REVOLT OF THE CYBERSLAVES



                                        By Lawrence Dworin



          Copyright 1991 by Lawrence Dworin



         ********************************************
                       **SHAREWARE**
          This book has been electronically published
          under the "Shareware" concept. If you read
          and enjoy this book, a contribution of $10.00,
          or any amount, would be greatly appreciated.
          Please send it to to:

                         Lawrence Dworin
                          P.O. Box 413
                        Durand, MI 48429

          Your comments, criticisms, and suggestions are
          also welcome.
               Thank you.
          ********************************************
               



                         CHAPTER  1


     "Um, It's not exactly what I had in mind!"
     Ernie Ross looked ruefully at his imitation fur loincloth and
flimsy plastic broadsword. "Um, I sort of thought...."
     The girl behind the counter gave Ernie a sour look. "You
wanted to play the `Goombah the Barbarian' Virtual Reality Game,
right?"
     "Uh, yeah," Ernie replied.
     The girl examined a sheet of paper, cracking her gum loudly.
"In that case, you have to wear the fur loincloth and carry the
plastic broadsword. It says so right here."
     Ernie thought about this. "Well, in the ad it said that
playing the game would be just like being Goombah the Barbarian.
There'd be monsters and wizards and everything, just like the
movie!"
     "That's correct," replied the girl. "Here at the Virtual
Arcade, we offer simulated reality games of just about any popular
character or story line. Our huge mainframe computers allow us to
synthesize any reality in amazingly high resolution, allowing us to
believably create stories in which YOU can be the main character.
You can step into the role of a commando, a swashbuckler, a space
traveler, just about anything that any popular movie or book has
featured recently. You can act out the role of your favorite
character, doing anything that character could. You can actually BE
your favorite fictional character! You can live out your fantasies,
for only a few dollars a minute!" She seemed to reading from a
prepared statement.
     "Well..." Ernie was still unsure. He had heard that these
games were tremendous fun. They had become very popular in the last
few years. You could now find a Virtual Arcade at just about any
major shopping mall (they were franchised). Of course, you had to
pay through the nose to play, but nobody seemed to mind. They were
just so much FUN...
     "I still feel silly wearing this fur loincloth and carrying
this big plastic sword," complained Ernie.
     "That's what Goombah wears in the movie, isn't it?" the girl
said, looking bored.
     "Well..."
     The girl looked at the clock. "If you don't want to play
GOOMBAH THE BARBARIAN, I can let you play KILLER LESBIANS FROM
OUTER SPACE instead. I've got a game starting in ten minutes."
     "No, no, that's okay," Ernie protested.
      A chime sounded. "Your game starts in five minutes!" The girl
warned Ernie, fluffing her hair absently.
     Well, I guess I'm stuck with this, Ernie thought. I paid my
$47.95; and there's no refund. I hope this turns out to be worth
the money. Ernie was, after all, just a college student, and didn't
have money to burn.
     The chime sounded, again, this time more urgently. "Second
door on your right," the girl said brightly.
     This is not starting off well at all, Ernie thought, as he
headed down the hallway. If this doesn't improve real quick, I'm
going to file a complaint, or something.
     Ernie entered a small cubicle. A technician sat him down in a
large, comfortable reclining chair, and fitted him with the stereo
goggles and headset that made Virtual Reality come alive. He even
added the latest refinement: tactile sensation electrodes, which he
glued to Ernie's body at strategic locations.
     As Ernie settled into the new visions and sensations that
awaited him, he began to feel somewhat better. There before him was
the mysterious landscape that Goombah inhabited in the movies, full
of forbidding crags and castles shaped like skulls. Of course, none
of it was actually there, but the illusion was amazingly realistic.
It was hard to believe it was all just synthesized artificial
reality. Ernie was impressed. Maybe this will be okay after all, he
thought. He unsheathed his huge plastic broadsword, preparing to be
attacked by dragons, wizards, or any of the other fearsome
mythological characters that Goombah customarily battled.
     Suddenly, Ernie heard a loud, high-pitched bark. He looked
down and saw a little white dog with a black spot over one eye. The
dos looked up at him expectantly.  Ernie was not prepared for
something like this. I'm supposed to be Goombah the Barbarian, he
thought. Goombah does not have any silly little dog!
     The dog suddenly jumped up into Ernie's arms. He caught it
automatically. It peered up into his face, as though expecting him
to do something.
     "This has got to be a mistake", said Ernie to himself
exasperatedly. "This dog must be from somebody else's game. What am
I gonna do with him?" 
     Before he could think about the problem any further, a  bright
light in the sky attracted Ernie's attention. Here it comes, he
thought, gripping his broadsword tightly. What will it be, a demon,
a flying dragon? Ernie strained his eyes. It's...a flying saucer?
Sure enough, it was a flying saucer, looking as though it had come
straight from an old 1950's science-fiction movie. Ernie was taken
aback. There weren't supposed to be any flying saucers in Goombah
the Barbarian!
     The flying saucer quickly landed a few yards in front of
Ernie, and two space creatures emerged. They seemed to be some kind
of humanoid reptiles. They reminded Ernie of giant iguanas. The dog
under Ernie's arm wriggled uncomfortably.
     Ernie frowned. Space creatures? he thought. What am I supposed
to do with space creatures? This isn't what I was expecting at all!
Ernie frowned. What kind of game is this, anyway?! The creatures
began approaching Ernie.
     Maybe I'm supposed to say something, he considered. Suddenly,
an idea occurred to him. He drew himself up to his full height.
"Klaatu barada nikto!" he announced.
     One of the space creatures pulled out a ray gun and pointed it
at him. Hmm, thought Ernie. Maybe that wasn't quite the right thing
to say. It occurred to Ernie that a strategic retreat might be a
good idea. He looked around quickly. Unfortunately, the landscape
of swirling mists and forbidding hills didn't seem to contain
anyplace to retreat to.
     Ernie turned back to the creatures. "Look, uh, what I said
about Klaatu, I didn't really mean..." The creature fired. Ernie
felt himself suddenly stiffen into immobility.
     "It's stunned, sir," Ernie heard one creature say to the
other.
     "Good, load it onto the ship." The two creatures lifted Ernie,
who had become stiff as a board, and began carrying him, dog and
all, toward the ship.
     In spite of himself, Ernie was impressed. These special
effects are fantastic, he thought. I wonder how they do that
Stunner business?
     Suddenly, a costumed comic-book character appeared, complete
with flowing cape and a big, red `M' on his chest. He blocked the
aliens' path. "Unhand that barbarian!" the comic-book character
boomed.
     The space creature looked at each other in confusion. "Unhand?
What does that mean? Are we supposed to cut off his hands?"
     The comic-book character looked exasperated. "Look, just put
him down, okay?" he said, in a much more conversational tone.
     "Put him down? Put him down?" One space creature looked at the
other. "What do we do now, sir?"
     "Oh, I don't know", the other creature replied. "Just
disintegrate him, I guess." They drew their weapons.
     The comic-book character looked confused. "Um..uh.." The
creatures advanced menacingly.
     Suddenly, the comic-book character shouted what seemed to
Ernie to be a very odd thing. "JMP 08F1!"
     Instantly, the entire scene vanished. Ernie, still stiff and
board-like, found himself unsupported, and dropped three feet to
land with a thud on a carpeted floor. "Hi guy!" Ernie heard someone
say. "Howya doin'?"
     Ernie attempted to moan, but discovered that he was still
quite securely frozen. "Here, let me help you up," he heard the
same voice say. The room swung into view as he felt himself lifted
up and placed on his feet like a statue. He seemed to be in
someone's living room.
     The owner of the voice came into view. It was the comic-book
character, who in the cold light of day appeared to be a pleasant,
although rather vacuous-looking fellow of indeterminate age. "Allow
me to introduce myself," he said cheerfully. "I'm Captain Memory!"
He extended a hand. Ernie instinctively attempted to shake the
man's hand, but discovered he was still quite frozen. It occurred
to him that he was still carrying the silly little dog, which was
also frozen.
     The man dropped his outstretched hand embarrassedly. "Hey, I
forgot," he said cheerfully. "You're still paralyzed! Hey, no
sweat! It'll wear off in a few minutes!" The man seated himself on
a nearby sofa and began perusing a small book he had produced from
somewhere. Ernie, of course, continued to stand where he was,
immobilized.
      This is a really weird game, Ernie thought. The special
effects are fantastic, but the story line is bizarre. Like, what am
I supposed to do now?
     After about fifteen minutes, Ernie's little finger began to
twitch. The twitching slowly spread across his hand. Finally, with
great effort, Ernie was able to take a step towards the comic-book
character, who was still seated on the sofa, reading his book.
      The comic-book character looked up. "Ah, it's wearing off!"
he said. "Are you feeling okay?' 
     "Ungph", said Ernie, discovering that the power of speech was
slowly returning to him.
     Captain Memory took that to mean "yes". "Good, good," he
replied in a cheerful tone. 
     "Wharf gumg om?" Ernie got out with difficulty.
     "You're probably wondering what's going on."
     "Yarf!"
     Ernie felt something sharp digging into his side. It was the
little dog, trying to get away. Unfortunately, that arm had not
unfrozen yet. 
     Ernie's ability to speak seemed to have returned. "All right,
so what IS going on?"
     "I had to rescue you from those creatures,"  Captain Memory
explained. "They were taking you to be a Cyberslave in the mining
pits."
     Ernie frowned. "What's a Cyberslave?"
     Captain Memory shook his head sadly. "They were going to force
you to operate mining robots, like so many other poor fools before
you. Like you, they thought they were going to play a game. The
next thing they knew, they were forced into a life of virtual hard
labor, operating mining robots 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, until
finally their bodies shrivelled up and their brains burned out." He
sighed. "I was too late for most of them, but at least I could save
the two of you!"
     Ernie shivered. Some of this was beginning to seem a  little
too real. "Man, this is a really strange game!" he said. "I'm not
complaining, mind you! I mean, the special effects alone make it
worth the money!" He looked around. He seemed to be in a huge
living room, all decorated in 1950's style. It all seemed very
solid and believable. Ernie couldn't help being impressed. "I mean,
this is, like, SO realistic! It's just that I'm having a real hard
time following the story! Like, what is supposed to be happening in
this game, anyway?"
     Captain Memory sighed. "Look, I'm trying to explain this to
you. It's NOT a game, okay? That game business was just a ruse. It
was a trap to get you to come in and hook yourself up to their
Virtual Reality system. Once you're in, you can't get out! They
turn you into a Cyberslave, and make you work until your brain
burns up!"
     "Oh, right," Ernie caught himself. "I get it. You're not
supposed to admit it's a game. You're supposed to pretend it's
real. Okay, I'll play along. So, what now?"
     Captain Memory shook his head sadly. "I can see this isn't
going to be easy." He thought a moment. "Okay, if this is a game,
you should be able to quit any time you like, right?"
     "Uh, yeah." This was beginning to make Ernie uneasy.
     "So, how do you quit?" the Captain demanded. "Where's the ESC
button, or BREAK or whatever? HOW do you get out?"
     Ernie suddenly realized that he hadn't been given any
information on what to do when he wanted to quit playing. "Uh,
well, I can quit anytime I want," he said defensively.
     "Okay; try!" Captain Memory demanded.
     Ernie shuffled uncomfortably. "Well, maybe I'm not ready to
quit yet!"
     "Try it, just to see what happens!" the Captain urged.
     "Well", Ernie considered. "It looks like I got into the wrong
game here. I wanted to play GOOMBAH THE BARBARIAN. I mean, no
offense, this is a cool game and everything, but I really wanted to
play GOOMBAH!"
     Captain Memory looked upset. "This really isn't a game!"
     Ernie sighed. "I'll tell you what. I'll just give up on this
for today, and I'll try again a week from Thursday, okay? So, I'll
just be heading home now, okay?"
     "Great!" said the Captain enthusiastically. "Just quit right
now, okay?"
     "Well, okay," Ernie agreed halfheartedly. He tried to think of
what to do. "Hello!" he called up into the air. "Is anybody there?
I'd like to go now!" Nothing happened. 
     Ernie's heart began to pound. "Hey, c'mon! Isn't anybody
listening to me? I said `I wanna GO!'" No response.
     This was beginning to be more than Ernie felt he could deal
with."Look, I'm not asking for my money back, or anything. I'll,
you know, try again some other time. I just want to go home, okay?"
No answer.
     Now Ernie really DID want to go! He began to panic. "Hey,
isn't anybody out there!? WAKE UP!! I don't wanna play anymore! I
wanna go home!" He wailed, "I WANT MY MOMMY!!" Nothing!
     "All right, all right, calm down!" Captain Memory tried to
soothe Ernie. "We'll get you out of here! It's just going to
take...a little time!"
     Ernie's left arm unfroze convulsively, dumping the little dog
on the floor. It growled unpleasantly. "Why can't you get me out of
here NOW?" he demanded petulantly.
     The Captain shrugged. "Hey, I don't run this show! I was lucky
I could even get you away from those creatures! Getting out is
another story altogether!"
     "Oh, this is awful!" Ernie wailed. He still wasn't entirely
sure whether this was a game or not, but whatever it was, he didn't
like it anymore!
     "Maybe you'd better sit down." Captain Memory moved over to
one side of the sofa. Ernie decided that sitting down was probably
a good idea, and did so. This was beginning to get altogether too
real. "Anyway, it could be worse!"
     "How?" Ernie moaned.
     "You could be like that poor guy over there," the Captain
said, gesturing towards the dog.
     "I don't need your sympathy," the dog snapped.
     Ernie started. "A talking dog! This is unbelievable! What
next?"
     "Yeah, yeah", the dog snarled. "Believe me, you don't look so
hot in that ridiculous fur loincloth either! Goombah the Barbarian!
I'm sure!"  The dog pulled a cigar out of some invisible pocket and
began to smoke it, holding it in his front paw in a very un-canine
manner.
     Ernie was suddenly very conscious of his loincloth. He looked
at the dog. "What..what...?"
     "See what I mean?" the Captain gestured towards the dog. "In
Virtual Reality, you can be anybody, or anything! You're lucky you
came through as yourself! You could have wound up like him, as a
dog!"
     The dog made a wry expression. "Yeah, right. Or like YOU!" He
looked the Captain up and down. "A super hero?" he said
sarcastically.
     Captain Memory seemed nonplussed. "Well...what's wrong with
that?"
     "I'm sure!" the replied. "Okay, what super powers have you
got?"
     The Captain seemed defensive. "Well, I do have some powers!"
     "Like what?"
     "Well..." the Captain thought a moment. "Like, I program in
Assembler, and he doesn't!"
     "Wait a minute!" Ernie was confused. "WHO doesn't?"
     "Why, the man behind all this, of course," the Captain
explained. "The evil genius, Waldo Stadium!"
     "Oh, I get it!" Ernie brightened. "This really is a game,
right?"
     Captain Memory sighed exasperatedly. "Look, for the last time,
this is NOT a game. The evil genius, Waldo Stadium, has embarked on
a plan to take over the entire world's computing power. He's been
breaking into people's systems one at a time, taking control of
them, and linking them to his other systems to create a vast
network that grows more powerful all the time. When he takes over
a system, he establishes complete control over anything and anybody
that happens to be in it at the time. That's how you fell into his
clutches. He's taken over the Virtual Arcades; anyone who was
playing a Virtual Reality games there is now his Cyberslave!"
     "Oh, man!" Ernie sank his head into his hands. This was just
too much to handle! Suddenly, a thought occurred to him. "So, how
did we get here, anyway?" He gestured to the room around them.
     Captain Memory pulled himself up to his full height. "I
brought you here!" he said proudly. He turned to the dog. "See, I
told you I had powers!"
     "Great," said the dog sarcastically. "So where are we,
anyway?"
     "We're in Virtual Reality," the Captain explained. "You know,
Cyberspace."
     "Wait a minute," Ernie was finding this all hard to follow.
"If we're still in the computer, doesn't that mean that this guy
Waldo Supermarket has control over us?"
     "Stadium", Captain Memory corrected.
     "Whatever," Ernie said exasperatedly. "What about my question?
Who's in control here?"
     "Ah, that the beauty of it," explained the Captain, warming to
his subject. "He's been taking over systems so fast that he can't
keep track of them. He doesn't even know what he's got! Remember,
when he takes over a system, he gets EVERYTHING that was in it.
He's got games, spreadsheets, database files, and hundreds of
different Virtual Realities, all mixed together in no order! That's
what gives us our window of opportunity. We can hide out in areas
he doesn't even know he's got, until we figure out how to bring
this diabolical scheme to a halt!"
     Ernie thought about this. "Okay, we're in Cyberspace."
     "Right."
     "But where in Cyberspace?"
     The Captain slumped. "Well....I don't exactly know."
     The dog snickered. "Some super hero!"
     "Well, well, I was under a lot of pressure!" The Captain said
defensively. "Those creatures would have had you in another second!
So, I just picked a location at random and JUMPed to it!"
     "You JUMPed to it?" Ernie was confused. "How do you do that?"
     "That's the beauty of Assembler," the Captain answered
enthusiastically. "You can do stuff like that! Now, with a high-
level language, you'd never be able to do stuff like that. You can
only do what the language says you can do. In Assembler, you can do
ANYTHING." Captain Memory chuckled. "That's Waldo's weak point. He
refuses to learn Assembler. He insists you can do all this stuff in
C, or whatever language he using now. Well, we'll show..."
     Suddenly, the dog broke in. "At RANDOM!?" he barked. "You
JUMPed at RANDOM?!!!"
     "Well..." the Captain was taken aback.
     "You mean," the dog continued. "We could have wound up in the
middle of a SPREADSHEET!!?"
     Ernie tried to imagine life in a spreadsheet. It didn't sound
too appealing.
     "It was a chance I had to take," Captain Memory explained
defensively.
     "Great," the dog snarled. "You take chances with our lives!"
     "Okay, okay," the Captain said placatingly. "I've got a better
location." He rummaged furiously through the pockets in his
costume. "I wrote it down; it's here somewhere." he continued
searching. "Um, no, um AHA!" He brandished a small slip of paper in
the air. "Here it is!" He read the paper aloud. "It's: INSPECTED BY
NO. 42!"
     "Some super hero!" the dog repeated.
     The Captain frowned. "Well, maybe that's not the right one!"
He continued to rummage through his pockets. "I'm sure I had it
here somewhere!"
     Ernie looked askance at the comic-book character. "You don't
REMEMBER it?"
     Captain Memory fidgeted uncomfortably. "Hey, it's not easy to
remember a long string of numbers in Hex, you know! I'm doing the
best I can!"
     Ernie moaned quietly. This was all giving him a terrible
headache. Suddenly a thought occurred to him. "Hey, this is all
really just a game, right?
     Captain Memory looked annoyed. "No, it is not a game. It never
was a game. Will you PLEASE stop saying that!"
     Ernie moaned quietly. Captain Memory glanced at his wrist.
"We'd better hurry. We're running out of time."
     Ernie looked up. "You don't have a watch," he said
suspiciously. 
     Captain Memory continued to look at his bare wrist. "Well,
no," he said, a bit crestfallen. "I always wanted one, though."
     Ernie looked around. "Can't we just stay here? It's nice
here." They seemed to be in a very large living room of a well-kept
home. It appeared to be furnished in Fabulous Fifties style, except
for a few odd objects that Ernie couldn't identify.
     "We can't stay in one place to long," replied Captain Memory.
"Waldo Stadium is sorting his data as fast as he can. If we stay in
one place too long, sooner or later he'll zero in on us. Anyway,"
Captain Memory looked around. "This place is beginning to look kind
of familiar to me. If I'm right, this isn't a safe place to be!"
      "Okay, then where are we?" the dog demanded.
     "I think we've landed in a game called `ATTACK OF THE GIANT
EGGPLANT.' If I'm right, this place is going to be nuked in" he
glanced at his bare wrist again, "oh, forty-five minutes or so."
     Ernie began to be aware of a queasy feeling in the pit of his
stomach. This is making me anxious, he thought. I'm not going to do
things like this anymore. That's it, no more Virtual Reality for
me.
     "Maybe you'd like to watch some TV," Captain Memory suggested
cheerfully. "Maybe that would make you feel better."
     "I thought we were in a hurry," Ernie answered.
     "We can watch for a couple minutes," the Captain replied.
      I guess that makes as much sense as anything else, Ernie
thought, and followed the Captain towards the other end of the
room, where he noticed a television with a ten-foot-wide screen
playing with the sound turned off.
     As they approached the television Ernie noticed a large, high-
backed '50's-style sofa positioned close in front of the TV. As
they came around the side of the sofa Ernie was startled to see two
people sitting there, staring intently at the television screen.
"Hey!" Ernie uttered involuntarily.
     The two people seemed oblivious to Ernie's presence. "Um,
hello?" Ernie said tentatively. "Excuse me?" The people did not
respond.
     Captain Memory sighed. "It's too late for them, I'm afraid."
     Ernie moaned. "I wished you'd stop saying depressing things.
It makes my stomach hurt."
     "Oh, sorry." Captain Memory seemed concerned. "Um, how about
`It's too late for them, I'm pleased to say?'"
     "That's not much better."
     Captain Memory shrugged. "Hey, I tried." He fell silent.
     Ernie looked at the people. They seemed frozen into position,
staring at the television. They seemed emaciated; their muscles
seemed to have withered in the positions they were in. "Okay, so
what's wrong with them?"
     Captain Memory shook his head. "They've been in Cyberspace too
long," he said sadly. "There's a limit to how much of this you can
take, you know. Your brain burns out. I don't think these two have
much longer. All they can do is sit here in front of the TV."
Captain Memory sighed. "Terrible, just terrible. Look at them; they
can't even change channels anymore."
     Ernie shuddered. This is gruesome, he thought. I think it's
bad for me to look at gruesome things.
     "Oh well," Captain Memory brightened. "Can't be helped." The
Captain unceremoniously pushed the stricken couple off the sofa.
They fell stiffly to the floor, motionless except for their eyes,
which rotated to stay fixed on the television screen. Captain
Memory seated himself as comfortably as possible on the sofa. "So,
what do you want to watch?"
     They heard a voice behind them. "Crap!" The dog was looking
ruefully at his half-burned cigar and cursing quietly.
     "What's the matter?" Captain Memory inquired cheerfully.
     "I'm almost out of cigars," the dog groused. "Here I am stuck
in this stupid pointless computer game, and I can't even get a
decent cigar."
     "Well, maybe we can get you some more, uh, what was your name
again?" The Captain inquired.
     "Sterno." The dog intoned pompously.
     "Sterno?" said Ernie dubiously. "What kind of a name is that?
Sterno is those little cans of heating stuff."
      "I'll have you know that I am Lord High Keeper of the Sacred
Flame. Why, in better days...."
     "Oh, I remember now!" the Captain broke in brightly. "That's
a game called `DOG STAR'! You must have been playing it when Waldo
took over your system! That's why you're trapped in the body of a
dog!"
     Sterno was taken aback. "Uh, well, yeah, I was..."
     "Lord High Keeper of the Sacred Flame, huh?" the Captain
continued. "You were doing pretty good!"
     Sterno brightened. "Well, yes, as a matter of fact..."
     "Wanna watch `Stump the Stars'?" Captain Memory said to Ernie,
cutting off Sterno's tales of past glory.
     "What's that about?" inquired Ernie.
     "It's this game show where famous Hollywood celebrities have
to answer these questions, and if they get them wrong, they get
their arms and legs chopped off. Stumps, get it?" Captain Memory
laughed.
     Ernie frowned. "I don't like these new game shows." He glanced
at the television. The program seemed to be a game show. The MC was
an unpleasant looking man wearing a black military uniform with
skulls on the collar. He wore a monocle in his left eye, and
carried a riding crop, which he periodically cracked against his
jackboots.
     "Oh, it's one of those sadistic Nazi game show hosts," said
Ernie. "Isn't there anything else on?"
     Captain Memory was paging through a copy of TV Guide. "Doesn't
look like there's anything on except game shows. How about `Vomit
for Dollars'?"
     Ernie grimaced.
     "Here's a movie," the Captain continued. "How about `The
Humpback of Notre Dame', starring Ronald Reagan? You know, the one
about the whale that plays football?"
     Ernie sighed. "What's this we're watching now?"
     "I don't know." Captain Memory reached for a dial. "Let's turn
up the volume and find out."
     The off-camera announcer's voice came blasting out off the
set, painfully loud. "... time for Wheel of Torture! The show which
every week asks the question: How much can you take?"
     The sound of applause welled up from the audience.
     "And here's our host," the announcer continued. "The Gestapo's
greatest, that famous fiend, Sturmbannfuhrer Dr. Heinz von   
Liederkranz!"
     Once again the sound of applause welled up. The sound seemed
to be growing impossibly loud. In fact, it seemed to be coming from
all around them.              

