Interview With a Maniac

I finally found Gizzmo hiding in a closet. She was currently a yellow Elephante.

“No!” she yelled. “Not again, please!”

“This is for your own good,” I said and dragged her out of the closet. It was time to haul her over to the Secret Laboratory again.

When we arrived there the lab scientist greeted us at the door. His eyes looked greedily at Gizzmo and his mouth curled into an insane smile. “Come this way,” he said in his odd voice. He led us into a much larger room that contained the lab ray and pushed some oddly-coloured buttons, as he did every day. As usual, Gizzmo cowered beneath the ray and I watched, hoping for good results. This time she turned into a desert Elephante, but I still was not satisfied.

The Scorchio cackled and shooed us out of the lab. “SAME TIME TOMORROW!” he shouted loudly, even though we were standing right in front of him. He continued his not-so-sane laughter as we walked away and it got to the point where he was rolling around on the ground, howling with laugher.

“What a kook,” I muttered when he was out of earshot. And then a great idea popped into my peanut-sized brain. I had been waiting so long for the perfect story, so long to finally come up with something fit for the Neopian Times. Finally I had found it. Who wouldn’t find an interview with a madman entertaining? That is, it may be entertaining if I can get him to say any words. Chances were he’d probably just cackle the entire time.

Later that day I told my friend, Dog, of my intentions.

“You have the guts to get that close to a pet as crazy as him? And the brains?” she said. “I was always astonished you could find your way there, even with that map.”

“Gee, thanks for the support,” I told her.

Dog sighed. “Look,” she said, “Take me with you. That way you might not embarrass yourself as much as you would if you were by yourself.”

“That’s a great idea!” I exclaimed. “I’m glad I thought of it!”

Dog gave me one of those “Why do I talk to you again?” looks and didn’t say anything else.

*****

Well, now that I have explained what led up to doing something as foolish as conversing with the lab ray scientist, I will skip on over to the interview.

Now I, Lama (be quiet, I know the name has only one “L”), will attempt to do something no Neopian has ever done before. I am plucking up the courage to venture into the realm of the lab scientist and talk to him like no living being has done before. I know you’re saying I’m crazy and you know what? You’re probably right.

When we arrived at the lab we were about to knock on the door, but it opened before my fist could hammer on it. In the doorway stood the lab scientist. His sudden appearance frightened Dog so much that she actually let out a little scream of terror. After all, she hadn’t met the scientist face to face before.

The madman before us went into another fit of maniacal laughter. We stood there waiting for him to finish for about 2 minutes until he finally stopped and looked at us like he just realized we were there.

“When did you get here?” he asked. The tone of his voice seemed to change with each word.

Dog looked at him in disbelief and said in an overly kind voice much unlike her own, “Never mind. Mr. Lab Ray Scientist, would you please—”

The scientist cut her off as he asked me, “Is she here to be zapped?”

“Yes! I mean... um... no,” I said when Dog threw a reproachful look at me.

The ever-present smile on his face seemed to droop a little.

“Would you spare some time to give us an interview, Mr. Scientist Guy... sir?” Dog said after a long silence.

“An interview?” he said. “What is that? It sounds fun!”

“It’s very fun!” I said as if I was talking to a 5-year-old. “And best of all, it doesn’t involve zapping!”

“It must be very fun if it’s more fun than zapping!” said the scientist and his already wide eyes grew even wider.

The lab scientist led us down a long hall and into a room I had never visited before. It was small and the walls were plain grey stone. Inside it sat three plainer than plain wooden chairs. The scientist, Dog, and I each sat in one of them.

“Okay, so here’s how it works,” I explained as if I was talking to a child again, “I ask a question, and you answer it.”

The scientist nodded and we began the interrogation. Well, we would have if a little petpet hadn’t just hopped through the door. It was a rabid-looking kookith that oddly resembled his Scorchio owner. It began making these odd screechy noises, almost like it was barking at us. The Scorchio began another fit of laughter and we again waited for him to finish before moving on.

“Hey, I just thought of a question!” I said. “What is that thing?”

“That’s not on the cards!” Dog said and she pulled out some note cards she had written questions on to ask the scientist.

The scientist ignored her and said, “Why, that’s my evil little kookith!”

“What his name?” I asked.

The Scorchio scratched his head. “Hm... I don’t know. I normally just call him my evil little kookith, or Mr. Cuddlebunnies.”

Dog looked at me as if it were my fault she was sitting in the same room as a Scorchio whose insanity proved to even be a match for me.

“And why did you pick a kookith as a petpet?” I asked him, trying to make sure I had enough for my article.

The Scorchio scratched his head again. “Well because kookith is a fun word to say of course!”

“Hey, it is!” I said and the scientist and I began to repeat the word over and over again.

