we got opposable thumbs!" he cackled.
"Someday you will accept tentacles as your masters!" said the guard, glaring at Zed..
"Ha! You losers can't even ride tricycles!"
The guard looked apologetically at Laverne. "You see why no one wants them as pets?"
"Bite me, tentacle," said Zed defiantly. The guard's frown grew deeper. "Oh, go suck your thumb," continued Zed. "Whoops, I forgot! You don't have one!" Zed chuckled.
"Er," said Laverne. "Well, I guess I'll be going, then."
"Hey, I don't want to be here either," protested the guard. But Laverne was gone.

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