     The game show host smiled and bowed to the audience. "Tank
you, tank you!"
     "Now, let's drag in today's first victim!" The announcer
continued. "From  Palo Alto, California, let's have a big         
round of applause for: CAPTAIN MEMORY!"
     The huge waves of applause filled Ernie's head, blocking out
everything else. He clenched his eyes tightly, trying to regain his
composure. He opened them again, and staggered back in shock. They
were no longer in the suburban living room. They were actually
standing on the stage that they had been watching only seconds
before. They had actually been sucked INTO the game show!
     Captain Memory seemed confused. "Hey, uh, wait a minute. I
didn't..."
     The announcer continued. "And here's contestant number two!
From the Land  that Time Forgets, let's have a big hand for:
Goombah the Barbarian!"
     Ernie realized that they meant him. A Nazi SS trooper grabbed
him, and shoved him roughly forward.    "Hey, lemme go...ow. Look.
I'm not supposed..."
     "Say, I just LOVE your loincloth!", the announcer quipped.
     Ernie could hear the audience laughing. He began to feel
terribly self-conscious.
     "And what a CUTE little dog!" the announcer went on.
     Sterno didn't seem to be particularly bothered by the state of
affairs. "Say, you got a cigar?"
     "Why SURE!" The announcer handed him one. The audience
chuckled.
     The announcer continued. "Well, all RIGHT then! Dr. von
Liederkranz, what are we going to start out with today?"
     The Nazi smiled theatrically. "Vell, Biff, I tought I'd shtart
out vit a liddle infention of mein own: de Hot Vhirling Corshcrew!"
He pulled out a fiendish-looking device, made of glowing, whirling
metal parts. Without warning, he jabbed Captain Memory with it. The
Captain let out a blood-curdling shriek.
     The audience applauded wildly.
     "VERY good!" The announcer exclaimed jovially. "Now, let's see
how that rated on our applause meter. A 57! Well, that's..."
     "Forget this!" shouted Captain Memory. "JMP 08F1!"
     Suddenly, Ernie found himself back on the porcelain sofa. The
TV was now off. Ernie was trembling. "Wha...what happened?"
     Captain Memory was rubbing his side ruefully. "Oh, I JUMPed us
back here. I really didn't like that Hot Whirling Corkscrew!"
     "Good cigar, though." Sterno added, puffing away. The cigar
seemed to have improved his disposition somewhat.
     "I...I don't understand," Ernie whined.
     "You know how in a lot of computer games there's these little
doors or windows or something, and when you step through them
you're on a whole different level?" Captain Memory asked.
     "Yeah?" Ernie replied tentatively.
     "Well," the Captain gestured towards the TV. "That's one of
them!"
     Ernie noticed an odd smell. He glanced towards the floor. The
two shrivelled people were...vibrating. Wisps of smoke seemed to be
coming out of their ears.
     "Oh, I forgot," said the Captain. "You're never supposed to
turn the TV off on these people. Something bad happens... I forget
exactly what, but it's real bad."
     Ernie continued to watch the couple in horror. The smoke was
coming more heavily new. Their foreheads seemed to be bulging.
     "What...what are we gonna do?" Ernie choked out.
     Captain Memory regarded his bare wrist carefully. "Some day
I'm gonna get a watch," he said thoughtfully.
     "I really think we ought to do something," said Ernie
anxiously. Smoke was coming out of their noses now. Light seemed to
be appearing behind their eyes.
     "A silver watch might be nice. Do you think silver would look
good with this outfit?" Captain Memory wondered.
     "I really, REALLY think we ought to do something!" said Ernie
urgently. The TV addicts bodies were beginning to swell rapidly.
Ernie inched away from them.
      "Oh well," said Captain Memory unhurriedly. "I guess it's
time to go. Uh, let's see." He thought a moment. "Let's try: PUSH
FF0C." With that, they were gone.
     Ernie blinked and staggered. The scene had changed completely. 
Now he saw an elaborate 18th century drawing room around him. The
walls were decorated with filigreed mirrors and candelabras.
Delicate furniture surrounded them. It all looked very expensive. 
          Captain Memory looked about, obviously pleased with
himself. "Hey, it worked!"
     Ernie's head swam. He felt confused and disoriented. These
abrupt changes of scene were making him sick. He sagged into a
chair. "I don't feel very good," he complained.
     Sterno puffed his cigar. "This is almost decent," he mused.
"You don't suppose there's a snifter of brandy about, do you?" The
sound of a harpsichord drifted in from somewhere. "Ah, Telemann,"
Sterno commented. "Very tasteful."
      Captain Memory turned to Ernie. "Gee, I'm sorry you're not
feeling well," he commiserated. "Would it make you feel better to
watch some TV?"
     Ernie sat bolt upright. "NO!"
     The Captain had brought along his copy of TV Guide. "You're
missing the `Ozzie and Hitler Show'."
     "I don't care."
     "This is a good episode: `Ozzie forgets that the boss is
coming for dinner, so Hitler has to invade Poland on a moment's
notice.'" Captain Memory chuckled.
     "I don't like these TV programs," grumbled Ernie.
     "Well, you know," said Captain Memory conversationally. "If
you're going to travel to other Realities, you're not always going
to be able to get your favorite TV shows."
     "I want to go home," Ernie sulked. Suddenly a thought occurred
to him. He brightened. "Hey, this is really just a game, right?"
     Sterno glared at him. "This `game' business is getting really
old. Knock it off, okay?"
     Ernie had begun methodically feeling the furniture. He
reasoned that if it were a Virtual Reality illusion, he would be
able to see it, but since it had no substance, he wouldn't be able
to feel it. If my hand goes right through this stuff, he figured,
I'll know it's just an illusion. Unfortunately, everything was
proving to be distressingly solid.
     "You know, you look really stupid in that fur loincloth,"
Sterno commented. "And what in the world are you going to do with
that ridiculous plastic broadsword?"
     "Well, I hadda put a deposit on it," said Ernie defensively.
"If I don't bring it back I lose 40 bucks." 
     Sterno shook his head. He turned to Captain Memory. "Do we
really have to drag this kid around with us?"
     Captain Memory shook his head sadly. "I'm afraid so."
     "Why?" Sterno demanded.
     "Well, you know", the Captain said off-handedly. "We can't
just leave him to be a Cyberslave. It wouldn't be, you know, nice."
     A thought occurred to Ernie. "So, what are we supposed to do
about all of this, anyway?"
     "Hmm?" Captain Memory, still perusing the TV Guide, was not
paying very much attention.
     "Like, are we just going to keep bopping around Cyberspace or
what? I mean, do you have a Plan, or something?"
     Captain Memory pulled himself up. "Of course I have a Plan!"
He turned to Sterno. "See? I have Powers, and I have a Plan!"
     "Okay, okay," Sterno agreed wearily. "You're a fine super
hero! So, what's the plan?"
     "We have to find a way to terminate this reality within the
confines of it's own logic," the Captain explained.
     "Huh?" Ernie didn't follow this.
     "We have to end the game," the Captain rephrased. "We have to
carry it through to it's logical conclusion, so that it terminates,
and shuts down."
     Ernie frowned. "What's the point of this game, anyway?"
     "That's a problem," the Captain admitted. "This isn't a game.
It's dozens, maybe hundreds of games, all stuck together in no
order. The "point" of what we're in now could be the point of any
of the games, or all of them, or none of them. There's no way to
tell. Luckily, we don't have to win the game, we just have to end
it. Any ending that's logically consistent will do."
     Sterno frowned. "Why do you have to end it within it's own
logic system? Couldn't you just crash it?"
     Captain Memory sighed. "I could crash the system, but it
wouldn't be a good idea!"
     "Why not?" Sterno demanded. "Why can't you just insert some
totally impossible instruction and crash out the whole system? Then
this whole thing would be over and we could get out of here!"
     "That's true," the Captain admitted. "but you'd get some bad,
um, side effects."
     "Like what?" Sterno wanted to know.
     "You see,"  Captain Memory explained. "After you've been in
Cyberspace for a while, you brain gets synchronized with it, and
your system becomes adapted to it. If it suddenly crashes, it
causes a tremendous shock to your system."
     "What, you mean we're going through all this just to avoid an
upset stomach or something?" Sterno asked sarcastically. "After
all, how bad could it be?"
     "Well, um," the Captain looked very uncomfortable. "It's not
just an upset stomach...."
     "Okay," Sterno demanded. "Then what DOES it cause?"
     "Um, generally, cardiac arrest," the Captain answered
reluctantly.
     Sterno was shocked. "You mean, if you crash the system it'll
KILL us?"
     "Afraid so," the Captain nodded sadly. "Along with anybody
else who's hooked into the system at the time."
     Ernie began to worry. "What about ending the game, then? Won't
that kill us, too? Does that mean we're trapped here forever!?" He
began to panic.
     "No, no, calm down," said the Captain reassuringly. "if we end
the game within the confines of it's own logic, it'll shut down in
an orderly manner, giving your systems time to readjust before
you're returned to reality.It won't be a shock to your systems, and
your hearts won't stop. It's only if it suddenly, abruptly, stops,
like when the system crashes, that..."
     "Okay, okay, we get the picture," Sterno broke it. "Don't
crash the system!"
     "Okay." Captain Memory returned to the TV Guide.
     Ernie sighed. It was bad enough being trapped in a computer
game. Now his life was in danger as well. And his only hope seems
to be this costumed clown who thinks he's a super hero. Wasn't this
ever going to stop getting worse?
     Suddenly, Captain Memory started. "Oh NO," he wailed. "Not
THAT!"
     "What happened? What happened?!" cried Ernie, panic-stricken.
What could possibly have happened that was worse than the
predicament they were already in?
     Captain Memory was still holding the TV Guide. "We missed
Gilligan's Island!"
     Ernie cradled his head in his hands. "I can't stand it. I just
can't stand it."





