[Adrics] 2002 Awards Show, Part 8/9
BKWillis
A string of mumbled words in which 'smeg' features prominently
and repeatedly comes through the microphone as he starts the next
video.]
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**CARRIE ON CROSSOVERS**
*Post the Sixth*
*In Which the Third Prize Is Abominably, Blasphemously,
Cacogenically Awarded*
===
{The discussion on the merits of processed Spamite shapes as a
suitable reward for writerly virtuosity is winding to its acrimonious
conclusion. Perhaps surprisingly, most of the participants are still
relatively intact and conscious. THE PROPRIETOR has remained
unmolested, save for some slight shrinkage in the pocket area.
MAGNUS and VARNE just happen to have taken up casual
positions between him and the mass of patrons.}
SAM: ...endangered species!
PAJAMA MASK: We wish!
PRINCESS LEIA OF HUNGARY: Well, *I* think it's yummy, and
*I'm* higher-born than any of you!
NYSSA [sniffs]: That's a matter of opinion.
SUSAN: I don't know how you can!
LEIA: That's because you haven't eaten fifteenth-century English
cooking. It tastes like salted shoes boiled with grass, only worse.
BARBARA: Now, you don't really know how bad *that* tastes,
dear...
LEIA: Mummy and Daddy weren't very well off. Why do you think
they married me off to a soppyhead like Edmund? Sir Douglas, may
I have your sporkum lozenges if you don't want them?
'SIR DOUGLAS' [green about the gills]: Be my guest, Your
Highness.
THE GREY STEWARD: And now, putting sp--- orkum and all
related matters thankfully aside, we reach the thrilling Third Prize,
which involves actual food as we know it and has been won by...
THE MAGICAL MECHANICAL MUSICAL BOX: Have mercy
love, I only ask a kindness. I'm falling into darkness, and --
PSYCHO NYSSA'S AK-47: Dakka dakka dakka!
M M MUSICAL BOX: Alas, oh bad revolting bummer! I am slain!
[Dies.]
THE GREY STEWARD: 'To Die For' series, by Douglas Killings,
BKWillis, The Outsider, Shay Gitnick, K Michael Wilcox, Diane
Brendan, Imran Inayat, Tony Velasquez, Clive May, Andrew
Lawston, Mags Halliday, S Daniel Wilson, Susannah Tiller, Bill K,
Paul Gadzikowski, Erin Tumilty, Helen Fayle, Bill Brewer, Jan
Strewer, Old Uncle Tom Cobleigh and all, and all... [CARRIE fwaps
him with a rolled-up website], and pretty much everyone except me,
really. So that's *their* dinner bills wiped out, then...
THE PROPRIETOR [gibbering]: They can't *all* have contributed
this year!
STEWARD: I put it to you that all, as authors who inherently live
only for Art, Beauty, Virtue, Justice, and Booze, are naturally
honourable persons who could scarcely be prevented from making
a discreet repayment should they deem themselves in fact to have
been ineligible. There is in any case some question as to whether
this mighty edifice, resting so heavily as it does upon their
previous efforts, as it were that this year's towering efforts stood
on the shoulders of so many giants before them, must not in fact be
regarded as an ongoing collaboration between all...
THE PROPRIETOR: NO IT MUSTN'T!
LEELA: Though no chieftain of true magnanimous liberality would
be troubled by that.
KATARINA: Fear not, sister. It seems me only minutes ago that,
lulled by the Steward's Morpheus-blessed speech, I fell into a
vision from Apollo. 'Lo!' he seemed to say to me, 'let the Proprietor
be your pattern of sheer magnanimous liberality...'; and I took his
meaning not, for it did seem oracular.
LEELA: Then this is a true vision, for I thought I heard my totem
say the same thing.
JAMIE: Och, and the Phantom Piper of the McCrimmons, now ye
mention it!
PROPRIETOR [tonelessly]: I must bow before the edict of the
spirits. The river of my bounty must now burst its banks, though
bankruptcy and beggary inevitably follow. Those who care for the
survival of this hallowed institution will surely make some
voluntary donation to our freshly-opened Emergency Hardship
Fund, on a similarly heroic scale. [Places twenty-gallon hat on bar.]
Bah, hamburger!
STEWARD: Truly, we are honoured by this exemplary display of
cross-class and possibly cross-species solidarity! Carrie -- how
does our dazzling Datemaker describe the Motley Crew's ideal
dinner-guest?
{Business with Dream Datemaker, which goes into a long series of
auto-nudges and special bonus gamble routines before finally
disgorging a very short piece of paper:}
CARRIE [reads]: You must be kidding. Leave me alone. I want my
mummy!
