[MST] - Mistaken Identity by Jeri Massi [3/4]
C. Glenwood Williams
rec.arts.tv.mst3k.misc, alt.tv.mst3k.mstings, and alt.drwho.creative as
well as to Web Site #9. If you are reading this post on any other
newsgroup, then it has been reposted, most likely without the original
author's consent or knowledge.
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>
>Two days later, the lab at UNIT HQ was quiet when the Doctor cautiously
>poked his head outside the TARDIS door.
TOM: And it appears the Doctor has seen his shadow, signalling three more
weeks of PBS pledge drives.
> He glanced back inside the
>control room and gestured that the person inside should wait before
>following him out.
MIKE: Forgetting of course that she now had the brain of a rabbit.
> He darted out and made a beeline for the lab doors,
>to lock them. But he was moments too late. Just as he nearly had his
>hand out with the key,
TOM: So he's actually fumbling around in his pocket looking for the ring.
Not what I'd call "moments too late."
> the left door swung open and the Brigadier strode
>in.
CROW [John Cleese]: Sorry, chicken's off.
>
>"Doctor! Back from your test run already?" he asked. "How's the pump,
>eh?"
CROW: See? I'm ignoring that line completely.
>
>The Doctor jumped back and backed up all the way to the TARDIS.
>
>"Needs a bit of work," he said quickly. "Look, Brigadier, I'm in a bit
>of a mess, and I really need to close off the lab--"
MIKE [Doctor]: Do you know of a good kennel?
>
>"What are you so jumpy for?" the Brigadier asked, striding after him.
>"Where's Miss Grant?"
CROW [Doctor]: She's naked- I mean, she's not naked, she's um, pining for
the fjords.
>
>"Oh, just inside the TARDIS, finishing up a few figs--" He placeded
>himself in front of the open TARDIS door, blocking it.
>
>The Brigadier cocked an eyebrow. "Figs? Is she fond of figs? Look here,
>Doctor,
CROW: Woo! Shift in the conversation flow, here!
> I can't do much if you want to go gallivanting off 'round the
>universe, but we do need to talk about Miss Grant. She has been assigned
>to UNIT, and I'm answerable for her safety."
TOM: On top of that, she's hot. So where is she?
>
>In spite of the pressures of the moment, the Doctor became indignant.
MIKE: One of Pertwee's few *good* emotions.
TOM: I liked Pertwee!
>"What do you mean? She's perfectly safe with me. I look after her very
>well." Something crinkled. The Brigadier looked down.
>
>"I say!" the he exclaimed. "There's a hand in your pocket!"
CROW: No there's not. I'm just glad to see you.
>
>"What's that?" the Doctor glanced down at his jacket pocket. A slender,
>careful hand coming from behind him was cautiously extracting a bag of
>figs from it.
TOM: Awww, Jo learned how to use her thumbs.
> "Cause and effect reasoning at last," he muttered.
MIKE [Jo]: If I interrupt his conversation with the Brigadier, it cheeses
the Doctor off. Keen!
>Impulsively, the Brigadier leaped forward and seized the wrist of the
>trespassing hand.
CROW: There you go. Poor impulse control.
>
>"Miss Grant? What are you about? Come out at once!" he ordered.
>
>"You mustn't do that." The Doctor caught the Brigadier's wrist. "Let her
>go. You'll frighten her."
>
>Jo peeped out from behind the Doctor, frightened,
MIKE and BOTS: See?
> and tried to slip back
>into the TARDIS. She pulled to escape the grip on her wrist. Surprised,
>the Brigadier released her. She whisked out of sight.
CROW: Now that's just good military training right there. If the person
you're restraining resists, just let them go.
>
>"Congratulations. Your name has just preceded mine on her predator
>list," the Doctor said.
>
>"What's happened to her?"
MIKE: Oh, let's see. Sun, fun, relaxation, and a little bit of forced
empathy with small furry creatures.
>
>The Doctor turned his head and crinkled the cellophane bag in his
>pocket. "Do you want the figs, Jo?" he called softly. "Come out. Don't
>be frightened."