                         Chapter 2


     Ernie was beginning to feel a little bit better. After all,
nothing really weird had happened for about, oh, twenty minutes or
so. Things were, relatively speaking, pretty quiet.
     Ernie examined his surroundings. "What is this place?"
     "It's a spaceship," said Captain Memory conversationally.
     Ernie was skeptical. "It doesn't LOOK like a spaceship."
     Sterno sniffed. "They don't have to always be those ghastly
chrome-and-glass space things. Utterly tasteless. This place,"
Sterno looked about approvingly. "Is actually not bad."
     Ernie was unconvinced. "It's not moving."
     "Sure it is," the Captain returned. "You just can't feel it.
Wanna look out?" Captain Memory stood up, and walked over to what
appeared to be a small harpsichord. He regarded the keys. "Let's
see. Um, C Major?" He hit the appropriate keys. With a deep
rumbling sound, the ceiling slid back, revealing a view of deep
space. "Ah!" Captain Memory was pleased. He returned to the sofa.
     Ernie regarded the view with amazement. Stars and galaxies
burned brightly against the blackness of space. They seemed to be
an incredible distance from Earth. Ernie turned to Captain Memory.
"Where ARE we?"
     The Captain shrugged. "Space."
     "But where in space?" Ernie wanted to know. "Are we far from
Earth?"
     Captain Memory concentrated. "Let's see, um, `Long, long, ago
in a galaxy far, far..." Ernie frowned. The Captain stopped. "Wait,
that's not right." He furrowed his brow. "Well, I can't exactly
recall where we are, but it doesn't really matter." Captain Memory
was absorbed in looking at the vista of deep space. "After all,
when you wish upon a star, it makes no difference where you are."
     Ernie frowned. "Something about that bugs me."
     "It doesn't sound quite cricket," agreed Sterno.
     "Well, by jiminy," exclaimed the Captain. "We'll just have to
move on to something else. Wanna watch some TV?"
     "I'd rather not," said Ernie.
     "Aww." Captain Memory was disappointed.
     Ernie looked around. "Are we safe here?"
     "For the moment," the Captain shrugged. "As I said, we can't
stay anywhere too long. Waldo will zero in on us if we do."
     "Then what?" Ernie wanted to know.
     "I dunno," the Captain mused. "I suppose he'll come after us."
     Ernie frowned. "You mean he'll come in himself, like
personally?"
     Captain Memory thought about that. "Well, I don't suppose
he'll come in AS himself. After all, you can be anyone, or
anyTHING, in Cyperspace. He'll come in the form of someone else,
some famous person, or someone he'd like to be..."
     "Like you and your super-hero outfit," Sterno broke in.
     "Well...yeah," the Captain admitted.
     Ernie gave than some thought. "So, what form would an evil
genius want to take?"
     Captain Memory shrugged. "I dunno. A Nazi, maybe..." He
returned to the TV Guide.
     "This is much like my own Virtual Reality," mused Sterno. He
seemed to have found a snifter of brandy somewhere, which he
swirled pensively in his left paw. "I had a drawing room like this.
I wrote poetry there. Immortal odes to the glory of the canine
race."
     "Really." Captain Memory was not really paying attention.
     "In fact, I happen to have some with me. Perhaps you'd like to
see it?"
     "Mmm." Captain Memory was gazing at the view. Sterno took his
answer to be a `yes', and handed him a piece of paper with some
verses on it. 
     Captain Memory barely glanced at it. "Looks like doggerel to
me," he said uncaringly.
     Sterno's mood turned black. "I suppose you think that's
funny," he snarled. "I open my heart to you, and you mock me. Well,
we'll see who has the last laugh! I know when I'm right! I'm right,
and you're wrong, and that's all there is to it."
     Ernie thought a moment. "Sounds to me like you're being a bit
dogmatic to me."
     "You fool!" Sterno barked. "You don't even have the vaguest
idea what's going on here! You're a fine one to talk!"
     Captain Memory abruptly changed the subject. "Wanna watch some
TV?" 
     Ernie really didn't want to watch any TV, but he was feeling
very uncomfortable with the current drift of the conversation.
Maybe watching TV would be a good way to change the subject.
     "Uh, this isn't gonna be like last time, is it? We're not
going to get sucked into the TV show again, are we?"
     "Naw," the Captain assured him. "That was a fluke. One-in-a-
million chance. It'll never happen again."
     "Well, okay then," Ernie agreed reluctantly.
     Captain Memory returned to the harpsichord. "Um, F-sharp?" He
hit the appropriate keys. The ceiling view-screen suddenly changed
from a view of space to a television picture. They seemed to have
tuned in to a commercial.
     The announcer was an dour looking man wearing a brown military
uniform and jackboots. He seemed to be making a strenuous effort to
be cheerful.
     "Hi, I'm Martin Bohrmann," the announcer held up two record
albums. "And if you remember me, you remember HITLER'S GREATEST
HITS!"
     "I don't remember that," said Ernie to no-one in particular.
     "Now, together at last on these two long-playing record
albums, 50 all-time golden hits from the Third Reich! You get the
Gestapo Glee Club with HEIL HITLER, DEAR!" Military-sounding music
started up in the background.
     "Do we have to watch this?" Ernie complained.
     "...you can't buy these records in any store, but if you call
this number, a secret messenger will knock on your door in the
middle of the night and..."
     "Oh, okay, I'll change it." Captain Memory struck a key on the
harpsichord. The screen changed to black-and-white. Characters in
1950's clothing appeared.
     "It's an old movie," Ernie commented. He felt better. An old
movie; that would be safe, right? Nothing bad could happen out of
an old movie, right?
     A man in a suit with a cloth over his head appeared on the
screen. A pretty young woman came up to him, and suddenly yanked
the cloth away. Under the cloth, the man had the tremendously
enlarged head of a fly, complete with huge, multifaceted eyes,
antennae, and a long black snout. The young woman began to scream.
     "Hey, I remember this!" said Ernie brightly. It's THE FLY -
the original version, too. You know, that movie about the scientist
who goes into a matter transmitter, except a fly gets in it, and he
winds up with the head of a fly? Hey, this is a great movie!" Ernie
settled back to watch, pleased that he could finally watch
something he understood.
     The movie cut to a commercial. "Hi, I'm Martin Bohrmann, and
if you remember me..."
     Ernie moaned. I wish they wouldn't keep running the same
commercial, he thought.
     The commercial ended. "And now, back to THE DATING GAME!"
     "THE DATING GAME!" Ernie sat bolt upright. "I don't wanna
watch the Dating Game! What happened to my movie?!"
     Captain Memory looked up. "Oh, a game show!" he said brightly.
He hadn't been paying much attention up to this point. "I like game
shows! You know, you can really get into game shows!"
     "I KNOW," Ernie interrupted. "That's what I'm AFRAID of!"
     The man on the screen looked like a typical game show host,
wearing a plaid polyester suit with a large carnation in his lapel.
The only thing that seemed a bit odd about him is that he was
wearing jackboots and a monocle.
     "Congratulations!" he was saying to an excited female
contestant. "You'fe von an all-expenses-paid dream date vit
bachelor number 3!" The game show host seemed to have a bit of a
German accent.
     "Oh, I just can't wait to see him!" The young woman was
jumping up and down with excitement. 
     "Bachelor number three, come on out!" The game show host
called out. A door opened, and out stepped a man, wearing a suit,
who had the enormously enlarged head of a fly. The young woman
began to scream.
     Ernie looked confused. "Hey, what are we watching, anyway? Is
this THE FLY, or THE DATING GAME, or what?"
     Captain Memory was looking at the TV Guide upside-down. "Mmm
hmm," he agreed, not paying much attention.
     The host seemed to be wrapping the show up. "Vell folks, dis
is Biff Mozzarella, saying..."
     "Wait a minute" Sterno interrupted. "I think something smells
around here!
     Captain Memory looked up. "Got a problem?" he asked
unconcernedly.
     "Think about it," Sterno considered. "His name: Mozzarella."
     "Huh?" said Ernie. "You mean, Biff?"
     "This guy's name is Mozzarella," Sterno noted. "The last guys
name was Liederkranz."
     "So?" asked Ernie uncomprehendingly.
     "Cheese, get it?" cried Sterno. "They're both cheese!" 
     I don't think I like the sound of this, Ernie thought. "Um,
well, you know," he began to Captain Memory. "Maybe we ought to
give this some consideration..."
     But it was too late. With a deafening roar, the delicate panel
doors to the room were blown off their hinges. A dozen armed men
rushed in, pointing wicked-looking weapons at the trio. "FREEZE!"
one of them shouted.
     Captain Memory looked uncomprehending. "It seems a bit warm
for that," he commented.
     The group of armed men parted to make way for an unpleasant
looking man wearing a black military uniform, jackboots, and a
monocle. "Zo, ve meet again!"
     The man, did, in fact, look somewhat familiar to Ernie.
"Haven't I seen you somewhere before?"
     The man smiled warmly. "No doubt you've seen my TV show. THE
TORTURE GAME is a big hit these days. I'm..." He drew himself up to
his full height. "Sturmbannfuhrer Dr. Heinz von Liederkranz, the
Gestapo's greatest." He paused; he seemed to be waiting for
applause. His men looked at each other quickly, and began clapping.
Ernie thought it might be a good idea if he applauded too.
     "ENOUGH!" Von Liederkranz silenced his men with a quick sweep
of his riding crop, leaving Ernie applauding feebly all by himself.
Ernie looked around, and quickly stopped.
     Von Liederkranz prodded Captain Memory in the chest with his
riding crop. "Now! You will tell us your name, rank and serial
number!"
     "My what?" Captain Memory looked uncomprehending.
     "Your name, rank, and serial number!"
     "Name, rank and cereal number?" mused the Captain. "But I
never even eat cereal."
     "Do not be coy with us!" snapped the Sturmbannfuhrer. "We know
you are one of Them! Ve know you are a spy on a mission of sabotage
and destruction!" He paused calculatingly. "Remember, ve have vays
of making you talk!"
     Ernie turned to Captain Memory in confusion. "Who are these
guys, anyway?"
     "They LOOK like a bunch of Nazis," the Captain replied
thoughtfully. "But they COULD be..."
     "Enough!" von Liederkranz broke in. "You vill answer our
questions!"
     Captain Memory concentrated. "How about: Who Put the Bop in
the Bop-Shu-Bop-Shu-Bop?" he suggested.
     Von Liederkranz's tone abruptly changed. "You know," he turned
to Captain Memory. "Ve do not haff to be enemies. Ve could be
friends. You vould like to be friends, nein?"
     "Sure." Captain Memory was nothing if not agreeable.
     "Then tell us vot ve vant to know!"
     "Okay." The Captain thought a minute. "The attack is set for
exactly 10:30. Julius Caesar will march on Omaha, and the
Enterprise will attack the Titanic somewhere in the South China
Sea. Then Patton will drive up through the south of France, make a
right onto Route 66, go down three stop lights, turn right and it's
the third house from the corner."
     "Just as ve thought!" This, of course, was not what the
Sturmbannfuhrer had thought at all. However, he had to maintain a
good appearance in front of his men. He smiled amiably. "Please go
on!"
     Captain Memory decided it was time to stop. "I think I've said
too much already!"
     Von Liederkranz's face turned hard. "You misunderstand," he
said menacingly. "I'm not asking you, I'm TELLING YOU! TALK! NOW!!"
     "I'd really rather not." Captain Memory didn't seem to be too
upset by the proceedings. Ernie, however, was beginning to sweat.
Sterno was glaring at the other two, giving them an I-told-you-so
look.
     Von Liederkranz smiled sadistically. "You can't escape, you
know. Ve haff total control of all computation in zis sector. Ze
system vill not accept commands from anyone but me. Dere is no vay
out. Ve have you vhere ve vant you!"    
     "Well," Captain Memory began. "I'm afraid I don't have
time..."
     "So be it!" cried von Liederkranz. "If dat's de vay you are
going to be - bring on de Hot Vhirling Corkscrew!"
     Captain Memory looked pained. "You know, I really don't care
for the Hot Vhirling...I mean `Whirling' Corkscrew."
     Von Liederkranz laughed sadistically. "You are very funny. Ve
vill see how funny you vill be after a few hours vit mein
Corkscrew!"
     Captain Memory seemed offended. "Well, if you're going to be
like that, I'm simply going to have to leave."
     Von Liederkranz laughed sadistically, again. In fact, he
didn't seem to be able to laugh any other way. "Dere is no way
out!" von Liederkranz continued. "You cannot break into ze system
from here!"
     Ernie noticed his stomach beginning to hurt again. Stress, he
thought. It's not good for me to be under this much stress. I think
it's affecting my health. Maybe I'm getting an ulcer?
     Von Liederkranz switched on his Hot Whirling Corkscrew, which,
true to it's name began to whirl and glow. Laughing sadistically,
as usual, he began to bring it closer and closer to Captain
Memory's face.
     The torture device edged ever nearer, inch by inch, spinning
and hissing as it approached Captain Memory's unprotected face.
Ernie shut his eyes tightly. It's too horrible, he thought. I can't
watch. He waited for the inevitable screams.
     Captain Memory looked miffed. "Okay, be like that! JMP 08F1!"
     Ernie opened his eyes. The rococo sitting room had vanished.
They seemed to be back in the huge Chicago living room that they
had originally found themselves in after leaving the Simulation
Arcade. Ernie's head swam. This is all changing too fast for me, he
thought. I just can't keep up with it. He found a chair and sat
down. Ernie didn't feel well at all.  
     Captain Memory was strolling around, ruefully inspecting the
surroundings. "Look at this place," he lamented. "What a mess!"
     Ernie looked about. The place, was, in fact, in dismal shape.
The walls were covered with soot, the furniture was singed. Much of
the furniture was knocked over; some was totally splintered. It
looked rather like a bomb had gone off in the room. Ernie recovered
enough composure to speak. "Why...why are we back here?"
     "Oh, I apologize for that,"  Captain Memory explained. "I just
couldn't think of anyplace else on such short notice. I should have
known this place would be a mess."
     Ernie looked around. "Yeah, this place has really gone to the
dogs." 
     "I suppose you think that's funny!" Sterno growled. 
     Ernie noticed two piles of burned rags lying near the TV set.
They were still smoldering slightly. He shuddered. He would rather
not think about what might have happened here.
     "Well...well," Ernie started again. "How did we get here? That
Nazi said we couldn't escape. He said they controlled all
computation in the sector!"
     "That's right, Captain Memory smiled. "We JUMPed to a
different sector!"
     Ernie decided to just accept that explanation, even though he
didn't entirely understand it.
     "Makes about as much sense as anything else," Sterno agreed.
He seemed to have found another cigar, and was puffing away on it
contentedly. He seemed to be in a much better mood whenever he had
a cigar. "Pity you couldn't have transported that brandy along with
us, though."
     Ernie was desperately trying to make sense of all of this.
"So, who were those Nazi guys, anyway?"
     "That's hard to say for sure," CM said thoughtfully. "They're
probably Cyberslaves, just like you would have been if I hadn't
rescued you."
     Ernie shuddered. He really didn't like the sound of that
`Cyberslave' stuff."
     "What about their leader, Von Liederkranz?" Sterno wondered.
"He didn't look a slave. In fact, he seemed to be having a really
good time!"
     The Captain nodded. "I'm sure he's not a slave," he agreed.
"He's one of the Slavemasters. In fact," Captain Memory furled his
brow in thought. "He MIGHT even be Waldo Stadium himself!"
      "So, what are we doing in all of this?" Ernie wanted to know.
     Sterno rolled his eyes upward. "Hopeless!"
     "Don't pick on the kid!" Captain Memory defended Ernie.
     "Yeah!" Ernie agreed.
