"Now that we're back home, the whole thing seems kind of like a dream. Were we really in a magical castle yesterday, Ellen?"

"Of course we were. But I know what you mean. I'm glad you were there too, or I'd be wondering if--hey, you didn't mention this to anyone, did you?"

"Of course not. They'd lock me up and throw away the key!"

I told Rob about Charlie being missing. "So, do you still want to go back into that Web World?"

"Why wouldn't I?" challenged Rob. "Do you think a little threat of death scares me? I still say I could do better than you in a game that presented some direct competition."

"Fine," I said.

"Fine," said Rob.

We glared at each other a moment before I said, "So which web site should we try next?"

"I've got a computer right here in my bedroom, so we don't have to go back to school. You did bring the CD, didn't you?"

In the mood we were both in, I didn't have to worry about his intentions in the bedroom. I put the CD in the drive, and after logging in to USOL with my login, entered "www.WideWebWorld.edu" again. The eyes were there again, looking sort of worried.

"Hey, do we have to use one of these web sites?" asked Rob.

"No, but do you have any better ideas? These are fun web sites, and they seem as good a place to try as any other. I bet the web sites you book mark are all boring research and business-related sites, aren't they?"

"Well, I wouldn't call them boring, but they certainly aren't as silly as these." We looked at the list together:

www.Punville.com

www.Toonland.com

Castle d'Intrigue was a different color, indicating that it had already been accessed.

"So tell me about these other sites so we can pick one," said Rob.

"Well, you'd probably like Space Wars. It's based on an action packed comic book series. But it can be pretty violent, and there's a good chance that a player who is unprepared will get killed."

"Okay, we'll pass on that one," said Rob. "I think I've had enough puns for a while, so we can skip Punville. What about Toonland?"

"It's a wacky cartoon world, and there is a lot of competition between characters. But I'm an expert on the cartoons it's based on, and I've seen the movie many times, so I would probably have quite an advantage there."

"That would just prove my point all the more, when I beat you. What kind of challenge would there be in Toonland?"

"I've heard that they were planning to make the sequel about some sort of car race. The original was about Donny Donkey trying to take over Toonland, and the other characters trying to stop him. Either way, it could provide quite a challenge, worthy even of you."

I tried to imagine how the game might handle Toonland. Maybe I could choose any cartoon character I wanted, such as the lovely Penelope Pitstop. Or better yet, a voluptuous beauty like that rabbit's wife. Then when Rob was literally drooling all over himself, I would ignore him. That would show him!

"Fine," said Rob. "We'll go to Toonland."

Eager to avoid any more arguments, I agreed. Besides, Toonland should be really fun.

"Before we go, let’s go back to the home page for Wide World Web, I mean Web Wide World, I mean, Web…. oh, you know, that dumb web site," said Rob while hitting the Back button to the Wide Web World home page.

"What’s that ‘Options’ choice at the top?" I asked. "I never noticed that before."

Rob clicked on Options. We noticed check marks next to "Keep same characters" and "multi-player game".

There were other options, but my reading was interrupted by Rob’s sudden shout of "Let’s check our scores".

Competitive Rob would think of scores, of course. But I reminded myself that there was nothing to worry about. I was sure to be ahead, since it was my actions that got us out of Castle d'Intrigue.

"I read previously that the scores range from zero to one hundred, and we both started with fifty," Rob explained. He clicked on Scoring.

I was appalled at what came up on the screen:

"Hah!" gloated Rob. "I'm already winning. So you'll need any advantage you can get, just to catch up. You'll have to have some god-like powers to beat me!"

I was perplexed. "Why are you winning? Why has my score gone down? I'm the one who thought up the giant burger that saved the castle. I don't understand the scoring."

"To be honest, neither do I. My score went down too, you know. Maybe we can figure it out when we compare our scores after Toonland. Are you ready?"

"Okay, let's go."

CHAPTER 11

After the bright flash of light faded, my eyes were still overwhelmed, but now it was by bright colors. I was surrounded by vividly colorful objects and an unreal landscape. It was just like when Mary Poppins jumped into the chalk drawing; I was in the middle of a cartoon painting. Although I had expected something like this, it still felt really weird actually being there.

I was in a big open area, filled with strange vehicles and even stranger creatures. Most were animals, but the nearest one was a robot, who appeared to be laughing at me.

"I thought you said you would have an advantage here," said the robot in Rob's voice. The robot was holding its metallic sides and tilting its square head back in laughter.