TOM [Doctor]: The brigadier just wants to run some tests and vivisect
you. All in the name of science.
>
>She glanced out at them warily, and then darted to safety behind the
>Doctor. She peered at the Brigadier from behind the time lord. The
>Doctor let her use him as a barricade. "Yes, it's quite all right," he
>told her.
MIKE: Doctor's little shnooky-wookums mustn't be afraid of the big, bad
Brigadier.
> She touched her cheek to the upper sleeve of his jacket, just
>a brief touch. "She does that to reassure herself," he said quietly. "I
>think the velvet makes her feel like the pack is near her."
CROW: Either that, or my pheromone cologne is really working!
> As the
>Brigadier remained still, the Doctor slipped the bag of figs to her.
>Without another glance at either of them, she took the closed bag, moved
>out of sight behind the Doctor, opened the bag, and ate the figs.
TOM: Oh, she's actually been infected with the personality of a house
cat.
>
>"Two days ago she could not reason her way clear to open the bag," the
>Doctor said.
MIKE: Poor dope thinks she's a space man. Sad.
> "She's trying to re-orient herself. For Pete's sake, keep
>your voice low, and don't look at her directly."
CROW: Now show your throat, roll over on your back, and bark like a dog.
>
>"What's happened to her?" the Brigadier asked.
>
>"We visited a planet where there's nothing but these little furry
>creatures called quilae. They're very shy, very gentle little things.
MIKE: Except for every Friday night when the clubs open.
> I
>always wondered how it was that when they were threatened with
>extinction they bounced back from it. Well, now I know--"
TOM: Superball rubber.
>
>Finished with the figs, Jo dropped the bag and spied the enormous window
>in the lab. She darted towards it, leaping up on the workbench and
>running down the length of it.
>
>"Jo! That's a pane of glass!" the Doctor exclaimed.
MIKE: Go! Run faster!
TOM: We have to pick up enough speed or we'll never break through!
> He winced, for he
>knew she did not understand his words, and chasing her would have driven
>her into it. But she saw her reflection as she got close and stopped
>short of bashing into the glass.
CROW: This means the story isn't over?
MIKE: I guess not.
> She climbed onto the narrow window sill
>and pressed herself against the window. She turned and looked back at
>him, pleading, wanting to go outside where the sunlight was real.
CROW: She and Teller would get along real well.
MIKE: Three people in America are going to get that joke.
CROW: And they'll thank me for it.
>
>"Can you sit down?" he asked her.
MIKE: Sit, girl, sit!
> "Here, try this. Help me Brigadier."
>They pushed the workbench up against the window so that she had room to
>sit down, but she stayed where she was, every inch of her longing to be
>outside.
TOM: You're supposed to offer her a treat while you push her tail down.
>
>"What the blazes does this mean? Does she think she's one of these furry
>little things from that planet?" the Brigadier asked.
MIKE: Ding! Tell him what he's won, Jonny!
>
>"She doesn't think she's a quila, but she's thinking like a quila," the
>Doctor told him.
CROW: I call no fair. She definitely thinks she's a quila.
> "Any creature hunted long enough either finds a way to
>survive, or inadvertently survives, or it is destroyed.
MIKE: Well, yes, but that seems to be true of *all* creatures.
> The quilae
>originally were slightly telepathic with each other.
CROW: They toured the late-night circuit with the Amazing Kreskin and
made a bundle.
> They generate their
>basic impulses: food, rest, danger and so forth as telepathic signals
>back and forth.
MIKE: Leading to mass confusion and the extinction of the species.
TOM: It's a fanfic, Mike. It doesn't have to make sense.
> Well, over time when they were being hunted down for
>their pelts, their numbers were drastically reduced. The need to
>maintain contact with each other must have grown enormously. My guess is
>that as there were fewer and fewer quilae, their telepathy got more and
>more powerful as a final protective barrier to keep the packs intact.
CROW: Either that or the little beasties are just freaks.
TOM: I'm going with the idea that they're tools of Satan, myself.