     "After all," Captain Memory continued. "It's not his fault
he's stupid!"
     "Yeah, it's..." Ernie broke off. That wasn't turning out the
way he'd hoped. 
     Sterno looked at the Captain. "So, what kind of super hero are
you supposed to be, anyway?"
     "Me?" Captain Memory expounded. "Why I'm a strange visitor
from another planet who came to Earth with powers and abilities far
beyond those of mortal men."
     "Powers and abilities?" Ernie wanted to know. "Like what?"
     Captain Memory continued expansively. "I'm faster than a
speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive; why, I can even
leap tall buildings in a single bound!"
     This was beginning to sound a bit familiar to Ernie. "Anything
else?"
     "I can also change the course of mighty rivers and bend steel
in my bare hands."
     I've got it now, thought Ernie. "You don't, by any chance,
tend to go around disguised as Clark Kent, mild-mannered reporter
for a great metropolitan newspaper, and fight a never-ending battle
for truth, justice, and the American way, do you?"
     Captain Memory looked totally mystified. "Why, no. Why would
I want to do a thing like that?"
     Ernie was nonplussed. "Well...I dunno. I just sort of
thought..." He trailed off.
     There was an awkward silence. Sterno cleared his throat. "You
don't suppose these people keep caviar about somewhere, do you?"
     Grateful for the interruption, Ernie began searching. He found
a small white cabinet that looked like it might be a refrigerator.
"Ah!" He pulled out a small jar. "How's this?"
     Sterno examined the jar ruefully. "Oh," he sniffed. "American
caviar. Well, I suppose Beluga was a bit too much to ask. We'll
just have to rough it, I imagine." He looked around. "You wouldn't
happen to have a slice of fresh onion, by any chance?"
     Captain Memory had returned to perusing the TV Guide. "Wanna
watch some TV?" he asked brightly. "It's almost time for that great
game show about the dinosaur age."
     "Which one is that?" Ernie couldn't recall any shows about
dinosaurs.
     "Oh, I'm sure you've seen it. It's real famous!" the Captain
explained. "It's called YOU BET JURASSIC!"
     Ernie frowned. Something about that name did seem a bit
familiar. All these familiar-sounding things that he couldn't quite
place were making him very uneasy. 
     Suddenly, the television came on. "Prepare to die, inferior
creatures!" the speaker blared.
     Ernie was annoyed. "I thought we turned that off!"
     Captain Memory looked upset. "Oh, dear. I forgot about that!"
     Ernie began to get that queasy feeling in his stomach again.
"Forgot about WHAT?"
     The television screen showed a huge purple vegetable, lifting
itself up on a green stalk. It seemed to be gloating, insofar as a
vegetable can gloat. "You will soon respire your last, animal
scum!" the vegetable continued. "No longer shall we of the
vegetable kingdom be your helpless victims, to be bred and
destroyed at your whims! The day of reckoning is here at last!
Prepare to receive the Vengeance of the Vegetables!"
     Ernie shifted his weight uncomfortably. "This sure is a weird
program."
     "Oh, it's not a program," Captain Memory explained. "The
Killer Eggplants are about to attack!"
     Ernie thought he'd better sit down again. "Huh?"
     "I told you, we're in a game called `ATTACK OF THE KILLER
EGGPLANTS'!" Captain Memory regarded his bare wrist. "Oh dear, it's
been almost forty-five minutes."
     Ernie didn't get it. "I don't get it," he said.
     "Remember those nukes I told you about?"
     Ernie didn't like the sound of this. He tried to put the
pieces together. "They're going to nuke us?"
     "Afraid so," said Captain Memory cheerily. He didn't seem
particularly upset at the idea.
     "WHY?!"
     "To put an end to the Revolt of the Vegetables," Captain
Memory explained. "And fry the Great Eggplant once and for all!"
     Ernie was trying hard to understand all of this. "let me get
this straight - you mean the vegetables have risen up in revolt?"
     "Of course not!" Captain Memory laughed. "How could vegetables
possibly do a thing like that?"
     Ernie was getting frustrated. "Then WHAT is GOING ON!?"
     Captain Memory chuckled. "Oh, it's all a big practical joke!"
     Ernie felt relieved. "Then they're NOT going to nuke Chicago?"
     "Oh no, they're really going to do it." Captain Memory seemed
to think this was all very funny. "After all, they don't know it's
a joke, do they? It wouldn't be very funny if they KNEW it was a
joke, would it?" Captain Memory chuckled. "Nope, they're going to
bomb the whole city back to the Stone Age."
     Ernie heard the sound of jets flying very close by outside. He
began to feel very uneasy. "So, um, what are we going to do?"
     "Do?" asked Captain Memory innocently.
     Ernie began to feel an intense heat radiating through the
walls. He clenched his eyes tightly closed. I'll just close my
eyes, he thought. Maybe when I open them again this will all be
gone.
     He opened his eyes.
     It was all gone.
     Ernie was taken aback. Wow, he thought. It worked.
     He looked around. They were in the midst of a grassy field,
studded with wildflowers. Bright sunshine bathed the scene. Captain
Memory was idly toying with blades of grass; Sterno was sniffing
the flowers.
     "Where are we?" Ernie asked dumbly.
     "Why, the Stone Age, of course." Captain Memory seemed to
think this was quite obvious. "Somewhere in the Jurassic period, I
think."
     "You knew this would happen?" Ernie cried.
     "Sure," replied the Captain offhandedly. "It's part of the
game!"
     Ernie sighed. A gentle breeze swayed the tall grass. He could
hear birdsongs in the distance. It all seemed very peaceful. Good,
thought Ernie. I could use a break. He lay down in the grass and
rested. At least, he thought, we won't have to watch any TV.
     The sun moved slowly across the sky as the hours passed. After
a time, Ernie sat up. It occurred to him that he might be getting
a sunburn. "So, what are we gonna do in the Stone Age?" he asked. 
     "Get stoned?" Sterno offered.
     Captain Memory looked at his bare wrist. "I'm glad you
mentioned that," he said. "It's time we were on our way."
     I knew I shouldn't have said anything, Ernie thought. Oh well,
it's too late now. "So now what?"
     "We'd better find a cave before it gets dark, don't you
think?" Captain Memory said cheerily. "Wouldn't want to have a run-
in with one of those saber-tooth tigers, would we?" 
     Ernie frowned. He had forgotten that there would be things
like saber-tooth tigers in the Stone Age, although he supposed he
should have realized that. It suddenly occurred to him that Stone
Age caves often held giant cave bears. "Um, maybe we should think
about this," he called out to Captain Memory. The Captain, however,
was already far ahead of Ernie, striding purposefully towards a
ridge of white cliffs in the distance. He seemed not to hear Ernie,
or, if he did, he paid no attention. Ernie hurried to catch up.
     "At least you're properly dressed for the occasion," Sterno
commented to Ernie. "I understand fur loincloths are all the rage
this year." Sterno snickered.
     Ernie looked down at his garment. He had been wearing it so
long he had sort of forgotten about it.
     "If we run into any saber-tooth tigers," Sterno continued.
"You can just chop them up with your plastic broadsword." Sterno
laughed unpleasantly.
     "Are you still carrying that thing?" Captain Memory called,
without looking back.
     "Hey, it's a forty buck deposit, okay?" Ernie sensed that they
were both laughing at him. "Gimme a break, huh?"
     "Hopeless, just hopeless," Sterno muttered, amused.
     Ernie began to be able to make out an odd looking object in
the distance. It seemed to be some sort of primitive building. As
they approached, Ernie began to see it more clearly. It seemed to
be a house, made out of huge slabs of stone. Holes were cut in the
front slab for windows and a door. A huge flat slab made up the
roof. Sitting outside the house was a very odd object. It was a
wooden framework connected to two huge stone rollers. There was a
seat on the framework, and a piece of fur held up above the seat,
creating a primitive roof.
     "How odd," commented Sterno. "Some sort of totem object, no
doubt. Perhaps a throne of some sort?"
     They approached the house. It began to look a bit familiar to
Ernie. Those fur curtains on the windows, where had he seen those
before? A neat walk led toward the front door. At the end of the
walk was a stone box, held up on a pole. There was something
written on the box. The name confirmed Ernie's worst fears: "F.
FLINTSTONE".
     "Hey guys!" Ernie called out.
     "Hmm?" returned Captain Memory, continuing to walk toward the
house. He was, as usual, not paying much attention to Ernie.
     "Um, I don't think we should go in there!"
     "Why not?" Captain Memory did not even slow down.
     "I've got a real bad feeling about this place!"
     "Aww, is the big, strong barbarian afraid of the little
house?" sneered Sterno. "Well, then he can just stay out here with
the saber-tooth tigers if he likes." The two of them continued into
the house, leaving Ernie standing alone on the front walk. Ernie
looked around. The sun was slowly edging towards the horizon,
casting long, menacing-looking shadows. Ernie found himself
anxiously looking around for places large enough for a saber-tooth
tiger to hide in. Well, he thought. There's not much point in
standing here. I might as well go in.
     Stepping inside the doorway, Ernie found himself in a living
room, appointed with furniture made of stone and wood. Captain
Memory and Sterno had made themselves comfortable on the stone-and-
fur sofa. The owners of the house were nowhere in sight.
     "Rather luxurious for the Stone Age, don't you think?"
commented Sterno. Captain Memory was, once again, engrossed in his
copy of the TV Guide. Ernie noticed, across from the sofa, what
appeared to be a roughly carved, stone television set. He moaned.
     "Whatever is the matter!" said Sterno impatiently.
     "Hey guys," Ernie implored. "I really think we ought to get
out of here. I think this is some kind of a trap, or something."
     Sterno rolled his eyes upward. "Paranoia," he commented. "The
poor creature would like to think he's important enough for anyone
to bother persecuting." He turned to Ernie. "Who in the world would
want to lay a trap for you? What possible use could they have for
you if they caught you?"
     Ernie shifted back and forth uncomfortably. Suddenly, an
object caught his eye. "Paranoia, huh?" he demanded. "What about
THAT!" He pointed to an object in a dark corner.
     Ernie's exclamation was enough to tear Captain Memory's
attention away from his TV Guide. He peered at the object. It was
a box with what appeared to be a lens attached to it. As they
looked at it, it whirred quietly, moving the lens back and forth.
     "It's a hidden camera!" Ernie cried triumphantly. "We're being
watched!"
     Sterno was nonplussed. "Where did that come from?"
     "Well, tear it out, then!" Captain Memory said.
     Ernie strode over to the dark corner, grabbed to camera and
yanked it out of it's mounting. He dashed it to the ground, where
it shattered, revealing feebly glowing electronic parts which
slowly, one by one, went out.
     "Well, so much for that," Captain Memory returned to the TV
Guide. 
     "Is that ALL?!" exclaimed Ernie.
     "Well, what else did you want?" asked Captain Memory,
mystified.
     "Look, I just proved to you that this is some kind of a trap
or something!" cried Ernie exasperatedly. "There was a hidden
camera watching us, for heaven's sake!"
     "So, you took it out." Captain Memory seemed perfectly
satisfied. "So much for that."
     Ernie was getting very frustrated. "Well, well, what if
there's another?"
     "Oh, I very much doubt that," Sterno commented.
     Captain Memory was still studying his TV Guide. "Wanna watch
some TV?" he asked brightly.
     "NO!" Ernie was building up a real aversion to television.
     "Why not?" Captain Memory couldn't imagine why anyone would
not want to watch TV.
     "Look," said Ernie desperately. "This is the Stone Age, right?
There aren't supposed to be any TVs here. They haven't been
invented yet. This is before television!"
     Captain Memory chuckled.  "Don't be silly! No time is before
television!" He got up and walked over to the set.
     "How primitive," Sterno commented. "No remote control. That's
only to be expected in the Stone Age, I suppose."
     "Look," said Ernie urgently. "I'm positive there were no
televisions in the Stone Age!"
     Captain Memory sighed. "Be reasonable," he said. "have you
ever seen, oh, let's say `I Was a Teenage Caveman'?"
     Ernie thought a moment. "Um, yes."
     "Where did you see it?"
     "On TV."
     "It takes place in the Stone Age, right?"
     "Um, yeah." Ernie wasn't sure he liked the way this line of
questioning was going.
     "Well, how could that be, UNLESS THERE WERE TELEVISIONS IN THE
STONE AGE!?" Captain Memory cried triumphantly. "I rest my case."
     Sterno applauded. "Bravo," he said politely.
     "Well...well..." Ernie was sure there was something wrong with
this argument, but he couldn't quite figure out what it was. He
noticed that no-one was listening to him anyway.
     Captain Memory switched on the television. Being a primitive
set, it took a long time to warm up.
     A picture of a room very much like the one the three were in
appeared on the television screen, taken from an odd angle.
     "Eww, black-and-white," sniffed Sterno. "This really is the
Stone Age, isn't it?"
     Ernie stared at the picture. A man in a comic-book-character
outfit, accompanied by a dog, entered the room, and they both sat
down. After a short wait, another figure, clad in a fur loincloth
and carrying a large plastic broadsword, also entered. The
characters seemed to be conversing, but their voices were too
indistinct to understand.
     "I can't hear what they're saying," Captain Memory said.
     "Seems to be a sound problem," Sterno sniffed. "Only to be
expected from prehistoric TV stations."
     Suddenly, one of the characters pointed directly at them.
"...hidden camera!" They heard the figure say. "We're being
watched!" The other characters said something indistinct. The
figure in the loincloth loomed larger and larger in the picture,
until finally the screen was entirely taken up by a face not unlike
Ernie's own. A huge hand loomed up over the screen, and the picture
went dead.
     Ernie looked at the dead television screen. "I don't like the
looks of this at all," he said warily.
     "Neither do I," agreed Captain Memory. "Let's watch something
else." He changed the channel.
     A different scene appeared. In it, two men were seated at a
large array of electronic equipment, their backs to the audience.
They were peering intently at their devices, and conversing.
     "Looks like they found the hidden camera," one said to the
other.
     "What are we gonna do?"
      "Let's switch over to the second camera."
     "What if they find that one?"
     "They won't. They don't suspect a thing."
     The two men flipped some switches. "Here we go," said the
first. "Wanna see it?"
     "Sure." The man flipped a switch. Suddenly, the scene changed
back to the room suspiciously like their own. The figure in the
loincloth appeared upset.
     "Hey!" cried Ernie. "`Hey!'" cried the loincloth-clad figure
on the television. "That's us!" "`That's us!'" echoed his TV image.
     Captain Memory regarded the television picture. "Not a very
interesting show," he commented, echoed a moment later by the
comic-book-clad character on the television. "Seems a bit
repetitious. Might as well turn it off."
     "Wait!" Ernie cried, but it was too late. Captain Memory had
already shut off the set.
     Captain Memory was confused. "Wait? I thought you didn't want
to watch TV? I just turned it off to be nice. I can turn it back on
if you want." He reached toward the set.
     "NO! No, uh that's okay. Uh, thanks. I'd just as soon we
didn't watch anything right now, if you don't mind." Ernie was not
prepared for the possible consequences of turning on the TV again.
He had more than enough to deal with as it was.
     Ernie gathered up his thoughts. "Okay, guys, look. I gotta
tell you something. This place is not what it seems!"
     "Really." Captain Memory had returned to the study of his
favorite reading matter, the TV Guide.