STEWARD [laughing heartily]: And the ignorant yet deride the
concept of machine humour! [CARRIE looks daggers at him.]
Open the gateway to Good Company!
{CARRIE does this thing. The Datemaker rumbles and shakes. A
sound like the clashing of giant gears begins, rising rapidly in
volume.}
THE SEVENTH DOCTOR: I'd shut that off, if I were you.
STEWARD: And in the unlikely event that anything sinister were
about to happen, would that work?
THE SEVENTH DOCTOR: In a pig's eye. Ace! Get ready!
{The neon sign flashes erratically, revealing the mutating message:
TTR Welcomes -- TTR Doesn't Welcome -- Too Many Rows --
Multiple Constraint Violation -- Insertion Not Authorised --
Windows Emulation Error!!! -- }
ACE: Nitro-9, Professor?
THE SEVENTH DOCTOR: Annoying cries of "I told you so," Ace.
HARRY SULLIVAN: I say, Doctor, that's a bit strong!
{The neon sign flashes up in virulent hazard yellow:
TTR Doomed By: Absolute Ultimate Negation Global
Inconsistency Error 0X1773440 #@$%!}
THE SEVENTH DOCTOR: But necessary, Harry.
CARRIE: Er, hadn't we better *try* shutting it down, before all the
contradictory gating specs --
{The Dream Datemaker *unravels* into a nauseously swirling,
irregular PLOT hole, from which eldritch skirlings, burblings, and
wailings of Ineffable Horror Series 34B (Large Economy Size) begin
predictably to emanate. The faux-neon sign explodes into sharp
fragments of all-too-hard light, slicing CARRIE's projected
garments to tatters and blowing the STEWARD half-way across
the stage.
BUFFY, ANGEL, and THE DOCTORS rise to face the unknown but
obviously cosmic menace. An unfeasible number of bricks
descend from the legs of TURLOUGH's trousers. }
CARRIE: -- rip apart the very fabric of Reality? Eek -- must go
make myself decent! [Vanishes].
{A strange, swirly orange Phenomenon arises from the
disintegrated worldgate. The sounds resolve into a cacophony of
foully distorted voices, as of a choir of Care Bears tripping on most
heinously bad acid.}
CHORUS OF DOCTORS: I told you so! [Run over and huddle in
corner, in furious technical discussion as to best how to save the
day by pulling an unexpected rabbit from the hat at the last minute.
Yeah, right!]
{Crystallised Ribena begins leaking out the edges of the
Phenomenon, along with a vile voice of primaeval evil, suppurating
with thesaurine saccharine, gangrenous and telic as Stephen R.
Donaldson on a grossout. Screams as the full horror of what is
about to befall dawns upon various members of the AUDIENCE.}
VOICE OF PRIMAEVAL EVIL [glutinously]: I love you, you love
me, let's have a munch on your psyche...
CATBERT: Aieee! Shub-Barneyrath is come out of the mind's
ancient slumbers in Daytime-TV'lyeh! Why am I expositing and not
running for all nine lives?! [Remedies this.]
XANDER: This would be wiggle-away-Evil time again, Willster!
WILLOW: That... only works once a year...
{THE GREY STEWARD staggers, by none know what titanic
effort, to his feet. He looks ghastly, and his leaden features are
scored with many small cuts. BUFFY and PSYCHO NYSSA confer
rapidly on the availability and utility of various bazookas, grenade-
launchers, and pieces of cutlery against the emerging menace.
ANGEL poses heroically before the stage.}
ANYA: I could have warned him not to offend the Black Goat, but
does anyone listen to me? Be like that, then! Get all our souls
candied and sucked on by the incarnate abyss of evil, see if I care!
ANTIMONY: You may also prefer not to do this.
SHUB-BARNEYRATH [beginning to emerge in all its obscene,
betreacled purple inglory into the worlds of light]: Will you be my
friends? Would you like to meet my *other* friends? My friends
in the Abyss know a good game we could all play together!
THE GREY STEWARD: Fly, you fools! [Leaps for SHUB-
BARNEYRATH, feet flying like Hong Kong Phooey. Misses
completely, and crashes straight through badly repaired portion of
stage.] Aaargh!
SHUB-BARNEYRATH: It's called 'Inappropriate Use of Tentacles'!
Goodness, and now it's available in fractal-space metrics! We''ll
love them in bits, won't we?
PSYCHO NYSSA: ...nothing short of a lesser god.
BUFFY: Great! So what am I supposed to do, throw Glories at it?
JO GRANT: Zaqqum! You're more than just a goddess, and isn't
that one of those cacodemons you warned me about? Please...?
ZAQQUM, THE DESOLATION BEYOND TIME [a star falling from
her eye]: My Universe sucks like a Dyson. My serial drags on
forever. I ate two of the sausage rolls. Let it all end!