> So
>there came a point when it became powerful enough to over write the
>thinking of the more intelligent hunters. I don't think it was a
>conscious strategy. I think it just happened."
MIKE: Well, that's comforting.
>
>"So you're saying that these furry little watchamacallits
CROW: Chocolate bars?
> can make
>rational, two-legged creatures start thinking--"
>
>"And behaving," the Doctor added. "Thinking and behaving like members of
>the pack. We were only there for a few hours. Next thing I knew, Jo had
>gone back to the wild.
MIKE: I just couldn't bear the idea of her out there grubbing in
the mud.
CROW: I just wanted to join in.
> I found the remains of other humanoids here and
>there on the planet's surface."
>
>The Brigadier cocked an eyebrow at him. "Remains?"
>
>"Yes, well, the quilae are perfectly adaptable to sharing their lives
>with other species, but the other species don't do too well.
TOM: So, Mike, do you think the author is weaving a subtle allegory
concerning the ideas of British Colonialism and White Man's Burden?
MIKE: Actually, no.
TOM: Me neither. Just checking.
> I think
>that the humanoids starved to death trying to live off the grasses that
>sustain the quilae.
CROW: None of them realized that you need Munchos with grass.
> Jo certainly was not able to subsist eating their
>natural food. That's how I finally caught her. She couldn't resist a pot
>of boiling figs, which I'd laced with knockout drops."
MIKE [Doctor]: Actually, I didn't plan on the knockout drops. They just
kind of fell into the pot.
>
>The Brigadier looked from her to him. "Well now that she's away from
>those things, won't she snap out of it?"
CROW: Oh, Brigadier, what would we do without your pasty face to explain
things to?
>
>"She should. I thought that coming home might help her along," the
>Doctor said. "Also, I need to get some human brain wave emission charts
>to use as a basis of comparison.
MIKE: And I'll need a few gallons of human blood, if you can manage it.
> I might be able to help her mind's
>functions re-set themselves."
CROW: Just give her a good thwack on the head. It always fixes my
computer.
> He walked over to the sink, ran the water
>from the tap, and found one of the chipped, battered mugs they often
>used for tea. He filled it with water and took it to her.
>
>"Do you want water, Jo?"
TOM: It has ground glass mixed in with it, just like you like it.
>
>At his voice, she glanced at him, took the mug in both hands, and drank
>from it. He turned to Lethbridge-Stewart. "When I first recaptured her,
>she couldn't reason the use of a container of water or a bag that
>contained figs.
MIKE: I had to beat the concepts into her. Scientifically, of course.
> I had to give everything to her directly. But now she
>can open bags, explore containers--"
>
>"Pick pockets--" the Brigadier added wryly.
CROW: So she's become a sideshow worker?
>
>"It's a tremendous step forward," the Doctor told him. "Because the
>quilae cannot do those things.
TOM: Of course, the fact that they don't have opposable thumbs has
something to do with it.
> So she's coming back to us. But I would
>like to speed things along." Finished with the water, Jo dropped the mug
>before the Doctor could catch it.
CROW: Perfect. She's responding at a normal two-year-old level.
> It hit the window sill and rolled onto
>the table. The Brigadier scooped it up before it hit the floor.
MIKE: Ceramic mug, five rounds rapid.
>
>The Doctor rubbed the back of his neck. "Mmm. We may want to use paper
>cups."
MIKE: And a classic example of the dry Pertwee wit.
TOM: I *liked* Jon Pertwee.
>
>"Look, how long is it going to take for her to snap out of this?"
>
>"Well." The Doctor considered and then shook his head. "Too long. Even a
>week is too long.
MIKE: So more than a week is what you're saying.
> If she were to get away from me, she could be killed
>or seriously injured. I can't tie her down or leash her as if she were
>an animal, because she's not an animal.
TOM: At this point, that's debatable.
CROW: At any point it was debatable.
> But she doesn't have any more
>awareness of the dangers of traffic and burners and acids and chemical
>poisons than an animal would.