     Ernie continued. "This isn't a typical Stone Age house, okay?
It's actually a set from a 1960's cartoon series called  `The
Flintstones.'"
     "Oh, we know THAT," Captain Memory commented, not bothering to
look up.
     "You DO?!" Ernie was upset. "Well, well, why didn't you SAY
something!?"
     "You didn't ask."
     Sterno was considering something Ernie had said a few moments
earlier. "What makes you think `The Flintstones' isn't typical of
the Stone Age?"
     Ernie dropped into a chair. This was getting to be to much for
him, he thought. The more he argued about all of this, the more he
seemed to be losing ground. He wasn't even sure what point he was
losing ground on.
     Ernie decided to try another approach. "Okay, I give up. You
tell me, then: What is going on?"
     "Oh, you want to know what's going on!" said the Captain
brightly. He always enjoyed telling stories. "Why didn't you say
so! Well," he went on, warming up to his subject. "All of this is
totally artificial. It was put here to be a trap..."
     "That's what I was trying to tell you!" cried Ernie excitedly.
"It's a trap! I knew it!"
     Captain Memory was annoyed. "Do you want to hear this or do
you want to talk?"
     "Sorry." Ernie shut up.
     "Where was I?" Captain Memory gathered his thoughts. "Oh yes.
Anyway, this is part of a game called `THE FLINTSTONES', in which
Fred and Barney thwart an attempt by aliens to take over the Earth
back in the Stone Age. It's really quite elaborate."
     "An excellent game," Sterno added. "I've played it myself."
     "Anyway," Captain Memory continued. "This house is actually a
trap set by the aliens to try to capture Earth people. We knew
that, but we thought we'd come in here anyway, because it's more
comfortable than a cave, don't you think?"
     "Aha!" cried Sterno.
     "What?!" Ernie was startled.
     "Cigars!" Sterno had found a stone jar, and opened it. He
pulled out a cigar and examined it, sniffing it carefully. "They're
not very good, but I suppose they'll have to do. One must, after
all, make allowances in the Stone Age." He lit one, puffing little
clouds of blue smoke into the air. Captain Memory returned to the
TV Guide.
     "So, what about these aliens?" Ernie inquired. "What do they
want?"
     "Oh, I don't know. Typical alien stuff, I imagine. `Take me to
your leader', conquer the world, steal your brain. You know, all
that stuff aliens always do."
     Ernie was mystified. "But why?"
     "Oh, I don't know. Probably from watching old science fiction
movies on TV. The aliens seem to think that sort of thing is
expected of them."
     Ernie wasn't following this. "Watching TV? Aliens watch TV?"
     "Of course," Captain Memory went on. "You'd have to expect
something like that to happen. After all, we've been beaming those
radio and television waves out into outer space for years. It was
only a matter of time until someone picked them up. Do you realize
that there are civilizations forty light years from here that are
now watching 1950's situation comedies? What do you suppose they
think of that?"
     "Well..." Ernie began.
     "Did you ever think that they might consider it a hostile
act?" Captain Memory continued animatedly. "They might think having
"I Love Lucy" reruns beamed at them is an act of war."
     "Huh?" Ernie wasn't following this too well.
     "Well, look at it from their point of view," Captain Memory
explained. "Here they are, they come home from a hard day at, well,
whatever it is they do, they just wanna watch a little TV, you
know? So they flip on their set, and what do they get? `Mr. Ed',
`The Flintstones', `I Love Lucy'! They don't wanna watch this! They
wanna watch, you know, ALIEN shows!"
     Ernie considered this. "I Love Lucy, huh? Well, I can see
their point."
     "So maybe they decide to flip on the stereo," Captain Memory
continued. "And what do they get? The Chiffons, the Ronettes, Chuck
Berry! Maybe they don't like rock n' roll! Did you ever think of
that?"
     "No," Ernie was amazed. "I thought everybody liked rock n'
roll!"
     Captain Memory shook his head sadly. "You can't take anything
for granted in Outer Space."
     Ernie found this disturbing. "Maybe it wasn't such a good idea
to let all those TV waves get out into space, then."
     "Probably not," agreed Captain Memory. "But, it's too late
now. We'll just have to deal with the consequences."
     Ernie didn't like that word `consequences.' He would rather
not think about what the `consequences' of all of this might be. He
rubbed his head. He especially didn't like that `steal your brain'
business.
     "So, what are we gonna do?" Ernie wanted to know.
     "Do?" repeated Captain Memory distantly. He had returned to
reading.
     Ernie heard a shout far in the distance. He strained his ears.
There it was again! It sounded like...`Yabba-dabba-doo?'
     "Look, I think we ought to get out of here," Ernie pleaded. "I
think something bad is gonna happen if we don't leave, like, right
now!"
     "Oh, my! What a coincidence!" cried Captain Memory.
     "What now?" Ernie asked uneasily.
     "You'll never guess what's on! And here we were, talking about
almost that very thing just a moment ago!"
     Ernie had a bad feeling about this. "Not..."
     "That's right!" returned Captain Memory jovially. "TRUTH OR
CONSEQUENCES!"
     "I really don't wanna watch..." But it was too late. Captain
Memory had already flipped on the set.
     The set came on. "...and here's our host," the announcer was
saying. "That fabulous Frenchman, Henri Gruyere!"
     "This isn't the `Truth or Consequences' I remember!" said
Ernie suspiciously. As usual, no-one was listening.
     "Gut efening, ladies und gentlemen!" the host was saying. He
was an unpleasant-looking man wearing a traditional French outfit:
red-striped shirt, scarf, beret. The only things that seemed a bit
out of place were his monocle and jackboots.
     "First of all," he continued. "I vould like to point out dot
I am French. I am not German. Not at all. Not efen a little bit."
     "Wait a minute," said Sterno suspiciously. " Something smells
here!"
     "Hmm?" Captain Memory looked up unconcernedly.
     "Think about it!" cried Sterno. "Don't you realize..!? His
name! Gruyere! It's...CHEESE!"
     But, it was, as usual, too late. Sudden brightness dazzled
Ernie's eyes. As his vision cleared, he found himself standing on
a game-show stage, with Captain Memory and Sterno beside him. He
blinked and staggered, disoriented by the sudden change of scene.
He moaned and held his head until the sickening swimming sensation
stopped.
     Ernie looked up. He was facing the audience. He noticed
something odd about the people watching. Oh, that's it, he thought.
They're all wearing Nazi uniforms.
     "I thought you said this couldn't happen," he said to Captain
Memory accusingly. "I thought you said there was a million-to-one
chance of us getting sucked in through a TV again!"
     Captain memory shrugged. "So I was wrong," he admitted. "So
sue me!"
     The game shoe host turned to the threesome. "Perhaps you vould
like to step through door number three?" the host said to them.
     Ernie turned around. A number of very nice prizes were
displayed on the stage: a red sports car, furniture, some shiny new
appliances. Several very attractive women in cut-down outfits were
standing around the stage. Unfortunately, they all carried guns,
which they held trained on Ernie and the others.
     Captain Memory was replying to the talk show host, "No, I
don't think we would care to step through door number three. Thanks
just the same."
     The talk show host laughed unpleasantly. "I vould strongly
recommend dot you step through door number three!" he said
urgently.
     "No, we'd really rather not," answered the Captain pleasantly.
     The host's face darkened. "You vill shtep through dat door!
NOW!" The women's fingers tightened menacingly on their triggers.
     "Oh, well, if you put it that way," the three of them found
themselves prodded towards door number three. The door opened in
front of them, and they found themselves thrust into blackness. The
door slammed behind them with a resounding crash. 
     Ernie blinked. As his eyes began to adjust, he could see that
the room they were in was not entirely dark. A small amount of
light came in from a barred window high up on the opposite wall.
They were in a large chamber with damp stone walls and a dirt
floor. It seemed to be...a dungeon.
     "Oh great," Ernie muttered. "So this is what's behind door
number three!"
     "It could've been worse," said Captain Memory jovially.
     "Oh yeah?" Ernie returned glumly. "How?"
     "It could've been door number four."
     "So? What's the big deal about door number four?"
     "Oh," Captain Memory shook his head. "You don't ever want to
go behind door number four!"
     Ernie didn't like the sound of that. "So, what is it?"
     "It's the worst," Captain Memory went on ominously. "I mean,
it's just too horrible..."
     A voice came from out of the darkness. "Hi, guys!"
     Ernie was taken aback. It hadn't occurred to him that someone
else might be in the dungeon with them.
     A figure approached from out of the darkness. Ernie gasped. It
was a horrendous creature with the body of a human, but the
tremendously enlarged head of a fly, complete with huge, faceted
eyes, antennae, and a long, trunk-like snout. It was wearing rather
a nice designer suit. "Say," the creature continued. "Have any of
you guys seen my date?"  
     Ernie stared soundlessly.     
     Captain Memory shrugged. "Sorry."
     The creature sighed. "She seemed like such a nice girl, too."
The creature shuffled back and forth, scuffing his expensive
designer shoes in the dirt.
     Ernie peered at the creature. He didn't seem to be menacing at
all. Quite the contrary. In fact, he seemed quite unhappy. But then
again, Ernie thought, it's kind of hard to read expressions on a
fly.
     "Aww, that's okay, guys," the Fly said sadly. "You don't have
to tell me. I can figure it out. She took off, right?" He sighed.
"Just like all the others." 
     Poor guy, Ernie thought. His date stood him up. Ernie could
sympathize; he'd been in situations like that himself. Of course,
this guy did have an unusual problem.
     "I know," the Fly continued. "It's my looks, right?" His
antennae drooped sadly. "One little accident, and there goes your
whole social life."
     Ernie felt awkward. What was he expected to say in a situation
like this?
     Nothing, apparently, for the Fly went on: "I mean, I've got a
nice personality, I'm intelligent, I'm a fun guy, you know? I got
a good job, a nice car, I paid a lotta money for this suit." He
fingered the expensive silk lapels. "But girls nowadays, do they
care? Naw, all they care about is looks!" The Fly continued
animatedly. He really seemed to appreciate the opportunity to get
all of this off his chest. "I mean, I go into a bar, you know, not
one of those sleazy places, but a nice singles spot, where the
drinks cost like five bucks each, you know? I figure, maybe I can
meet some nice girls here. So, I see some cute chick, I try to
start up a conversation, and, like, does she even give me a chance?
Hell, no! I mean, she doesn't even wait to find out, like, what I'm
all about or anything. It's just `gasp, scream, faint,' `gasp,
scream, faint,' the same old thing over and over again. I mean,
what kind of a way is that to behave?  Don't girls have any manners
anymore?" He sighed. "Looks. All they care about is looks."
     "Gee, that's...too bad," Ernie really didn't know what to say.
     "Thanks, guy," the Fly answered. "I really appreciate it. I
don't get to talk to too many people around here, you know?"
     A disturbing thought occurred to Ernie. "Is this guy okay?" he
whispered to Captain Memory. "I mean, he's not an alien or
anything, is he?"
     "Oh, no," laughed Captain Memory. "He's the Fly! You saw the
movie, didn't you?"
     "Well, yeah," admitted Ernie. "But I thought it was, well, a
movie!"
     "You see?" replied Captain Memory. "I told you it could be
worse. At least you're trapped in Cyperspace as yourself. He's
trapped as the Fly!"
     Ernie had to admit that the Captain was right about that.
Still, it didn't make him fell much better.
     "Anyway," continued Captain Memory, looking at the Fly. "The
aliens are much prettier."
     "I say," said Sterno to the Fly. "You wouldn't happen to have
a cigar on you by any chance, would you?"
     "Sure, guy," the Fly pulled out an expensive gold cigar case
and flipped it open. 
     Sterno removed a cigar and examined it. "Lovely!" He seemed
very pleased. "Havana, no less! Thanks ever so much!"
     "Hey, my pleasure," The Fly seemed to enjoy the opportunity to
show off his fine-quality things. It seemed to Ernie that the Fly
had gone to a lot of trouble to get the best of everything, but
didn't have much opportunity to impress people with it.
      "Are we going to be leaving here soon?" Sterno inquired of
Captain Memory. "It is awfully damp in here, and it rather bothers
my sinuses."
     Ernie shivered. The dampness was getting to him, too. Wearing
only a loincloth as he was, he had little protection from the
chill.
     "Hey, I like the loincloth, guy," the Fly said to Ernie.
"That`s the new `in' thing, right? Maybe I'll get one. You think
the girls would go for it?" Ernie didn't know how to reply.
     "Well, I guess there's no point in hanging around here much
longer," Captain Memory decided. "After all, there's no TV."
     "You guys gonna leave?" The Fly seemed crestfallen, or
perhaps, antenna-fallen. "But you just got here!" He brightened.
"Hey, you guys are gonna go someplace fun, right? Can I come? Huh?
Can I?"
     "Well..." Captain Memory began.
     "Do you know how we can get out of here?" Sterno inquired.
     "Hey, no problem!" answered the Fly. "You can take the 5:15
out of LaGuardia, and that'll get you there in about, oh, two hours
forty minutes, but if you want the special rate you gotta stay from
Sunday through Saturday but not any Mondays, or you can take the
6:25 out of O'Hare, but then you gotta..."
     "What about the door?" Ernie broke in.
     "Oh." The Fly was disappointed. He enjoyed showing off his
detailed knowledge of travel arrangements. "Yeah, well, there's
always the door."
     Ernie looked at the door. It was made of heavy steel, and
seemed to be secure bolted. "So, how do we open it?"
     "Just knock." The Fly seemed to think this was all too simple,
and therefore not very much fun.
     Ernie knocked. He heard the sound of a bolt being thrown back,
and the door creaked open. Outside were two burly guards in black
Nazi SS uniforms. "Ja?"
     "Uh, is it okay if we go now?" Ernie asked brightly.
     "NEIN!" The door slammed.
     "Oh, not like that!" The Fly seemed impatient. "You gotta use,
like, subterfuge, you know? Here, I'll show you!" The Fly was
pleased to have another opportunity to show off his expertise at
something. He knocked on the door.
     The door creaked open again. "Ja?"
     "I gotta go to the bathroom!" the Fly said urgently.
     The guards looked at each other. "Vhat are ve supposed to do
now? Dey didn't tell us vhat to do if dis happened." They looked
hesitant. "Vell, I don't know. I don't tink so..."
     Sensing failure, the Fly quickly switched tactics. "Hey,
look!" he cried, pointing past the guards. "A naked lady!"
     "Vhere?! VHERE?!" cried the guards, peering into the distance.
The Fly threw his entire weight against the door, which flew open.
"RUN!" he cried to the others. He sprinted toward center stage,
followed by Ernie, Sterno, and Captain Memory.
     A startled von Liederkranz was on center stage, trying to
flirt with the chorus girls. "Guards!" he cried. "Don't let dem get
avay!" He grabbed the nearest weapon, which, in this case happened
to be an alien Blaster of unknown properties. He aimed it at the
foursome, who were sprinting towards a door marked "EXIT". "Shtop,
or I'll shoot!" Von Liederkranz threatened. The four continued to
run. Von Liederkranz pulled the trigger.
      A huge ball of magneto-gravitational energy flashed from the
muzzle of the Blaster, instantly hurtling Ernie and the others into
a totally different Space-Time Continuum. 
     Von Liederkranz looked ruefully at the Blaster, and then at
the smoking hole in the stage where the foursome had been only a
nanosecond earlier. "Vell," von Liederkranz admitted. "Perhaps dot
vasn't der best veapon to use."