"Hey, I know your character," said the Robot, which sounded like Rob, between guffaws. "The last time I saw you, it was a miserable morning after a fun night with my old buddy Jack Daniels. I broke off the friendship after that."

Looking down at my body to see what he was talking about, I seemed to be enclosed in a large, sagging, pink balloon. I poked the center of the bulging pinkness. It was not rubber, it was blubber. A flab-revealing purple halter and matching tutu completed my humiliation.

"Don't you get it? Your character had to be something that would be similar to your real name, Ellen. So you ended up as Ellie." He laughed metallically. "Ellie Phant!"

An elephant! So that explained the pink squigly vacuum cleaner hose that kept flailing around in front of my face, which must be my trunk.

I looked at my arms and hands. My arms were like fat tubes that ended with flat circles. There were little toenails on the side, but no fingers. How was I to pick anything up? The skin was rubbery like a balloon, but that was only skin deep, the flesh underneath was sold flab, wiggling and jiggling with my every movement. The small purple halter covered two small bumps on my chest. If I had to be fat, couldn't I at least have big breasts? Whoever had picked this body (a sadistic computer programmer? a cosmic animator?) was very cruel.

I was so embarrassed. I couldn't even blush, because I was already bright pink. I tried to imagine myself as a beautiful, sexy woman. Or as a cute kitten. Would the game let me change my character? Apparently not, since I still felt huge and fat. I needed a mirror, but was afraid of what I would see. I supposed it was better just to get on with the race.

"Okay, very funny. You don't look so handsome yourself, you know, Rob the Robot. You look like something slapped together from a junk yard. Too many lights and buttons and wires. And stop that infernal beeping!"

Just then an announcement was broadcast from a nearby loudspeaker. "All contestants will report to the starting line and start their engines." The rim of the loudspeaker moved like lips as the words were spoken.

We headed for the large banner that said "Starting Line." Six rather odd vehicles were lined up under the banner.

First in line was a donkey with a hay cart. I expected him to be harnessed in front of the cart, but to my surprise, he sat down in the cart itself. It was apparently a motorized vehicle that he intended to drive.

"You must be Donny Donkey," I said.

He looked at me through huge glasses that magnified his eyes. "Prepare to beat my dust, pink pachyderm."

"Don't you mean eat my dust?"

"You won't have time to eat anything if you want to keep up with me. As you can see, I will not need to stop for food, as I have plenty of delicious gourmet hay with me." He picked up a handful of hay with a surprisingly dexterous hoof, and stuffed it in his large mouth.

I looked at his long, narrow face, similar to an exaggerated caricature of stringy Dan. I remembered the option that said "Keep same characters" and realized that the characters in Toonland would be based on my friends, supposedly making the game more comfortable for me.

Watching Dan/Donny chomp on hay, I wondered, "Why should I need to stop to eat? How long is this race, anyway?"

"Not well prepared, are you?" brayed Donny Donkey while chewing the hay still half sticking out of his muzzle. "It's many miles, of course, and expected to take about half a day to complete. For you, however, I would plan on a whole day. Hee hawwwwww."

"Very funny. By the way, this is Rob the Robot."

"Pleased to meet you, tin man."

"You too, Eeyore. Be prepared for some real competition."

"From a Johnny-come-lastly like you? Hee hawwwwwwww!"

"You're some jackass," said Rob.

"Thank you."

"I wasn't referring to your species," Rob said snidely.

The donkey seemed to be trying to decide whether he'd been insulted. I decided we'd better move on before he figured it out.

The next vehicle in line was a huge red apple on wheels, which sort of reminded me of Cinderella's pumpkin carriage. No one was driving it yet, but we peeked in the window. The driver's seat was strangely shaped, long and narrow.

"This must be Crystal's car," I told Rob. "She seems to be late, as usual. If she can't even get to the race on time, how can she expect to win?"

"Are you talking about that woman who was the king's mistress?" asked Rob. "What character is she in this goofy place?"

"I'll bet she's that sleazy snake, Chriss Hiss."

"Poisonous, hypnotizing, or the kind that squeezes people?"

"All of the above," I said. "Anything is possible in Toonland, you know."

Beside the apple was a child's motorized scooter, being checked over by a chuckling dog-like creature.

As we approached, Rob whispered to me, "This guy looks kind of like the jester in the castle."

Indeed, the dog-like cartoon creature definitely had Harry's charming crooked smile.

"Yes, the jester was Harry's character there, and a hyena is his character here in Toonland."

The dog-like creature with the sagging belly looked from me to Rob.

"Henry Hyena, meet Rob the Robot," I said, gesturing between them.