MIKE: So I have this beaker of Hydroflouric acid here....
> And she's only half tame, even with me. I
>think I can rig up something here in the lab to get her back to normal."
CROW: What I'm saying is, can I keep her? Huh? Pleeeeease.
>
>"Well, you've got an added incentive to return her to normal as quickly
>as possible, Doctor." The Brigadier let out his breath.
MIKE: Sorry, Brig. No Smint, no kiss.
> "You do remember
>our friend Mr. Chin, don't you?"
>
>"Who?"
CROW: The fellow who lived just down the road from Mr. Nose and Mr.
Mouth.
TOM: Chin. a decent old English name with a lot of Elizabethan history.
>
>"That disagreeable chap from the Ministry who jumbled things up so much
>in the Axos incident. Well, he's leveled innumerable complaints against
>UNIT, and against you and me in particular.
MIKE: But especially you.
> We've got a board of enquiry
>coming in tomorrow morning, and frankly, things would go a lot better if
>you simply were not here!"
TOM: That is to say, if I could present them with your *head* and the
*rest* of you were not here.
>
>"Well I like that! I risked my life and my TARDIS against Axos, you
>know."
MIKE: Oh, come off it, Pertwee!
TOM: Pertwee was a hero! Stop messing with Pertwee!
>
>With a glance at Jo, the Brigadier checked his voice.
CROW: Yep, still there.
> He spoke more
>soothingly.
MIKE: Come on now, my widdle Doctor-kins. Don't get so maddy-waddy.
TOM: I'm going to hurt you, Mike. You know that.
> "You know we are all very grateful to you, Doctor. And you
>know that there are few people I despise as heartily as I do Mr. Chin.
CROW: There's nothing I like better than a good despising of Mr. Chin.
>But the fact remains that these investigators will not be pleased to
>find a young woman, the niece of a cabinet minister, climbing on the
>furniture in search of nuts and berries!
CROW: Oh, I think they'd be *very* entertained. And then they'd behead
you.
> You've got to keep her under
>wraps, and you've got to make yourself scarce."
MIKE: Real scarce.
CROW: As scarce as possible.
MIKE: Go far away.
CROW: Very far.
MIKE: And don't come back.
CROW: Ever.
>
>The Doctor's reputation regarding high officials and the administrative
>buearacracy was legendary.
CROW: The Doctor had a very good reputation, I understand.
> He understood the Brigadier's wariness and
>decided to agree rather than be insulted.
MIKE [Doctor]: You're right, Brigadier. I'm a moron. I'll just take my
frizzy white hair and go elsewhere.
TOM: Come on, not another Pertwee joke!
>
>"Then let me lock myself in the lab, and don't disturb me," he said.
>"Maybe within a few hours I can have Jo back to normal."
TOM: If not, I'll have her put to sleep.
>
>"You do know what their verdict will be if they come into contact with
>her," the Brigadier said with a warning tone. The Doctor looked at him,
>puzzled.
MIKE: Duh, huh?
> "Chin will have her whisked down to a mental institution in no
>time, and even if we get her out of it and she gets back to normal,
>that's the end of her career with a top secret organisation like UNIT.
TOM: I understand quilae are worse than Furbies.
CROW: Really?
TOM: I read about it in the Star, donchaknow.
>Not to mention how traumatic it will be for her to be taken to a place
>like that." He stepped away from the Doctor and looked at Jo, who had
>her face pushed into the window,
MIKE: Shards of glass stuck in her cheeks.
> her eyes fixed on the world outside.
>
>* * * *
TOM: I see Davy Jones siamese twins!
CROW: So do I!
MIKE: It looks like dead ants to me.
TOM: Oh, *now* you decide to get morbid.
MIKE: I'm feeling down. Let's get out of here.
[Hold that fanfic rag!:...O...1...2...3...4...5...6...0]
[SOL]
[MIKE sits at the counter, looking depressed. CROW and TOM enter.]
CROW: Hey, Mike. You look down.
MIKE: Oh, hi, guys.
TOM: Something bothering you, Nelson?
