A/N: Been trying to get this story out of my mind for a while now - about 2 years, maybe.
I mainly felt there wouldn't be anyone to really give it interest in forums like Sufficient Velocity due how I felt this premise feeling too overly meta upon explaining it to mutuals. But I think I needed to take a gander to the current world of fanfic writing and even media itself at large - and know it's gonna be alright.
Incase this piqued your interested - I hope you enjoy.
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Prologue: Static Pressure
How many hours had it been?
Oh yeah. Just one.
It sure felt like an eternity... maybe a googolplex... if one can even pack that to a single day of June 23rd of '98.
Googolplex... that's certainly a word... how many zeroes were in that number? Million? Or was it ten hundred? Not that he had much use for this information in the future anyway, but maybe he could count to that, make this pesky time pass much faster-
"Yakko?"
He jolted awake, quickly remembering how he was waiting in the hallway near Hello Nurse's office, with Dot sitting just right of him in one of its few soft benches. He instinctively looked at his little sister.
"Yes, dear sib?"
"I keep feeling prickly... Can you scratch my skin a little? Afraid I might tear it off with my fingers - that is if my pretty nails don't come off first."
"Oh... sure."
He reached to where Dot pointed, being her right temple and scratched it a little. She leaned on to it - if she'd been in the mood of acting like a cat today, she'd definitely been purring by now.
Unfortunately, this had him end with eye contact at the two other sitting guests nearby.
One of them, a yellow, unusually large mouse, had been glaring at his sister since they all had arrived as he was resting on his young owner's slouched back. The air rippled with a bit of heat around its face as he could tell tiny sparks kept flying out of its red cheeks.
Well, that explains why his sister was twitching her fingers to scratch another growing itch.
"Come on Dot, why don't we swap places? You could use a softer seat for such a delicate body."
"Hmmm... you're right. Move over."
As he seated on where Dot was, Yakko started to feel the prickliness on his skin a little too. He can take it - his thick-skinned physical side came to him as naturally as his cool temper and slick mind.
"Do you think Wakko will be ok?" Said Dot, having now turned at him.
"He's taken much worse than that! Remember that time when a giant cow fell on his head 2 years ago?"
"The one that Earthworm Jim kept insisting it wasn't his? Yeah... who'd have thought he'd be telling the truth at the end? Chicken Boo's shooting crew not keeping track of their farm animals as they went loose from the set... go fig."
Yakko observed to his worry how Dot's expression kept shifting pensively however.
"But whatever
she pulled off back there though - that
definitely wasn't hitting in the same force as some single cow launched into space!
I mean, Wakko wound up in the nearby stadium!!! Where that baseball match was currently going on!"
Dot pushed down her urge to bite her nails via drumming her chin with fingertips, coming to slow stop as she went deeper into her thoughts.
"I really keep wondering was it something I said... but what exactly? I must have really set her off big-time..."
Yakko laid his hand on his sib's shoulder in assurance.
"Sib... we'll never know what exactly set her off. It's a shame how that ginger haired chick ended flipping her lid in the middle of the match."
He now could feel the stares intensifying from his right - and leaned near Dot's ear for whisper:
"But we only intended to mess with them to a point of not wanting to be part of this channel, not send her to... whatever that "inanimate" state was. That is, if we really had to come clean."
Dot shifted on her seat a bit, and shuddered.
"I know Yakko... it's just - that nurse that was with them? She kept glaring daggers at me while talking to Hello Nurse. As if she wanted to bore through my skull to whatever part of my brain controls whether I can move a muscle or not. Kinda makes me not wanna be near her any more."
"Cerebellum?"
Dot stared at Yakko, trying to take in what he just muttered out - until a lightbulb turned on... due Yakko having flipped the lightswitch near them. It was getting a bit dark in the hallway with the sun setting behind the lot, seen from the large window opposite of where they sat.
He watched how a more figurative lightbulb went on in Dot's mind. Not a physical manifestation of it above her head however.
"Oooo... so that's what they call the secretary of Townsville's dopey mayor."
Boy, did Yakko want to elaborate on that - alongside wanting to praise the shapeliness of that secretary.
Just as he was about to open his mouth, footsteps could be heard approaching from the other end of the hallway - the one emerging in the Warners' vision left both already chagrining.
A pink-haired woman had now stopped at the door to Hello Nurse's office, alongside even a pinker, egg-shaped...
thing carrying a pull cart with a food tray on it.
On it, a single boiled egg on a cup, and assortment of condiment bottles. Specifically ketchup, then creamy ranch, barbeque sauce ... chipotle sauce... a jar of maple syrup... and chocolate sauce.
