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

No, why, has my spelling gone out again?

Okay, that's one disaster averted. Glad I hired Red to be our villain, or this might've become a boring mission. Anyway, turn on the Mangar theme music, and we'll prepare to leave this system.

*Some "Weird Al" music begins playing*

No, no, not that. Here, lemme see . . .

*Runs over to CD player, pulls out all music*

Let's see . . . Al, Al, Al, Al, Tom Lehrer . . . maybe. Anyone in the mood for "Dr. Demento's Greatest Hits"? No?

*Rummages through the discs some more*

Okay, I know that I packed that theme music. This is a pretty dilemma. How can we proceed without our theme music? We might have to write our own if we don't find any soon!

~The Raven (AKA the Rave) slowly cruises past, blaring her own theme music mockingly on large speakers. It's a techno/metal rendition of "In the Hall of the Mountain King".~

*Shoots a near deadly blast of polka music from the Mangar's main speakers. The polka travels through the vacuum, slams into the Raven, and disables it for two posts*

Someone remind me to get to work on installing weapons that shoot polka at our enemies. Now, where is it . . . ah, here it is.

*Puts in the theme music for the Mangar, and goes to the Vorticon System at Ridiculous speeds. Stops just short of Ludicrous*

After all, we don't want to go plaid, do we?

My name is ALUNDRA, Not Aundra, Crome.
I Said the question so I could seem like i was working in school while actually speaking to you guys.
And Chrome, I love Uzis too.

Ok, is everyone back on board? Ready to leave? Of course, there is no sign of Irving - all searches have turned up no trace. I don't understand it, but perhaps he caught a shuttle back to the space station for some reason (left his stove on or something). Anyway, we have no choice but to leave without him. And the 2 missing ships. Perhaps he went on ahead with the two ships to scout for us, although I'm sure he would have told us if he was intending to do so.

Well, in Irv's absence, I can man the navigation console. What course, captain?

Wait a minute. Never mind. It's already programmed. Along with a Polka blast and a pie release.

Righto, we're off, at Ridiculous Speed.

What IS the theme tune? Mine's this rather natty MOD i've got called 12th Warrior.

Oh, and Ridiculous speed is too slow.

"Evil will triumph over good, because good is dumb" - SpaceBalls

My theme tune is Bruce Springsteen's "Born to Run"

Sorry, about the spelling, Alundra. I often make mstiakes wehn tpying...

*Puts theme tune on his headphones. Sings along tunelessly*
"Baby we were Born to Ruuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuun..." Da-ding da-ding!

Let's find a speed above Ludicrous. With the aid of a thesaurus

Our theme music is ... it's officially something with a lot of trumpet fanfares and stuff. But I suppose whatever you're listening to at home will have to do.

I'm currently listening to "Christmas At Ground Zero".

Okay then. We've just entered the Vorticon system. Now, I know that we said we would stop, but the Raven is due to be after us any moment now. Since we have no necessary repairs to be made, and are all fueled up (Risa and Vorticon are practically right next to each other), we'll continue onward.

This may be the first really dangerous part of the mission. Garius? Set a course for the Rodentar System!

*An ominous chord is played from the PA speakers*

*Looks up the coordinates in the star map on the navigation computer. Punches in the coordinates on the console.*

That should do it. Oops, wait a minute.

*Calculates hyperspace dialation correction and keys in corrected coordinates.*

Ok, all ready for the jump to hyperspace. I would suggest we raise shields to half power as a precaution before we come out of hyperspace, though.

Good idea, GL. And just to be safe, let's get to work on the polka guns. The Rodentars might've started to expect our snowzars and sleetzars by now. Let's start experimenting with this.

*Sets the CD player for "Polka Your Eyes Out" by "Weird Al"*

We need our weapons officer to design us some mega death speakers for that. I have a few ideas I could give her ...

Looks at the console which keeps an eye on the Engine. Someone (or something) has scrawled all over it in lipstick in a childish hand*

*reads (with difficulty)* Find the King and Queen of Philadelphia. Find them and bring them to me...

*shrugs and wipes it from the screen*

All engine sytems nominal. Preparing to engage hyperdrive!

*Leans forward in the captains chair and points at the forward view screen*

Engage! Hey, I've always wanted to say that.

Did someone say the weapon's officer is needed? *approaches GL with a glow in her eyes* What kind of mega death speakers are we talking about here?

*steps in with a biG box*

I found this one with german "Volksmusik", this is more selective then polka, because it contains so much happieness, that really EVIL can't resist its deadly !

*grabs one of the disks and reads* "Marianne & Michael"

uuuuuuuhh ... i.e. this heavy stuff ... for us its just unpleasant (we all a little bit evil, aren't we?!) but as more evil the target is ...

I think you understand

AXR

In SpaceBalls: The Movie there are three speeds.
HyperSpeed
Ridiculous Speed
Ludicrous Speed

Stopping at Ludicrous speed without seatbelts results in Mick Morranis (Dark Helmet) being catapulted into a wall.

Hence the quote....

Well, Alien, the speakers should be able to output incredibly loud sounds in a tightly focused beam. We did something like that at Crater Labs Inc in the form of a handgun, but here we need something much bigger. We will also need mountings outside the ships and aiming and firing mechanisms. You may need some extras to help string wires and to go outside the ship and mount the things and test them. Affy has donated two polka medleys from Weird Al Yankovik for ammunition.

AXR, thanks for the back-up ammunition. Our tests at Crater Labs found polka to have the most wide-spread aversion reaction, but your stuff sounds like it would work well too. We'll keep it in reserve. Especially since you say it works best against evil and if it ever backfired, Affy and I could be in big trouble (we're members of S.T.U.M.P.E.D. too).

And I have a very uneasy feeling about entering the Rodentar system. These feelings are usually quite accurate, so I am going to change our course slightly, just before coming out of hyperspace, so that we come out 3 parsecs to the left of where we would have come out. That will put us just behind the pluto-shaped moon of the Disney planet. And I hope those new Polka-cannons are mounted by then - I think we will need them.