MIKE: I don't know. It's just that back when I was a kid, I used to
watch Doctor Who every Saturday morning on my local PBS station, and it
was the best time of the week.
CROW: Really.
MIKE: Yeah. And it didn't matter to me back then that the sets were
cheesy and the monsters looked fake or that the plots often centered
around leaps of logic. It was just fun.
TOM: Yeah, I know what you mean.
CROW: So what's the problem?
MIKE: I'm having trouble recapturing that playful, innocent spirit of
youthful wonderment.
TOM: Really.
MIKE: Yeah. I feel like all of my wonderment has been sucked slowly out
of me by years of Michael Eisner, sports figures turned killers, and
the Rolling Stones. I don't think I can recapture that spirit anymore.
TOM: Well, Mike, we took up a collection and got something to cheer you
up.
CROW: Gypsy! Bring it in here!
[GYPSY enters and spits out an action figure blister pack. MIKE picks up
the pack and smiles.]
MIKE: Oh, wow! A Dapol Dalek! Cool!
TOM: Go run and play, Nelson.
MIKE: Wow!
[MIKE opens the pack and takes out the Dapol Dalek. He starts running
about the SOL with it.]
CROW: It's so nice to see them happy.
[Fanfic Sign starts flashing.]
TOM: Of course, now we have FANFIC SIIIIIIGN!
MIKE: MY-VI-SION-IS-IM-PAIRED!-EX-TER-MIN-ATE!
[Door Sequence Now:...0...6...5...4...3...2...1...O]
>
>She did not like the big, loud room with the odd smells and clattering
>noises everywhere.
MIKE: Strange, it looks like we just stumbled onto "The Man who Fell to
Earth."
TOM: Please, no. Anything but that.
> The white-haired other ignored her for most of the
>day, busying himself with making noise across the room with the objects
>that he found here and there.
MIKE: Hmm, I get it. You put the lime in the coconut and drink 'em
*both* up!
> Several times he went rummaging in various
>compartments in the big room. This rummaging action alerted her to the
>possibilities of food being available here and there.
CROW: Ooo! Week-old peanut butter sammich! My favorite!
> She would leave
>the window to join him and scrabble with her hands in the drawers as he
>did. Unlike the males from the pack, he did not snap at her for
>searching for food too close to him.
MIKE: He just bit her head off.
> But she never found anything to
>eat. And the hard and sharp objects in the compartments hurt her hands.
TOM: Well, so much for her opposable thumbs.
>At last after she had searched and rummaged a drawer, he would rummage
>with his hands again and would sometimes find a fig, which he would give
>to her. And he would touch the sleeve of his jacket to her cheek.
CROW: Bad touch.
> This
>satisfied her. But eventually he stopped looking for food and went back
>to making his banging noises.
TOM: Hey, Doc! Can't you see the sign? No "Stairway to Heaven"!
> She did not like the noise, and so she
>returned to the window.
CROW: Oo, dese kids today and deir music.
>
>At last as darkness came, she left her station at the window and
>accepted more food from the other (who no longer behaved like a predator
>at all).
MIKE: That's right. Get nice and plump for Thanksgiving....
> She searched along the walls for a place to curl up to sleep.
>The other found a dark niche for her under a spiral staircase in one
>corner of the room.
TOM: Aww, the Doctor helped her find a niche.
> She liked the softness of his cape and vest, which
>were similar to the softness of the pack all curled up together.
CROW: It was one big funny-sunny-yummy-fun vest!
> So he
>carefully folded his cape on the floor for her, under the steps, and
>then he walked away and resumed his tapping and clicking noises among
>the objects. She curled up on the impromptu bed and soon felt safe
>enough to close her eyes. But just as she was becoming drowsy, the other
>came and fastened something bulky around her neck.
MIKE: Oh, *nice move*, Pertwee.
CROW: Yeah. Way to keep her trust, man!
TOM: Will you guys shut up? Pertwee's doing something!
> She cried out and
>tried to get away from this unexpected invasion,
MIKE: Invasion U.S.A.
