h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

ARTHUR: I am the very model of a modern Major-General,
I've information vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I know the kings of England, and I quote the fights
historical
From Marathon to Waterloo, in order categorical;
I'm very well acquainted, too, with matters
mathematical,
I understand equations, both the simple and
quadratical,
About binomial theorem I'm teeming with a lot o' news,
With many cheerful facts about the square of the
hypotenuse.

MERLIN: Arthur?

ARTHUR: Mmm?

MERLIN: Never do that again.

To emphasize the point lucy kneed arthur in the groin. Since arthur still had magic it caused him to unknowingly perform some. The entire group was transported into a closet, somewhere in the world.

"I'm scared of the dark." Cinderella said.
"Well, why don't we open the door?" someone suggested. It was Possibly Arthur.

Death tried, but it was locked, and made of reinforced steal.

"Why don't you go out my way?" asked a voice in the corer.

"Who are you?"

"The Boogeyman. Look, you're making this a crowded closet, so just get out. I'm supposed to haunt some dino named Arnold, and you're not letting me do it very well."

Before our heroes could yelp in recognition, the monster pulled a lever, and they fell through a trap door.

"You can come back in a few hours. Until then, I have to make "bump" noises."

They slid through a tube before landing in a dark dungeon, that was suprisingly well decorated. The group sat on the beautifully ornate chairs while sipping some tea and eating various snacks. It was later explained to them that this was the boogeyman waiting room which was well furnished and stocked with food after the boogeymen went on strike against management.

After a few hours of screaming from upstairs, the boogeyman reappeared.

"I hope you're comfortable. We have a bad reputation, and rarely get visitors, so . . . hey, you're the group that's trying to get to the end of that road!"

"Well, yes, but there's this factory . . ."

"Never mind that, a friend of mine has been waiting for you here for a while."

Just then, Liz entered and said . . .

..."I'm not that interesting a character, so I am going to kill myself" Just then she drew a knife and stabbed herself and her body evaporated.

Just then Liz walked out from behind a curtain and said "isn't that the coolest trick you've ever seen?"

The group was a bit dumfounded and introduced liz to cinderella the gnat.

Liz said hello to Cinderella. About now, the boogeyman was getting tired, so everyone else left that room, and entered a large cavern which the boogeyman used as a front lawn.

"I've been doing some research," Liz said, "And if we follow this tunnel, it should lead us to the end of the yellow brick road. I actually think that we're about twelve miles away, so let's get going."

Now if we go back to arthur's child hood (and I guess technically death's also but that doesn't matter right now) then we can see him lagging behind all the other children at school as they ran their daily laps. It wasn't so much that he was slow but he had terrible endurance and after walking 12 yards he was taking a twelve minute break every three feet. The others were really annoyed. Death hovered and had no trouble, cinderella flew, and Lucy used to be on the track team so they were are running circles around him. (did i forget anyone?)

"Hey!" said Merlin. "I used to be on the track team at wizardry school! Don't make such a big deal about Lucy."
Lucy glared at him. "You think you can beat me? Bear in mind you don't have magic powers anymore."
"Yes."
"You're on."
"Arthur, will you do the honors?"
*wheeze* *cough*
"Okay...how about Dea... never mind. Liz?"

"Er... I wasn't payiing attention. You said you, er... wanted a cup of tea, right?" said Liz. "English Breakfast or Earl Grey? I think Earl Grey tastes like soapsuds myself..."

"Really?" Liz said. "I always thought they tasted like moth balls, myself, and . . ."
"I'm ready to go now." Arthur commented.

This was a mild annoyance, but Merlin and Lucy decided to race anyway. Unfortunately . . .

... they were both a little over competitive. To make a long story short (we're about 200 posts past that happening) Merlin and Lucy were checked out of the hospital (convienently placed in the tunnel) two days later and continued on their journey again. At first they were making good time until ...

...a gam of mauve weasels appeared riding unicycles made entirely out of bob evans breakfast sausage and juggling rubber chickens whilst reciting the entire works of Shakspeare starting with the comedy of errors.

"An ambush!" Liz shouted, after listening to The Comedy Of Errors and half of Hamlet.

"It's the return of the running jokes!" Merlin screamed. Merlin, not usually a screaming person, provoked much laughter from everyone then. This gave him time to think of a plan, which was . . .

...to join a circus and perform ridiculously dangerous stunts. Then he remembered how old he was and decided it probably wasn't such a great idea. As the weasels were reaching mid Romeo & Juliet, Cinderella realized something. They didn't have to sit here and wait for the weasels to finish, they could just keep on walking. She explained this to the group for about twenty minutes and finally just pushed them away from the weasels (pretty tough for a gnat).

Suddenly, and for no particular reason, all of the mitochondria in all of Arthur's cells released all of the energy they had stored in them at exactly the same time. This had the consequence of causing Arthur to spontaneously burst into flames and run around screaming for exactly forty-seven point six seconds. He would have done it for longer, but that was the exact time at which the flames reached his brain and caused it to stop sending signals telling him to continue running around screaming. As a consequence of this, his body, lacking instructions to the contrary, fell over and quietly sizzled.

Just then one of those annoying people who reads too much into simple stories started pointing things out. Like if all his cells burst into flames then he wouldn't be running around and his brain would be toast instantly. Everyone told this person to shutup and enjoy the story. Just then Lucy fell face first onto arthurs sizzled corpse and demanded they stop at a motel for cleanup. They left arthur's body where it was and did as Lucy said. Then the group of Lucy, Merlin, Death, and Cinderella woke up the next day and started back down the tunnel seemingly ignoring that Emperor Dark Nugget was about to kill Villain #1.

However, they didn't get very far before the Dutch Royal Family decided to interfer in the story again...

... they walked up to our heroes and started talking about how they all had an odd feeling that in a weird story involving frogs a villain was in danger. Our heroes ignored them and continued walking. Just then a member of the Royal family started making an odd whirring noise. Electricity started shooting through his body and everyone stopped to see what was going on. The electricity got more and more intence until finally he was just a human shaped piece of purple lightning. Suddenly the electricity shot out in all directions knocking everyone over. When the smoke cleared everyone realized that Arthur had miraculously appeared in the Dutch man's place thus re-entering the story.

Then all of his cellular membranes simultaneously ruptured (again for no particular reason, and certainly not one connected to him bursting into flames earlier) and he slowly oozed down his own skeleton. With no flesh to hold it in place, his skeleton collapsed into the ooze that was formerly Arthur, leaving only a viscous slime with bones in it where once stood the possible king of Camelot.