ANGEL: Stay back, all of you. [Pose.] This is my time. [Shirt
button pops off.] You're not coming through.
SPIKE: Git!
SHUB-BARNEYRATH [oozing through]: Let's pretend we can see
the future. Let's imagine a pound of candyfloss being rammed
down a human throat with a stick of Brighton rock, forever. And
remember that it *is* forever...
BUFFY: Angel, no! [Rushes to intervene. SPIKE rugby-tackles her
to ground.]
BUFFY AND SPIKE: Shit!
ANGEL: You're forgetting one thing, Shub-Barneyrath. [Pose] You
may think you know what love means [Smoulder], but I, [PSYCHO
NYSSA opens up with a gravity cannon, knocking the great purple
dinosaur back perhaps a pace], a demon [the ADRIC DEFENCE
FORCE pump several kilos of lead into the abomination without
evident effect] cursed [BENNY and FRANCOIS begin throwing
bottles of cheap Albanian red wine, which gives SHUB-
BARNEYRATH brief though serious pause] with a soul --
SHUB-BARNEYRATH [drooling]: A soul, vampire? [We *think*
that's what it said...]
ANGEL: -- and the agonies [K9, THE MASTERS, and CAPTAIN
KIRK zap the monster with rays] and joys [Pose] of true mortal
love, [TURLOUGH throws brown bricks at it] know one thing [ACE
throws Nitro-9 at ANGEL, hits SHUB-BARNEYRATH by mistake,
and makes no difference] that all your power can never --
{A fat pink and yellow cat, which has been sauntering towards the
purple dinosaur unnoticed during ANGEL's harangue, has now
heaved itself up onto the stage. With a mighty yawn, it leaps up at
SHUB-BARNEYRATH's treacle-beslimed throat and bears it
backwards into the abyss. The gap closes behind them.}
SARAH JANE [in awed horror]: Was that... who I think it was?
ANGEL: *My* heroic exit! [Storms out.]
STEWARD [poking head through floorboards, manly tears staining
cheeks]: It... should have been me.
ZAQQUM, THE DESOLATION ETC: It should have been me...
{Many of the Brits present break down in open sobbing, and are
beyond consolation.}
SPIKE [lewdly, from floor]: Well, boys and girls, that was a bundle
of fun!
{BUFFY kicks SPIKE.}
PERI: I mean, what is up with these guys???
ANJI: I think it may have been... Bagpuss. [Swallows.]
THE EIGHTH DOCTOR [rushing from corner]: Accursed
Purpurescence of Purulence, begone, for here is my plot device!
[Pulls rabbit from top hat.] Er, where...?
AUDIENCE: Boo! Geroff!
{Loud, feline snoring is heard from under the FORTUNATE
FINALISTS' table. A contagious aura of goodwill and happy sloth
radiates outwards from the fat pink-and-yellow cat which has
ensconced itself under PRINCESS LEIA's chair. Universal cheers.}
CARRIE [re-appearing]: And I think the Third Prize Posse's special
dinner guest has just elected himself...
ACE: Well wicked, Professor! Does Bagpuss rule, or does he
*rule*?
{THE SEVENTH DOCTOR taps the side of his nose and smiles
cryptically.}
BENNY: You're not fooling anyone.
{THE SEVENTH DOCTOR sulks. There is otherwise general mirth,
merriment, and imbibing for some while, as THE GREY STEWARD
is extracted from the wreckage of the stage and the remnants of the
set are cleared away. Even THE PROPRIETOR brightens faintly
upon learning that it is not appropriate to wake a sleeping Bagpuss,
and he thus has one fewer free meal to give away than he had
supposed.}
STEWARD: Comrades, classless enemies, ladies, gentlemen, and
all the terms of address in Mother Mealy's Big Book of PC Epithets
2001! May I have your attention for a moment?
{Apparently he may not. The stage has become an offence in the
eyes of the barflies.}
CARRIE [quietly]: Do you think I should lose the dress?
STEWARD: Definitely.
{The stage has become of universal interest. CARRIE flickers, then
re-manifests in a natty blue trouser-suit. THE GREY STEWARD
seizes his moment to speak:}
And now for the second prize announcement! Unfortunately, our
machinery has taken a battering from the recent cacodemonic
incursion, seriously compromising our ability to accompany the
good news with music, matchmaking, and jeopardy to the very
fabric of Outside from the gratuitous use of PLOT holes!
AUDIENCE: Wild cheers! Get on with it!
{FRANCOIS and several RED-SHIRTED EXTRAS enter from stage
left, lugging large items of machinery and monstrous stacks of 5 1/4
inch floppies.}
CARRIE: Fortunately, here are some backups we prepared earlier!