He took one look at Rob and started laughing loudly. Then he looked at me, and fell down in hysterics. I did not see the humor, and preferred to move on.

Next we came to an enormous plate, longer than it was wide, covered with 2 and 3 foot wide portions of cranberry sauce, potatoes, and dressing. Sitting in the middle on a soft, warm biscuit was an extremely plump, live, still-feathered turkey. The only similarity to the real Timothy was a mop of red hair on top of its little head and its general bulkiness, as if the stuffing had been put in early. This was the first indication I had seen that all characters did not come out looking much like their real-life counterparts, my friends from work. This came as quite a relief to someone who currently had a long trunk for a nose and wallowed in pink blubber.

"Hi Tom," I called to the bird. "Meet Rob the Robot."

"Gobble gobble. I mean, hi. Gosh, you're cute for an elephant. Love that shade of pink on you."

"Uh, thanks, I guess." Since most of my friends seemed to be here, I wondered about Charlie. "Tommy, have you seen Chucky Ducky?"

"Haven't you heard?" Tommy Turkey asked conspiratorially.

Afraid of the answer, I asked, "What happened?"

"His ratings slipped," he said, as if he was announcing a fate worse than death. "He couldn't keep up with the competition. There are just too many other ducks with speech impediments in the cartoon business right now."

"So what happens to someone when their ratings go down? Does their show get canceled?"

Tommy Turkey slowly moved the tip of his wing bulky horizontally in front of his neck, making a cutting sound. "The only thing that scares me more than Thanksgiving is," he shuddered, "losing the adoration of my public."

I had been afraid of this. Chucky Ducky, a cute little toon that always got picked on, would have been the obvious character for Charlie, but he did not seem to be here. Could Charlie really be dead? Best not to think about it right now.

The old spacecraft next to the platter was obviously Rob's transportation. It looked like a flying saucer built for one of those creatures-from-outer-space movies, complete with buttons and lights. But it appeared to have been rusting on the studio lot since the movie was completed back in the 1950's. When he tried to open the door to the spaceship, it fell off. The loud noise of a powerful engine being started and a lot of flashing lights cut off my laughter.

That left the tiny pink car at the end to be my vehicle for the race. It was only two feet high and three feet long. There had to be some mistake, since I would never fit in that miniature excuse for an auto.

"Contestants, on your mark... " said the loudspeaker with the moving lips. A purple snake with incredibly long eyelashes slithered up to the apple vehicle faster than I would have thought anyone could slither.

I was the only one still standing out on the road, and the only unoccupied vehicle in sight was the teeny little clown car. If I wanted to beat that smart-aleck robot, I had to do something fast.

Without thinking, I used the end of my truck like a hand to open the tiny door. I then pushed my big foot towards the interior of the little car. The foot went in, so I hopelessly tried to squeeze the rest of my body into the car. I was stunned to find myself sitting in the driver seat. Although extremely cramped and uncomfortable, I was actually inside the minuscule auto.

I didn't get time to try to figure out how I had fit, because the lips of the animate loudspeaker said, "Get set..."

Engines revved, while I searched under my flab for the ignition, trying to ignore the laughter of the hyena.

"Go!" shouted the loudspeaker, as I accidentally turned on the windshield wipers, the blasting radio, and every other accessory on the car except the ignition.

Hearing the roar of engines doppler away, I was suddenly surrounded by smoke. Now I searched blindly for the starter of my car. I felt a button and pushed it. I was happy to discover that my car was a convertible, because the top came down, giving me breathing space. Since the air around the car was all dust from the departed vehicles, it was more like coughing space.

As the smoke cleared I was able to stop coughing. The dissipating smoke revealed a lump on the road, just a few feet in front of the starting line. It looked like a pile of tangled rope. When it moved, I realized it was a pile of tangled Chriss Hiss.

"That *(&&)+! =!$%(! hyena!" swore Chriss Hiss, trying to untie a knot in her coils. "I'll get him back, even if it's the lasssst thing I do," she hissed.

She had apparently slid off the front of her apple vehicle. I looked back at the apple, which had was still running, wheels spinning, creating a hole in the ground that the apple was slowly sinking into. A rope was tied to the bumper, with the other end tied to the grandstand.

Cute little blue birdies circled the snake's head, chirping. She snapped at them, trying to bite them. I was glad she missed. I wasn't sure, but I thought I heard the hyena's obnoxious laughter in the distance. The snake flipped her tail over a coil in the same haughty way that Crystal would flip her hair, then slithered awkwardly back to her car, accompanied by squeeking and creaking noises.