Yakko and Dot knew how Wakko liked his eggs - which meant that he might be awake, maybe? He'd not be content with a single egg though, that's for sure.
So Hello Nurse might be testing his appetite? As much as that was nutty thought to even entertaint... Yakko shuddered a bit anyway due the implications presented before him
He watched the other foreign nurse suddenly getting stopped by the slouching trainer grabbing her by the dress's rim asking how his friend was doing. The young boy was promptly reassured by her with a gentle pat on the shoulder - tough the nurse might have looked slightly like she was faking it if going by her clinically placid, yet slightly struggling smile, trying to keep herself strong. Yakko was a bit surprised about that - not often did he get to have moments of reading facial expressions, the little twitches on faces of those he observed in more quieter, non-antagonistic moments.
Dot meanwhile, observed that yellow overgrown mouse having actually gone at the pulley cart as if in attempts to hop on it - but was promptly stopped by the egg-shaped thing waving its head. Prior to that she was sure that mouse was looking pretty intently at the direction of the ketchup bottle.
Nevertheless, both had to see how their middle sib was doing - and got up to approach the nurse. But when Dot tried to get up to follow along, Yakko pinned her back down to her seat.
"You said you didn't want to come near her anymore. Let me handle this." He smiled. Dot sighed in mock-defeat, and sat down.
As he approached her, Yakko didn't miss it when he saw the nurse turn at him with a pretty quick change in demeanor from a moment ago with the trainer. She stared at him calm, yet chilly - and for a moment, he felt like he was walking directly at frigid wind blowing powdery snow all over him.
"Excuse me... Nurse Joy, wasn't it? We'd like to see Hello Nurse regarding our brother's condition," he started. Joy only shook her head.
"I'm sorry Mr.Warner Brother. But you're not allowed inside during emergency examination. We'd appreciate not getting disturbed during it."
Yakko's eyebrow went a bit up at this. He buried down doing his reflexive "uuhhh"-interjection her before pressing on.
"Isn't that up to Hello Nurse? Did you know she's actually a fine medic on our lot? That would kinda put you, a regular nurse, not really in charge of this over her, am I right?" He said, raising his eyebrow on top of a confident grin.
A long moment went by in silence.
Yakko felt it broken by a very quiet, tired sigh - realizing to his complete befuddlement, that Nurse Joy had still not changed her serious expression.
"Yes... Everyone in this country has said the same thing," Joy replied. Pretty matter-of-factly.
"Which is why I'm carrying this."
Yakko felt a couple poke at his side and turned to see it being that egg thingamajig - now about to hand him a leathered, black folder that seemed a bit packed.
He spread it open, observing the full-page info on the right topped with Joy's admittedly sweet-looking mugshot, and starting reading through the first page kind of quickly.
But then his eyes slowed down - and eventually came to complete halt on one particular sentence.
Goodness no, that couldn't have been right - but there it said, that she was a--
"
Doctor?? You're a DOCTOR?!"
Nurse Joy rolled her eyes to the side, as if she hadn't heard that million times before.
"Yes. It's been very fortunate to know there was a fellow medic here - I was afraid I'd have to take longer trip off from this lot to get my patient examined with other healthcare professionals."
She stared up again - and visibly seemed to let her body relax a bit.
"Not to mention... Nerz-san is very pleasant to work with.
Now if you'll excuse me. Come on, Chansey."
She briskly bowed down at the toon, before unlocking the door and letting her thingamajig in. The egg-shaped thing repeated the name Joy called to it affirmatively as it pushed the cart in.
Yakko tried to get a look inside the office - but had to give that up as he ended up being in the way of the cart needing to be entered in it. Much to his bummer, the door got closed by Joy right after it finished entering.
There he stared at the closed door a bit dumbfound. Dot walked right at him after, with held-back fuming steam..
"Who does she think she is? I don't recall anyone giving her the authority to treat us like some waiters in a hospital!"
"Then what would you have done if you were there?"
Yakko and Dot turned to their right - and came face-to-face with a peculiarly shut-eyed, dark-skinned teenager they had met today before. Even with such shut eyes, his expression signified firm sternness. Both might have even described it as rock-steady. Maybe even brewing with tranquil fury.
In anycase, both were left bit empty on how to reply to his question, and chose to avoid his "eyes" instead, with their playful flippancy of wiggling their legs and even mock-whistling.
"I'd appreciate it if you put more trust and faith in
Joi-sa—" He paused, almost looking like something got caught in his throat.
"What I mean to say is: I hope you two know that this isn't gonna be an easy job at all for her. I mean, goodness sake... none of us have ever seen our friend like that before."