“Would you stop that?!” Dog shouted as if she was going to shove the note cards down his throat if he didn’t listen. We both fell silent and Dog decided to ask one of the questions written on the cards. “So when exactly did you begin—” she started but the crazy kookith suddenly leaped up and snatched the cards right out of Dog’s hands... then ate them.

By now I could tell Dog had had enough but she kept an abnormally calm face and said, “Alright, let’s do it without the cards. Now, where was I? Oh, right. I was just about to ask when you began zapping pets.”

It was silent for a while until finally the lab ray scientist looked at Dog and said, “Oh, was I supposed to answer that?”

Again, Dog tried to stay calm but it seemed to use up every ounce of strength she possessed. “Yes,” she answered with a forced smile.

The lab scientist let out a little chuckle and began to answer the question. “Well it was quite a few years ago, around the time Dr. Sloth launched his attack on Neopia.”

“Wow!” I exclaimed. “You’re OLD!”

“Lama!” Dog yelled as if I had just said something offensive.

“But he is! He’s older than... than... I don’t know, but he sure is old!”

Dog glared at me and said, “That’s enough!”

The lab ray scientist stared at us like nothing had happened.

“Why do you enjoy zapping pets so much?” Dog asked. “Is it joy you see on neopets’ faces when they turn into something beautiful?”

“Joy,” the scientist started, “Joy, what is this joy of which you speak? The best part is seeing the look of terror on their faces as they’re dragged in, as they’re sitting on the burned spot on the floor beneath the ray, as I mess with the Achyfi cans that make up the control panel that controls the ray, as I—”

“Achyfi cans?!” Dog yelled, horrified.

“Of course,” said the crazy scientist. “I don’t think neopets would mind if it’s safe or not! The risk is what makes it funny... I mean fun!” And again, he began to laugh.

“Hey, I have another question!” I said. “Can I ask it?”

“Fine,” Dog replied, even though she knew it would only be stupid. It seemed she had given up on trying to maintain a sane interview.

“What’s your real name?” I asked. “All everyone ever calls you is the lab ray scientist.”

The lab ray scientist scratched his head yet again. “I don’t think I have one... Oh, now I remember it! I think it was Frances... or not.” He then stared off into space, possibly trying to remember his name. All this time cooped up in the lab and his obsession with zapping had obviously gone to his head. That and he had probably swallowed a rancid potion of some sort.

“I still can’t believe you use Achyfi cans!” Dog said out of nowhere.

Another one of those maniacal smiles suddenly appeared on his face. “Would you like to see them?” he asked.

“I... uh,” Dog started. But she didn’t say anything else because the lab ray scientist (or possibly Frances) grabbed us both by the arm and pulled us out of the room, down a long hall, and into the familiar zapping room.

He brought us over to a metal table-like structure and sure enough the Achyfi cans were covering it. It would have looked as if they had just been empty cans scattered over a table if they had not all been sitting bottom-up. Each can was a different color and on the end of the table was one long, red lever.

“Would you like to get a better look at the ray?” he asked me.

“Sure!” I replied.

“Okay,” he said, “Go stand beneath it and take a nice long look.”

“Lama, don’t be stupid,” she said and realized it had not been a correct statement so added, “Don’t do something stupider than you would normally do!”

The kookith began to screech with excitement and once I was under the ray the lab ray scientist pushed a few Achyfi cans and pulled the red lever and... nothing happened.

“Infernal contraption!” he shouted.

Dog instantly ran over to me, grabbed my arm, and we ran for our lives. I had finally realized what the lab scientist had been doing. His insane kookith was at our heels, making those annoying screechy barks. We ran through the entryway of the lab and slammed the door right in the kookith’s face. Behind the door I could hear the scientist shouting, pleading for us to come back. We ran farther away from the lab until we knew we had escaped becoming electrocuted by that insane Scorchio and his kookith.

“I should have known something like this would have happened,” Dog told me as we walked on home. “This stuff always happens when we do something like this together.”

I wasn’t listening because I was reading through my notebook that in which I had recorded everything the scientist had told us. “This is perfect!” I told her. “We have everything we could possibly need for a great Neopian Times article!”

“You’re not going to send that in, are you?” Dog asked. “It’ll embarrass you and me because I was with you!”

I held the notes out of her reach (she was shorter than me) and laughed as she attempted to take the papers from me. Luckily I was quicker too, because she tried tackling me.

And that is the end of this... erm... special interview with a special Neopian. Have a nice day and watch out for those rabid kookiths!

Author-ish-note-type-thing: Thank you, Dog (dogitron0123), for giving me permission to put you in my article (note that Dog did not help write the article in any way)! And thanks for always putting up with my “slow moments.” Thank you for taking the time to read my rather long article and PLEASE feel free to neomail me with comments!