PROPRIETOR: Why me? Why?
{Fade to hornpipe from _Blue Peter_.}
----
[ADRIC switches tapes again with quick, savage motions. The
look on his face is almost as hard as looking at his tux without
wincing.]
----
**CARRIE ON CROSSOVERS**
*Post the Seventh*
*In Which the Second Prize Is Awarded, with Some Promise of
Penultimacy*
===
{Fade up to hornpipe from _Blue Peter_.}
PROPRIETOR: Adric, take a memo. [Tosses him beer-mat for
purpose.] 'Get qualified electrician to fix lighting circuit next time it
blows. No, sod it, after tonight we'll only be able to afford the
Doctor again.' Memo ends.
THE GREY STEWARD: The second prize, comprising kudos
second only to that of the first PLUS an all-you-can-eat
gastronomic extravaganza for two, goes to --
MAGICAL MECHANICAL MUSICAL BOX MK II: ROCK the Casbah!
STEWARD: -- indeed, by Mags L Halliday! [Applause] Carrie,
what characteristics does our new 'n' improved Datemaker
prognosticate for the dream dinner partner of the melligraphous
Mistress Mags?
CARRIE: I'm frankly disturbed you asked me that, Marmaduke.
[Pulls Datemaker's lever. Dials settle on what appear to be three
large tin-tacks. Reads:] 'Male, with spiky Bad Hair, eternal youth,
and a cutely anti-social persona. Penchant for terrorising whole
communities and horribly avenging all real or imagined slights. Or
just playing hob for the sheer hell of it. Invincible conviction of
own coolness essential.'
SPIKE [whooping, and swinging feet onto table]: Yes! I *am*
Daddy Cool! [Leers at BUFFY.] See where playing hard-to-get
leaves you!
BUFFY: Mm-h'mmm...
STEWARD: Open the Door into Candlelight!
{Over SPIKE's protests, CARRIE does so. The gate opens up into
what is unmistakably a young boy's bedroom. It is not one of the
tidier 99.9% of its type.}
AUDIENCE: Gak attack!
{A slovenly, overweight, badly-drawn boy with yellow skin is
lounging against a pile of composted-down laundry. Distant
strains of saxophone music float through the open window.}
THE PROPRIETOR [quickly]: This or none, M.s Halliday. For even
I cannot amend My own contracts, once signed in blood and
dripped in the holy Styx!
CARRIE: What?
STEWARD: Oh, some obscure English legal custom, apparently.
Mr... Simpson?, would you care to come forth for an exciting
evening of drinking healthful soda-pop and discussing the writer's
art with one of your most, ah, unexpected fans?
BART SIMPSON [bored]: Eat my shorts, deadhead. [Twangs
industrial-strength catapult at STEWARD, knocking him over.
Bellows out window:] Told you this date would suck, Leese!
VOICE OF LISA SIMPSON, from below: Maybe it'd be more
Grandpa's speed. I'll just run and find him!
{CARRIE deactivates gate hastily.}
STEWARD [from horizontal position]: Since Citizen Halliday has
been spared the trouble of refusing, she still has a choice of
crossover partner. According to our agreement, bound by blood
and Styx...
SPIKE: YEAH! [Dead insouciant again, to MAGS]: So, then, what
you reckon?
AUDIENCE: Aieee! Not the gate again! Save our sanity! Hooray
for Mistress Mags!
SPIKE: All the blood I can drink, isn't it? Well, now... [Looks
gloatingly around tavern.]
PROPRIETOR: Francois! Quickly down to the wine-cellars, and
bring some of the Chateau d'Alzaire to warm up from the cryo-
vault!
ADRIC [with ominous flatness]: The *what*?
PROPRIETOR: Have you no idea what your demises cost me in
cleaning fees alone? I have to recoup my expenses somehow!
PSYCHO NYSSA: You -- they're -- !
{ADRIC's eyes widen amazedly. NYSSA is actually shaking with
outrage.}
-- *my* kills! How *dare* you tamper with them without my
permission? *Leave my dead swamp rats alone!*
PROPRIETOR [to NYSSA's Chinese repeating crossbow]: The
customer is always right.
PSYCHO NYSSA: This one is. [Awkward pause.] Er, tip the
leftovers down the demon if he can stomach them, then. I can't
think of a better place for them!
{Long and tense silence.}
SPIKE: Yeah, sounds fair to me.
CARRIE [turning up volume to command general attention]: And
with that having gone so, er, smoothly, it's time to announce the
overall *winner*!
ZOE [holding up elaborately gridded paper]: Which my training in
logic has allowed me to deduce beforehand! The winner is --
----