                              Chapter 3

     Ernie, Captain Memory, Sterno, and the Fly sat on a rocky
crag, overlooking a lifeless purple sea. They watched the waves
crash against the rocks beneath them.
     Ernie sighed. "So, where are we now?"
     "Well, as far as I can figure out," said Captain Memory
thoughtfully. "We seem to have been blasted back to somewhere on
the order of four billion B.C. Life has not evolved yet on Earth."
     "Huh?" said Ernie. "You mean, we traveled in time?"
     "Of course not," the Captain replied. "What really happened is
that we got sent to another sector of Cyberspace. Probably by
accident." Captain Memory looked around. "After all, I can't see
any reason for Von Liederkranz to have sent us here on purpose!"
     Ernie looked out over the purple waves. "So, where ARE we? I
mean, really?"
     Captain Memory thought a moment. "We're probably in somebody's
Geology program. You know, like computer models of primeval Earth?"
He looked at the barren landscape. "While we didn't actually travel
in time, it's almost as if we did. This is like actually being on
Earth at the beginning of life."
     Wow, thought Ernie. That's really cosmic.
     The Fly looked at the bare rocks around them. "You know, man,
this place is, like, really dead."
     "Exactly," Captain Memory agreed.
     "I mean," the Fly went on. "There is, like, no girls. None at
all."
     "That's right."
     "So, like, what good is it?"
     Captain Memory thought a moment. "Good question."
     Ernie watched the orange sun, in a green sky, which was slowly
setting against a purple sea. "This is really a weird scene," he
commented. "I have never seen anything like this. Not even on TV."
He thought about that for a moment. "Not even on TV? Why, that
could mean that there's..."
     "No TV," Captain Memory agreed. "Not much reason to stay here
then, is there?"
     Ernie noticed a motion out of the corner of his eye. "I'm not
sure you ought to throw those cigar butts on the ground here," he
said to Sterno.
     Sterno looked annoyed. "Why in the world not?"
     "Well, I don't know that much about this," Ernie said. "But it
seems to me I read somewhere that the further you go back in time,
the more effect your actions have on the future. Therefore, if we
make even little changes way back here in four billion B.C., it
might have some kind of real big effect by the time we get back to
our own time."
     "Utterly ridiculous," scoffed Sterno, flicking cigar ash into
the sea."This isn't REALLY four billion B.C., it's only a computer
model of four billion B.C."
     "Well, yeah," Ernie admitted uneasily. "But the Captain said
that this was almost the same as really being there. And, I dunno,
I just have a real bad feeling about those cigar butts." 
     "Really." Sterno looked totally bored. "I just can't tell you
how concerned that makes me." He yawned.
     "Well, well, I just don't think it's a good idea, that's all."
     "Well, you know how it goes," said Captain Memory jovially.
"It's all just six of one, twelve dozen of another."
     Ernie frowned. "I don't think that's right.
     "Isn't it? Oh well," said Captain Memory cheerily. "Math was
never one of my strong points. Anyway, no time to worry about that
now. Let's be off, shall we?"  He though a moment. "Let's try some
Machine Language: 010F E4 61." The scene vanished.