As he said that, the dark-skinned guy turned back at the trainer scratching his yellow mouse affectionately behind it's ear in some search for comfort.
"Just her willingness to even volunteer helping your little brother's nurse alongside already tending to our partner..."
He went silent for a moment. Yakko wondered what he was gonna say. Some guesses was him getting smacked with a rude "She's too good for you" - but before he could hear such, something disquieting reached his ears.
When Yakko turned at it, he almost jumped as he came face-to-face with the baseball-capped kid.
"
Why...?" came from him. His facial features were darkened as he stared slightly down. Yakko didn't really take well to such unreadability. It was like he was dealt a fog-of-war.
"Uhhh...
Gee..." he muttered as he was trying to prepare some quick response.
Dot ended up elbowing him on the ribs. "
Read the room a little,
Einstein.", went her expression. Yakko turned at her a bit frantically.
"Look, I was not trying to follow his "Y" with "Z!" I mean to say that loan word that has long been used by people trying to avoid saying the name of Jees--"
Suddenly he felt two firm hands grabbing his shoulders. The kid was now glaring at him like a vicious hound.
"I said,
why!?" he repeated in growing anger, "Why were you treating us like that today??!"
Yakko, for perhaps the second time that day, was left speechless. Both Dot, the yellow mouse and the dark-skinned trainer went in, with the latter prying the kid off from Yakko while the little sister went protectively in front of him.
The office door had opened meanwhile. Much to the Warner brother and sibling's fortunate surprise however, it turned out to be Dr.Scratchansniff. They instinctively ended up jumping on his arms and rubbing themselves all over him, really needing a bit of antics to unwind down from the growing tension.
"Tell us,
Scratchy! Is Wakko okay?"
"Please, pleaase!!"
Scratchansniff almost wobbled over as he tried to avoid colliding with the taller trainer. He took support from a nearby wall and set the siblings down.
"Don't worry your heinies about him. He's... looking to be fine. Nurse won't disclose his condition to me however. Needs still time - but I must say... she und Ms.Joy really work well together. They're gonna find out sooner than we think."
A bit of a relieved smile came on both faces as both siblings held on to one another - Scratchansniff couldn't help smirking at that sight.
That was, before he noticed the dark-skinned guest having walked at his partner and trying to reassure him everything will be fine. In some ways, Scratchensniff was like Yakko - except he could check the body language of the boy as well.
It looked like that trainer was about to walk up the Warner Sibling and possibly grab him by the collar - if he hadn't done that already.
For as long as he had lived, Scratchansniff had, to borrow lingo of current youth, "
sucked" dealing with Warners before. But this time, it was of utmost importance to defuse the situation before it got out of hand.
"I think you und ze guests need to have a talk in my office."
He could see Yakko and Dot visibly twitch at the suggestion. Yakko's haw dropped with a rather quiet "Whaaah??" - but Scratchansniff continued on.
"It is better than sitting here for hours waiting to hear from Wakko and Miss Waterflower, ya? I think all of you could use figuring out your differences at zese guests instead of us having to be taken to court possibly by zis.. und,
to use un expression - put the future of zis whole television network in jeopardy."
Scratchansniff waited for Yakko to follow this up with something related to the said game show - yet to his surprise, a couple seconds passed with nothing. It seems like it hit the siblings harder than they expected what that would most likely entail their future - not only their show ceasing to be, but also everyone else's sharing the lot with them, having to be possibly redistributed on to syndication at best - if anyone wanted to air their show now having more badder reputation.
He motioned the two Warners to follow him - and eventually did the same for the guests nearby having overheard their conversation.
"Now then, let's get moving! You too, Mr.Ketchum, and..."
"
Brock. No surname's been chosen for me yet here in States."
"Hm. Brock it is zen."
And so they followed Scratchensniff's lead, with the two remaining Warners trailing behind him in front of the guests.
Once again Dot could feel the prickliness creeping upon her skin, being back on the familiar predicament of that annoying mouse currently trying to charge her skin up to give her poor fingers an unexpected zap if she'd try to touch any door handles today.
She slowed down again, letting the guests pass them while sweetly saying "After you." - and briskly joined Yakko's side.
"
When all this is done, I hope I get to put that overgrown mouse in an electric-proof cage."
Yakko knew she was letting out steam. Hopefully. During it he happened to observe passing by a crossing to another hallway. The forlorn "Why?" from that boy some moments ago, flashed in his mind.
It had been much earlier that day when he, Dot -
and Wakko happened to walk down this same hallway together, just having come up with their finest zany scheme:
Which was to, as he air quoted charmingly to his siblings that morning, "give our upcoming new members of this TV network, the
best kind of welcome."