TOM: The first American cartoon for adults.
CROW: Unless they don't like it. Then we'll stick it in Kids' WB.
> but it was too late.
>The heavy collar was fastened before she could escape.
TOM: But I don't have fleas!
> She tugged and
>tugged on it and suddenly found her voice.
TOM: What? Oh! It was behind the couch all along!
> Up until then she had
>remained silent when frightened. But now she made sharp exclamations and
>gasps of fear to let him know her discomfort.
MIKE [Doctor]: Does my heart good to see you whimpering like a whipped
dog, Jo.
>
>The other spoke softly to her and tried to comfort her with figs, but he
>would not remove the weight.
TOM: No matter how much I diet, I can't lose that holiday weight!
> She pulled and clawed at the collar, but it
>would not come free.
>
>He spoke again, very gently, and tried to move her hands away from it.
>Tears forced themselves out of her eyes, and she gave voice again to her
>distress.
MIKE: The Doctor's going to have to put one of those cones around her
head, isn't he?
TOM: That's where I think he's heading.
>
>He stood up and hurried to another part of the room, as though he had
>forgotten her completely.
MIKE: Not unusual for Pertwee.
TOM: Pertwee's a great man! You're not fit to lick his boots!
> She followed and patted at him, at his soft
>jacket and vest, pleading with him to remove the weight from her neck.
>The horrible, heavy collar suddenly hummed,
CROW: Forgot the words again.
> as though it were a living
>creature, and she cried out and tried to run away from it, behind the
>TARDIS.
MIKE: Of course, it followed her, being on her neck and all.
> It hummed again, and she ran away again, but she could not run
>away from it. It clung to her throat and hummed at her.
CROW: This is a pretty amazing intervention.
MIKE: Admit it! You have a problem! You think you're a quilae!
TOM: Yes! I'm so ashamed!
> She blindly ran
>around the large room, bumping into things and making them clatter,
>knocking herself over a couple times when she ran into things that would
>not yield,
TOM: All in all, a typical day for Jo.
> but taking to her heels again immediately, panicked by the
>thing at her throat.
CROW: It doesn't match my sweater! It doesn't match my sweater! Agh!
> She suddenly ran right into his arms, and he spoke
>again and removed the collar from her. He would have offered her food,
>but the crinkling paper had no attraction for her.
MIKE: Hey, Doctor, why don't we break all of that careful retraining
with a stupid move that probably won't work?
CROW: How Pertwee can you get?
TOM: Pertwee's ideas always worked! Shut up!
> Freed from the
>horrible collar, she whisked out of sight from him, under the workbench,
>but that was too open. Heavy machinery was stacked everywhere in the big
>room, especially in the corners, and she ran along the wall in a crouch
>until she found a narrow squeeze-way behind a great, unused card-feed
>computer. She got into the tiny recess behind it and hid from him.
MIKE: But first she had to push Edgar Allen Poe out of the way....
TOM: Don't make me regret getting you that set of Great Books, Mike.
>
>He came and sat on the other side of the great barricade and spoke to
>her, very soothingly, but she sobbed out her indignation and fear and
>refused to come out.
MIKE: Yeah, well walk a mile in our shoes, sister.
> He brought her the soft cape and passed it through
>the tiny opening to her. She snatched it, pulled it in, and huddled her
>face into its comfort.
CROW: Then she shredded it to make her new nest...
> He'd run out of figs by that time,
MIKE: What, the Doctor?
CROW: The same guy with the infinite supply of jelly babies?
> so he left her
>water and raisins within reach of the opening, but she would not touch
>them while he was close by. For a long time he stayed on the other side
>of the great machine and spoke to her. Finally, as she refused to come
>out, he went away.
MIKE: Again, nice move, Pertwee.
TOM: Shut up! You're making me cry....
>
>* * * *
CROW: Mike, I'm seeing stars.
MIKE: Hit your head on something?
CROW: Thanks. Don't mind if I do. [whacks his head on the armrest]
------------------------
(Continued in section 4)