                           *    *    *

     The foursome found themselves standing in the middle of a road
in bright sunlight. Once again, Ernie blinked and staggered, his
stomach doing flip-flops. As his vision cleared, He could see
around him what appeared to be an idyllic country scene. A rustic
rail fence bordered the road. Beyond the fence stood farms,
surrounded by fields full of amber waves of grain. In the distance
stood majestic purple mountains. Ernie turned around. Behind them
lay a broad plain. Ernie was pretty sure there was fruit on it.
     "I wonder where we are?" the Fly asked.
     Sterno looked around. "Kansas?" he suggested.
     Ernie began to get that queasy feeling in the pit of his
stomach again. A look down confirmed his worst fears: the road was
yellow brick.
     "I don't think I like this," said Ernie warily.
     Sterno rolled his eyes upward. "You never like anything!"
     Ernie tried to explain. "Well, you see..."
     "I know, I know," Sterno interrupted. "You have a really bad
feeling about this. You've seen it all before. You think it's a
trap."
     Ernie thought a moment. "Well...yeah."
     Sterno sighed. "You know, this is all becoming really
tiresome. I do SO wish you'd find something else to go on about!"
     Ernie thought a moment. Suddenly, he smiled broadly. "Hey, I
get it! This is all really just a game, right?"
     Sterno moaned. "Not THAT again!" Even Captain Memory looked
annoyed.
     The Fly was confused. "Like, what is this guy talking about?"
he asked Captain Memory. The Captain just rolled his eyes upward
and made little spinning motions around his temple with his
forefinger.
     "Oh, wow," the Fly went on. "So is this guy, like, crazy, or
what?"
     "Well, you know how it is," Captain Memory explained, not
unsympathetically. "Some people just don't deal well with travel.
It's too stressful for them. It upsets their systems."
     "Oh, wow," said the Fly compassionately. "Poor guy."
     Ernie was annoyed. "Awright, you guys, knock it off, okay? I
mean, enough is enough, all right?" Actually, he thought there was
probably quite a bit of truth to what Captain  Memory had been
saying. The stress probably WAS upsetting his system. However, even
if he agreed with what the Captain had to say, he resented his tone
of voice.
     "So, like, what are we gonna do now, guys?" the Fly wanted to
know.
     "Well," the Captain began jovially. "I guess we'll just have
to follow the..."
     "DON'T SAY IT!" Ernie broke in. "Okay?! Just don't say it!"
     "Touchy, touchy," sniffed Sterno.
     Captain Memory was somewhat taken aback. "Well...have it your
way. Let's go that way." He gestured down the road.
     The Fly shook his head. "I shoulda known. Anybody who'd wear
a loincloth like that..." He noticed Ernie glaring at him, and
stopped. "Hey, no offense..." He shrugged.
     Ernie scowled.
     They began walking down the road. Ernie peered ahead. Far
ahead down the road, he seemed to see something large and green.
Big and green?, Ernie thought. Is that, the Emerald...?
     Suddenly, Ernie had an idea. He stopped, clicked his heels
together three times, clenched his eyes tightly shut, and said
"There's no place like home. There's no place like home. There's no
place like home!"
     He opened his eyes. The other three were standing around him,
staring. "What is WRONG with you?!" Sterno demanded.
     Ernie was acutely aware of everyone watching him. "I'm having
a bad day, okay?" he said defensively. "Just leave me alone!" He
began walking forward again, quickly.
     "My, aren't we sensitive today!" Sterno said snidely.
     The Fly shook his head sadly. "The human mind is such a
fragile thing!"
     They proceeded down the road. The green object in the distance
began to resolve itself into some kind of building. Ernie continued
to be very unhappy about the entire situation, but decided he was
sick of being made fun of, and said nothing.
     They approached the green building. It was done in Greek-
revival style, with huge Classical columns in the front. "Hey, it's
a bank!" noticed the Fly. "Do you suppose I can cash a check?"
     The letters carved into the Greek-style pediment of the
building did, in fact, identify it as a bank. Ernie was confused.
He hadn't expected to find a bank here.
      "Why would there be a bank here?" Ernie asked incredulously.
     Captain Memory regarded the building. "Looks like we might
have run into a piece of somebody's business program. Accounting,
or bank operations or something." He shook his head. "That's what
happens when you start sticking a bunch of unrelated systems
together. You never know WHAT you're going to wind up with!"
     They proceeded up the long, marble stairway and entered the
bank. The interior was huge and very ornate, done in Victorian
style. Everything seemed antique, as though the bank were right out
of the 19th century. They walked up to a row of teller's windows,
each of which was protected by elaborate Victorian grillwork. 
     The Fly pulled a very nice quality leather checkbook out of
his suit pocket. "Hey," he said to the teller, a rather prim-
looking young woman. "Can you cash a check?"
     "I'm sorry, we can't." She didn't really seem to be sorry at
all. "We can't do anything right now.  Our computers are down."
     Ernie looked around. He saw men at high desks carefully
copying numbers with long quill pens. Nowhere was there any sign of
electricity, much less computers. "You don't have any computers,"
Ernie said suspiciously.
     The teller's expression turned ugly. "Well, we're still not
going to cash your check," she snapped.
     "Why not?" The Fly wanted to know.
     "We can't do any business. Our...our accountant has gone
crazy!" she concluded triumphantly.
     Ernie looked at the teller suspiciously. Something very
peculiar was going on here. However, he decided not to say anything
about it because he didn't want to be made fun of.
     "I wanna talk to the manager," the Fly decided.
     "Good," the teller sneered. "The manager would like to talk to
all of you, RIGHT NOW!"
     The teller came out from behind the counter and led them all
into a room which looked very much like a bank office. There,
behind a very large desk, sat a disagreeable-looking old woman with
a sour expression. Ernie somehow knew that the woman had something
unpleasant in mind for them.
     "Well, it's about time!" she snapped as they entered the room.
"There's a little matter of an unpaid balance to be taken care of!"
     Ernie looked at the woman. She was wearing a severely tailored
grey suit, with her greying hair pulled back in a tight bun. For
some reason, however, she was wearing shoes that didn't match her
outfit. They were a brilliant, sparkling red.
     The Fly approached the desk. "Hey, I got this check..."
     "Just one minute!" The manager cut him off rudely. "There's a
little matter to be taken care of first!" She pulled out a sheaf of
papers. "We have an invoice here for `Time Continuum Repair and
Reality Maintenance' which was referred to our department for non-
payment. Which of you is going to take care of this matter?"
     Sterno was becoming impatient. "What ARE you talking about?"
     The manager began reading from the papers. "It seems there was
a little problem with cigars butts left at four billion B.C."
Ernie glared at Sterno, who looked innocently off into the air,
twiddling his thumbs. "It seems these foreign materials left at
such an early point caused slime creatures to evolve into the
dominant life form on Earth. Precluding this disgusting development
required a maintenance order which took, let me see," she flipped
through the pages and pulled out a sheet marked "Work Order". "Here
it is: one million, two hundred and fifty-two thousand and three
standard Earth years, and forty-five minutes. Now, at $39.75 per
hour, plus time-and-a-half for overtime, and double-time on
Sundays, that comes to," she flipped through some more pages "One
hundred and ninety-five quadrillion, four hundred and twelve
trillion, seven hundred and seventy-one billion, two hundred and
thirteen million, three hundred and twelve thousand and thirty-two
dollars and twenty-nine cents." She peered at Captain Memory.
"Would you like to take care of this balance at this time?"
     Captain Memory shrugged. "Don't look at me! I don't have any
money."
     The manager peered at the Fly, who looked uncomfortable. "Hey,
sorry, but I got obligations, you know? I got car payments, I gotta
pay the rent..." He trailed off.
     The bank manager looked at Ernie. Ernie laughed. This was all
just too ridiculous. "Sure, put it on my charge," he said
flippantly.
     The bank manager smiled maliciously. "Mr. Ernest Ross," she
said in an disagreeable tone of voice, carefully writing his name
on the invoice with a quill pen.
     Captain Memory looked at Ernie, horrified. "Oh, you shouldn't
have said that," he said in an ominous tone.
     Ernie began to get the feeling that maybe he had made a big
mistake. The bank manager looked up at him. "Now, when may we
expect payment?"
     Ernie looked desperately to the others. They were all
pointedly ignoring him. "Look," he said urgently. "Forget I said
that, okay? I take it back!"
     "Oh, I'm sorry," she said in a tone of malicious sweetness.
"I'm afraid you can't do that. Now, will you be paying in cash or
by check?"
     "A hundred and ninety-five quadrillion dollars," said the Fly
wonderingly. "That's a lot of money. That's more than I make in a
week!"
     Ernie was beginning to panic. "No! I won't! Forget it! I'm not
going to pay that bill!" 
     "You'll pay this bill, my fine little friend," the bank
manager cackled. "Or I'll take care of you," she looked at Sterno,
"and your little dog, too!" She laughed nastily.
     "What a witch!" the Fly commented.
     Suddenly, Ernie had a brilliant idea. He grabbed a vase of
flowers off the desk, yanked the flowers out of it, and threw the
water all over the bank manager.
     "Eeyah!" she screamed. "I'm all wet!"
     The Fly looked at Ernie wonderingly. "Why in the world did you
do that?"
     Ernie looked at the bank manager. She was glaring and hissing
at him, water dripping off her face. She was not melting at all.
Ernie became uncomfortably aware of everyone staring at him. "Uh,
well, I thought..." Ernie stuttered.
     "You'll have to excuse our friend," Captain Memory ad-libbed
quickly. "It's the stress, you see. Financial problems. He's not
coping..." The three began hustling Ernie towards the door.
     The bank manager arose, hissing and spitting. "You haven't
heard the last of this," she shrieked. "You'll see!
     The four rushed quickly through the bank and back out onto the
road. The stopped to get their bearings.
     "Well, I hope you're satisfied," Sterno said contemptuously to
Ernie. "You've really made a mess of things now!"
     "Me!" cried Ernie. "Hey, I'm not the one who left those cigar
butts back in four billion B.C. It's not MY fault..."
     "Oh, sure," Sterno interrupted. "Try and blame it on me..."
     "Hey, guys!" the Fly broke in. "Look at that!" 
     The Fly's huge, multi-faceted eyes had picked up a detail the
others had failed to notice: behind the bank was a small, flat-
roofed brick building. A neon sign proclaimed: Deer Bar. There was
a large picture of a deer beneath it.
     "Hey, guys, it's a bar!" the Fly continued. "Whaddya say we
stop in for a drink? Hey, maybe we can meet some girls!"
     The others looked at each others confusedly. "Hey, it's okay,
guys!" The Fly went on. "I'll buy!"
     Captain Memory looked relieved. "Well, in that case, sure!
Thanks!" They all started towards the bar.
     Ernie was finding all of this very confusing. Every time he
thought he was beginning to understand what was going on, events
took a turn in an entirely different direction. Wasn't this
supposed to be the Emerald City? He didn't recall any bars in the
Emerald City! And what about that bank? And what happened to Judy
Garland? They entered the bar. Well, Ernie thought. I'm not sure if
this is a good idea or not, but I could really use a drink.
     Ernie found the interior of the bar reassuring. It was cool
and dark. It looked like a typical corner bar, with a typical
corner bartender. In one corner behind the bar a TV set was
mounted, but luckily it was turned off. There were few other
customers in the place, but, of course, business was always kind of
slow in the middle of the day. They seated themselves at the bar.
     They bartender, a portly, balding man smoking a cigar, came up
to them. "What'll you have?"
     "What kind of beer you got?" The Fly wanted to know.
     "Deer."
     "Deer?" The Fly was puzzled.
     "Deer Beer," the bartender stated matter-of-factly. "This is
the Deer Bar, we got Deer Beer. You want it or not?"
     "Uh, yeah, okay," the Fly replied, somewhat confused. "Uh,
three Deer Beers."
     Ernie looked at the Fly. It occurred to him that no-one around
here seemed at all disturbed by the Fly's looks. That seemed to a
bit odd. He would have expected the Fly to have attracted somewhat
more attention.  But then on the other hand, Ernie thought, it
probably didn't mean anything. After all, everything is pretty
strange around here. Ernie appreciated the opportunity to relax and
have a beer.
     The Fly pointed into the darkness at the far end of the bar.
"Hey, get a load of that babe!" he said to Ernie, his antennae
waving excitedly. 
     Ernie peered intently. He could just barely see, in the dim
light, a rather disreputable-looking young woman with bleached
blond hair and a skimpy outfit, perched on a stool at the far end
of the bar.
     "What's your name, dear?" The Fly called out to her.
     "Bambi," she replied.
     The Fly was encouraged. "Hey, whaddya say we..."
     "Cost you bucks," she interrupted.
     The Fly's antennae drooped dispiritedly. "How come there
aren't any nice girls around anymore?" He turned back to his beer.
     Sterno looked about worriedly. He sniffed. "Something smells
very peculiar around here."
     "Probably just onions." Ernie was unconcerned. 
     "Hardly!" sniffed Sterno. "There is something seriously wrong
about this place!"
     "NOW who's paranoid?" Ernie dismissed Sterno's fears.
     Just then the door to the bar opened, and a woman walked in.
She had flaming red hair, and was wearing a 1950's-style party
dress. "Hi, there, fellas!" she said loudly.
     "HI!" The Fly jumped up, his antennae waving excitedly. "Say,
can I buy you a drink?"
     "Sure!" she answered in a brassy voice. Ernie looked at the
woman. Not my type, he thought. Too loud. He looked at her again.
Something about her seemed very familiar. Ernie was sure he had
seen her before, but he couldn't quite remember where.
     "Gee!" she said to the Fly. "You sure are different-looking!
Where are you from?"
      The Fly thought quickly. "Uh..France!"
     "Oh, sure, I know France!" the woman answered brightly. "Ooh-
la-la, c'est-la-vie, Eiffel Tower, right?"
     "Sure, you got it!" The Fly whispered aside to the others. "Oh
boy, oh boy, I'm really getting somewhere now!" He turned back to
the woman. "So, like, what's your name?"
     "Lucy," she answered loudly. The door opened again, and a
swarthy man with slicked-back black hair entered. He was wearing a
Cuban shirt with huge ruffled sleeves, and carrying a pair of
maracas. The woman gestured towards the man. "And this is my
husband, Ricky."
     "Aww..." the Fly's antennae drooped.
     "How you do!" said the man, with a heavy Spanish accent. "I'm
Ricky Ricardo, de famous Cuban bandleader." He shook his maracas
rhythmically. "Chick-a-boom, chick-a-boom."
     "Yeah. Hi." the Fly answered glumly. He turned to the others.
"Wouldn't you know, she's married." He was obviously deeply
disappointed. He brightened a bit. "Say," he said to Lucy. "You
wouldn't happen to have any girlfriends you could ask over, do
you?"
     "Friends?" said Lucy shrilly. "Sure, I got friends. In fact,
a couple of them are on there way over right now!"
     The Fly was thrilled. "Oh boy, oh boy!" His antennae waved
excitedly. He turned to Ricky. "Hey, I like the shirt, guy! It's
the new `in' thing, right?"
     "Chure!" Ricky agreed. "Ees de latest style in Habana!"
     The door opened, and in walked an older couple, also dressed
in 1950's styles. "Oh," said Lucy. "Here's my friends now. Fellas,
this is Fred and Ethel Mertz."
     "Aww." The Fly was disappointed. These weren't the type of
friends he had been hoping for.
     Sterno leaned forward. "There is something terribly wrong with
these people," he said to Ernie and the Captain. "I can smell it."
     "Leave me alone," said Ernie. He hadn't forgiven Sterno for
blaming the bank problem on him.
     All these people looked terribly familiar to Ernie. Suddenly,
he had it!
     "I've got it!" he shouted.
     The Fly was more mystified than ever. "Now HE'S got it? What
is it, contagious?" He edged away from Ernie slightly.
     "No, not THAT!" said Ernie impatiently. "I just
remembered...it's `I Love Lucy'!"
     Lucy put her hand on Ernie's arm. "I love you, too." She said.
She edged closer. "Now that we're friends, I'd like to ask you a
little favor."
     "What?" asked Ernie suspiciously. 
     "It's just a little thing..." she began hesitantly.
     "What?" He edged away uncomfortably.
     "We'd just like to borrow it, just for a little while. We'll
bring it right back..."
     "What?!" Ernie was getting impatient.
     "Um," Lucy seemed a bit embarrassed. "We'd like to borrow your
brain."
     "MY BRAIN!" shrieked Ernie.
     "We just want to borrow it," said Lucy quickly. "Just for a
little while. We're not going to steal it!" Lucy laughed nervously.
     "NO!" Ernie cried.
     "Really, you don't have anything to worry about!" Lucy
continued. "We're not going to take it back to our home planet, or
anything! And we're certainly not going to put it into a giant
killer robot and use it to take over the Earth!" She laughed. "We
would never do that!" She turned to Ricky and the Mertz's. "Would
we?"
     "Oh, no," they all laughed. "We'd never do that! Never!"
     "There, that proves it!" Lucy concluded. "So, how about it?"
She reached towards Ernie's head.
     "NO!" Ernie screamed, leaping off the bar stool. "Keep your
hands off my brain!" He whipped out his plastic broadsword and
brandished it menacingly.
     After standing there a few moments, Ernie became aware of
everyone looking at him very peculiarly.
     "Hey, guy," the Fly inquired. "Like, what are you gonna do
with that plastic sword?"
     Ernie could hear the sound of muffled laughter, but he
couldn't tell where it was coming from. Ernie glowered. "Okay,
okay," he said, replacing the sword in it's sheath. "Just keep your
hands off my brain, all right?"
     Lucy frowned. She looked at Sterno, and then looked at her
companions. "Dog brain?" she asked them. They all shook their
heads, no. She looked at the Fly. "Fly brain?" she asked Ricky and
the Mertz's. "Nope." They shook their heads. She looked at Captain
Memory. She smiled broadly. "I wonder if I could ask you a
favor..."she began.
     "No chance!" Captain Memory cut her off.
     Her expression became ugly. Extremely ugly. In fact, thought
Ernie, she was changing into just about the ugliest thing Ernie had
ever seen. Lucy snarled, revealing rows of pointed, reptilian-
looking teeth and a forked tongue.
     "Foolish Earth creatures!" she hissed, pulling out a
frightening-looking weapon. "You will turn your brains over to us,
or we will destroy this miserable planet of yours!"
     "Who ARE these people?" Ernie whispered to Captain Memory.
     "Remember I told you about those aliens?" Captain Memory
asked. Ernie nodded. "Well, here they are!"
     "Hey, guys, what do we do now?" the Fly asked Ernie and
Captain Memory, looking at Lucy's weapon uneasily.
     Captain Memory looked up brightly. "Hey," he said to Lucy and
her companions. "Wanna watch some TV?"
     Lucy and the other aliens were totally confused. "Watch TV? I
don't remember that! Is that in the script? What are we supposed to
do?" They looked at each other confusedly.
     "Oh, wow, look what's on!" Before anyone could stop him,
Captain Memory had reached behind the bar and turned on the TV.
"It's time for `Wheel of Torture!'"





                            CHAPTER 4

     An image of Sturmbannfuhrer Dr. Heinz von Liederkranz filled
the screen. "Vis us tonight," he began. "Ve haff our contestants
from our last show." He turned to introduce them. "First, Captain
Memory!" Captain Memory bowed, to polite applause from the
audience. "Goombah de Barbarian!" Ernie blinked and staggered. Once
again, he suddenly found himself on the game show stage. His
stomach flipped over once again. He hated these abrupt changes of
scene. "Not again," he moaned.
     Captain Memory shrugged. "Hey, that's show biz!"
     The audience was staring at Ernie. They seemed to be expecting
something. He smiled and waved half-heartedly. The audience
tittered and applauded weakly. Ernie noticed that the audience was
still made up entirely of Nazis.
     He sighed. He might have known he would wind up back here, he
thought. Whatever the worst thing is that could possibly happen,
that's what will happen. Ernie frowned. In fact, this was even the
worst thing that couldn't possibly happen, and it was happening
anyway! Wasn't that against Murphy's Law, or something? Anyway, it
was all very confusing.
     Von Liederkranz turned to the other side of the stage. Ernie
noticed that the aliens had been transported onto the game show as
well, and were now staggering and blinking, just like Ernie.
 "Und tonight, ve have vith us special guests," von Liederkranz
said, gesturing towards the aliens with his riding crop. "Lucy and
Ricky Ricardo, the famous Cuban bandleader, and their friends, Fred
and Ethel Mertz." Thunderous applause greeted the introduction.
     The aliens were utterly confused. "Chick-a-boom?" asked Ricky,
shaking his maracas feebly. The Mertz's drew alien weapons,
pointing them in all directions uncertainly.
     "Und now, ze big question," von Liederkranz said to the
aliens. "Vill you take vot's in dis bag," he held up a small paper
bag, which looked a lot like somebody's lunch. "Or try for vot's
behind door number four!"
     The audience was hushed with anticipation. The aliens looked
at each other in confusion. "What do we do? I wasn't prepared for
this! I don't know what to do!" they told each other.
     Captain Memory decided to help them out. "Anyone with any
BRAINS would take what's behind door number four!" he hinted.
     The aliens brightened. "Brains! Brains! Yes, that's it! Let's
take what's behind door number four!" They looked pleased. "Chick-
a-BOOM!" said Ricky definitely.
     "Door number four it is!" called out von Liederkranz. The
audience roared it's approval.
     An attractive woman in a chorus-girl outfit opened door number
four, and the aliens filed in, looking very pleased. As soon as the
last alien was inside, the door slammed with a metallic crash. The
chorus girl reached over and daintily locked it.
     Immediately, Ernie began to hear the sounds of commotion
coming from behind the door. At first, pounding, then thuds, then
shrill, blood-curdling screams. The screams continued for several
minutes, and then died away. Finally, all was silent behind door
number four.
     The audience applauded. "Vell," von Liederkranz announced
jovially. "Looks like dey got vot dey had coming to dem, doesn't
it?" He laughed. He turned to Ernie, Captain Memory, and the
others. Ernie noticed that, while their attention had been drawn
elsewhere, guards with machine guns had surrounded them. "Shtill,
it vas very considerate of dem to find you for me," he said, with
an evil gleam in his eye. "I vas afraid ve had lost you forever
after dat unfortunate incident vit de alien Blaster." Von
Liederkranz turned to the guard nearest him. "...for vhich YOU vill
pay, schweinhund!" He lashed the guard with his riding crop.
     "But, Herr Doktor," the guard protested. "I vasn't even
there!"
     "Shut up!" von Liederkranz snapped. He turned to Captain
Memory. "Und now, perhaps ve vill continue vith ze questions, ja?"
He smiled sadistically. "You remember vhere ve left off? Vis ze Hot
Vhirling Corkscrew?" 
     A guard handed von Liederkranz the by-now-familiar diabolical-
looking device, which began to glow and whirl. Von Liederkranz
smiled evilly. He began slowly advancing toward Captain Memory with
his device.
     Von Liederkranz was disturbed by the sound of a knock. He
looked around. There it was again; someone was knocking on the
stage door. Von Liederkranz was annoyed. "Answer ze door,
dummkopf!" he snapped at one of the guards. The guard opened the
door.
     "Mailman!" A fellow in a post office uniform walked in the
door. "Got a special delivery letter here!"
     Von Liederkranz narrowed his eyes suspiciously. "For who?"
     "Is there a `Mr. Ernest Ross' here?" 
     "Uh, that's me," Ernie said.
     "Here you go!" The mailman handed Ernie a letter.
     Everything stopped while Ernie opened the letter. Von
Liederkranz and the Nazis milled about confusedly.
     Ernie was totally mystified. Who could be sending him a
letter, here? Nobody knew he was here, and even if they did, why
would they send him a letter here? Ernie tore the letter open and
read.

     "Dear Mr. Ross,
          We still have not received payment on your outstanding
balance of  $195,412,771,213,312,032.29. This account is now two
billion years overdue. Do not force us to turn this matter over to
a collection agency. Send in your payment immediately, before we
are required to take further action.

Sincerely,

First National Bank of the West

P.S. If you have already sent in your payment, please disregard
this notice."
     Ernie looked up. Von Liederkranz was watching him very
carefully. Ernie had an idea. "Oops, looks like I gotta go pay a
bill! See ya!" Ernie started towards the door.
     "Not so fast!" Von Liederkranz blocked Ernie's path. "Give me
dot letter!" He snatched it out of Ernie's hand.
     Der Sturmbannfuhrer was very upset. How dare they interrupt
his game show to deliver a letter! And just exactly who was this
message from, anyway? And what did it really mean?
     Von Liederkranz examined the letter carefully. "Zo," he said
thoughtfully. "You owe ze bank one hundred and ninety-five
quadrillion dollars. Just as we thought!" Of course, it wasn't
really what he thought at all.
     The Nazi's eyes narrowed. "Zis one hundred and ninety-five
quadrillion dollars, it is a great deal of money, ja?"
     "Ja. I mean, yes," agreed Ernie.
     "It is more, even, than I make in a veek!" Von Liederkranz
eyed Ernie suspiciously. "Zo, how is it dot you come to owe zo much
money?"
     "Well, you see, there was this problem with cigar butts two
billion years ago," Ernie explained nervously. He didn't like the
Nazi's tone of voice, and he particularly didn't like the Hot
Whirling Corkscrew. "And then, we were at the bank, and I had to go
and open my big mouth, and so then..."
     "SCHWEINHUND!" Von Liederkranz whipped Ernie with the letter.
"Do you take me for a fool!? No-one could possibly owe zis much
money! Obviously, zis is some sort of secret code. Now, who vould
be sending you secret coded messages HERE, on mein own game show!?"
     Ernie looked pleadingly at Captain Memory; the Captain just
shrugged.
     Von Liederkranz continued reflectively. "Und how could zey
know vhere to find you vis zis message, unless..." He whirled to
face his guards. "One of YOU is a traitor!!"
     "Nein! Nein!" The guards blanched and backed away. Von
Liederkranz looked at the audience. "Or perhaps, one of YOU!"
     "NEIN! NEIN!" the audience cried out in unison, fidgeting
uncomfortably in their seats.
     Von Liederkranz advanced on the audience, the Hot Whirling
Corkscrew spinning and glowing in his hand. "Zo, you vill not
confess, eh!?" he shrieked at the audience. "Perhaps a taste of the
Corkscrew vill loosen your tongues!"
     Ernie felt a tap on his shoulder. Captain Memory beckoned
towards the back of the stage. All eyes were riveted on von
Liederkranz, and on the hissing, spinning torture device in his
hand. No-one was paying any attention to the foursome. They tiptoed
into the wings and back behind the stage. As they left, they began
to hear screams coming from somewhere in the audience.
     They hurried along the corridor leading to the dressing rooms
backstage. Unfortunately, there seemed to be no exits anywhere in
that part of the building. The only exits were through the main
floor, which would have required them to go back out onto the
stage. This did not seem like a very good idea. An empty dressing
room beckoned ahead of them. They hurried into it and locked the
door behind them. The screams were still audible inside the room.
     "Hey, guys," the Fly wanted to know. "Like, what are we gonna
do now?"
     Ernie sneezed. "I wish they wouldn't keep the air conditioning
turned up so high," he complained, shivering.
     "Well, if you're going to go around wearing  nothing but that
ridiculous fur loincloth, you have to expect to get a chill,"
commented Sterno unsympathetically. " We'd all feel a lot better if
you'd cover up some of that pallid skin of yours."
     "Hey, that's an idea!" the Fly chimed in. "This is a dressing
room! Maybe there's some clothes here you can wear!"
     That seemed like a good idea to Ernie. He'd been uncomfortably
cold ever since he'd put that silly loincloth on. He began looking
through the closet, but found only filmy negligees and harem-girl
outfits.
     "Hey, there's a whole wardrobe room next door," the Fly
pointed to an adjoining room. "Take a look in there!" Ernie
disappeared into the next room.
     Sterno was searching the room carefully. "What'cha looking
for, secret passages?" the Fly asked eagerly.
     "Actually, I was rather hoping someone might have left a spot
of brandy about," he answered. "Aha!" He pulled out a bottle. A
look of disappointment appeared on his face. "MD 20/20?" he asked.
"What in the world could that be?"
     "Oh, wow," commented the Fly. "Mad Dog!"
     "I beg your pardon!" snapped Sterno huffily.
     "Hey, no offense!" said the Fly quickly. "That's just what
it's called, you know?"
     "Hmmph!" Sterno opened the bottle and sniffed the contents.
"Dreadful!" he proclaimed, and dropped the bottle in the trash.
     Ernie reappeared from the wardrobe room. He was now clad in a
Spanish toreador outfit, consisting of a scintillating gold suit,
covered with sequins, with knee breeches and white stockings, a
white shirt and tie, and an odd-shaped little black hat.
     He noticed everyone looking at him oddly. "Hey, it was the
only thing I could find, you know? Ernie said defensively. "At
least it's warm!"
     Sterno sniffed. "I must say, you have the most AWFUL taste in
clothes! But, at least it's better than looking at that sickening
body of yours!"
     Ernie was offended. "What's wrong with my body?"
     Sterno rolled his eyes upward silently.
     Only the Fly seemed to approve of Ernie's new outfit. "Hey,
guy," he said enthusiastically. "I like the suit! It's the new `in'
thing, right?"
     Sterno regarded Ernie critically. "Why are you still carrying
that ridiculous plastic broadsword?"
     Ernie shifted uncomfortably. "Hey, I told you, it's a forty
buck deposit!"
     Sterno rolled his eyes upward. "Hopeless!"
     Ernie sat down in a comfortable-looking chair. He thought he
had better take advantage of every opportunity to rest; he had no
way of knowing how long all of this craziness was going to
continue.
     "So, like, what's with that Lucy chick?" the Fly asked Captain
Memory. "I mean, like, what's her problem?"
     "Oh, she's an alien," explained the Captain.
     "A what?"
     "You know," the Captain went on. "Come from outer space,
invade the Earth, steal your brain, that kinda stuff." The Captain
made himself comfortable on a small sofa, and began leafing through
his copy of the TV Guide.
     "Aliens?" Ernie asked confusedly. "Are they really aliens?"
     "There as real as anything in Cyberspace, I suppose," the
Captain commented.
     "But what are they DOING here?" Ernie wanted to know.
     "They're part of a game called `MENACE FROM PLANET ZERO'. It's
quite popular," the Captain explained. "I figured we'd run across
it sooner or later. With all the systems Waldo's been taking over,
the odds are that it'd be in at least one of them."
     The Fly seemed a bit skeptical. "Well, gee, that chick sure
didn't look like an alien!"
     The Captain was impatient. "She's in disguise, of course! You
wouldn't want to see what she really looks like!" He shuddered.
"Anyway," he continued. "That whole bunch are aliens in disguise.
They've been watching our 1950's TV shows, and they think those TV
characters are normal Earth people. They think if they disguise
themselves as 1950's TV characters, you Earth people will never
know the difference."
     "They don't seem to be very smart," Ernie commented.
     "Well, you know," said the Captain thoughtfully. "Intelligence
is not the only way to approach reality. There are other ways of
thinking. It's possible to approach problem-solving from an
entirely different perspective. There are civilizations in which
thinking is done in an entirely different way, where `intelligence'
is replaced by a whole different way of looking at the universe!"
     Ernie had never heard Captain Memory get so philosophical
before. "So, do these aliens have a completely different way of
thinking?" he asked wonderingly.
     "No," said the Captain reflectively. "They're just stupid."
He returned to his TV Guide.
     "I mighta known," said the Fly reflectively. "After all, she's
hanging out with that Ricky guy! Man, he's something else! Anybody
who'd wear a shirt like that..." He trailed off, looking sideways
at Ernie.
     A number of magazines were scattered about an end table next
to Ernie's chair. A headline in one of the caught Ernie's eye:
"FANTASTIC ARCHAEOLOGICAL FIND REVEALED!" Ernie picked it up and
began to read:
     "On October 16, 1978, an Arab shepherd following a stray
animal into a cave near the Sea of Galilee made an incredible find
- a find unparalleled in modern history. A find so monumental, so
earth-shattering, so threatening to world governments and religious
institutions that its very existence has been suppressed. Only now,
by means of smuggled documents obtained at great personal risk to
all involved, can this fabulous story come to light  - the story of
the Dead Sea Phonograph Records!"
     Ernie was intrigued. He read on:
     "Our story must really begin in Ancient Egypt - deep in the
mysteries of the Middle Kingdom; an age which produced some of the
greatest wonders the world has even seen. Some of these, like the
Pyramids, have been known to the world for millennia. Yet it stands
to reason that any people capable of producing wonders like these,
wonders which the modern world has yet to equal, must also have
been capable of producing many other amazing things on a smaller
scale. Yet, all of these have been lost in the sands of time - or
have they?
     Let us consider for a moment the phonograph - a relatively
simple device invented in the last century by Thomas Edison. In its
basic form it consists of a disc, or even a cylinder, driven by a
crank, that comes in contact with a needle attached to a cone. One
can then either play or record simply by turning the crank and
either speaking into the cone, or listening. That's all there is to
it. A simple device like this can be made with almost anyone with
basic tools. It could have been made thousands of years ago - it
could even have been made by the ancient Egyptians! Certainly, any
civilization capable of producing incredible engineering feats like
the Pyramids would be capable of constructing a simple mechanical
device like this!
     Now there is evidence that they did! In the tomb of the
Pharaoh Pepto II at Bismol, hieroglyphics have been found which
bear an uncanny resemblance to Edison's early phonographs. Along
with these were others which were translated to read "...and the
voice of the Pharaoh shall speak on after he is gone
and...(fragment missing)...that we, who are as dogs to the mighty
Pharaoh, shall listen to Our Master's Voice!"
     Ernie looked at the accompanying illustration. It was a
picture from an Egyptian tomb, showing a dog listening to some kind
of a device with a cone coming out of it. It reminded Ernie of
something. Didn't it look a lot like...the RCA Victor logo? Then
again, maybe not. He continued reading.
     "But this is only the beginning! It would be monumental enough
if records of the voices of the Pharaohs had been found, but what
has actually been discovered is so spectacular as to make the
Pharaohs seem trivial by comparison. It was, of course, phonograph
records that the Arab shepherd found. They were in the form of
discs made of fine clay, a material much more durable than the
perishable vinyl that our present-day phonograph records are made
of, and were packed in the crumbling remains of an Egyptian-style
case. When played at approximately 78 rpm, they produced voices,
much like our own early phonograph records.
     But - stop and consider. These records were found deep in
Israel, near the Sea of Galilee - in other words, nowhere near the
Egypt of the Pharaohs. There is no evidence that the phonograph was
ever used in ancient Israel; what's more, they were in an Egyptian-
style case, and bore Egyptian markings. How could they have come to
a cave near the Sea of Galilee?
     There is only one way: They must have been brought there, from
Egypt - by th