Painted Into a Corner

Synopsis: Continuing from The Energy Virus, the wicked toon Splatter Phoenix  is on a quest to ravage all of ToonTown into a colorless, lifeless wasteland. Only the Rangers and their friends can defeat her.

‘I see a red door and I want to paint it black

No colors anymore I want to paint it black

I see the girls walk by dressed in their fancy clothes

And yet all the while still my darkness grows.’--Lyrics from ‘Paint it Black’ as sung by the Doors

‘I see your true colors shining through

Your true colors, that’s why I love you

So don’t be afraid to let them show

Your true colors

True colors

Are beautiful.”--Lyrics from ‘True Colors’ as sung by Madonna

Chapter 1--”I’ll Drain The Color From ToonTown ! Permanently !”

Splatter Phoenix blended in with the crowd at the charity event. There were so many vibrant colors in various artworks that were excruciatingly offensive to Splatter’s eyes.

‘I’ve HAD it with all these so-called artists thinking they’re so popular. Have they ever seen true modern art ? No ! These things are hideous ! I’ll mute everything here and then move on to ToonTown. They think their lives are drab now, wait until everything is monochromatic.’, Splatter vowed as she dipped her brush into a small bucket of black and white paint and began to splash its horrific contents everywhere.

‘Hey ! What’s happening to the color ?’, a horrified patron shrieked.

‘It’s turning into an episode of Andy Griffith ! Normally I wouldn’t be horrified by something like that but this is AWFUL !’, another philanthropist cried. Every color became worse than sepia tone. At least sepia had brown as its base. This was nothing. It was black, white and shades of grey.

Splatter cackled from a balcony after she had painted herself a ladder to climb up to it.

‘Don’t thank me ! I improved your event. Now everyone will cower at the prowess of Splatter Phoenix, for the PHOENIX rises again !’, she guffawed maniacally as she made her exit. Some of the Rangers were unfamiliar with the villainess, but others knew her obvious gaffes in fashion to know her, especially from her sadistic laugh.

‘This is one rogue toon who is incredibly dangerous. She had manipulate anything around her and create whatever she wants !’, Nao informed them. For a robot, he had a timbre of fear in his vocal output but showed no outer representation of his trepidation.

‘She’s heading toward ToonTown...we need to stop her, now !’, Jason said. There wasn’t any time to waste while Splatter was on the loose.

Chapter 2—Shades of Black, White and Grey

The colors were beginning to drain completely from every landscape. Without the vibrancy, ToonTown had lost its luster as well as its appeal. Some of the toons were becoming depressed and many had sunk into a deep, dark place that many toons dared not to tread. Even the old timey toons were becoming concerned.

‘This is horrible ! I know I say sometimes I wish it was the same back then, but this isn’t what I meant.’, Honey, a rubberhose toon from Tiny Toons plaintively confessed. Her tears were bigger than railroad cars and they were beginning to flood her home.

‘Please stop ! Crying will do us no good !’, the familiar timbre of Felix the Cat stated while assuaging young Honey. The typical laughter of the toons was now turning to crying. The only way that the Rangers would be able to fight is not to resist becoming toons themselves. It was an insane counterattack but it would give them an advantage over the psychotic unpredictability of Splatter Phoenix.

Chapter 3—Using the Elements...Literally

The toons began to develop a plan to use whatever media they could just lying around. Little had Splatter realized just how sloppy she had been in trying to entrap them. There had been a water dropper left in a silver pan, just lying there, being idle, waiting for a hero or heroine to wield it.

‘Let the colors flow !’, Clareabelle Cow victoriously called as she released the colors from the dropper. It wasn’t nearly enough. The spread of monochromatism had continued far beyond Toontown and into Disneyworld itself. Everything was getting infected by the drear, drab draining of color.

‘It’s not enough !’, Clara Cluck cried.

‘It will be, through Magic. Don’t lose heart.’, Merlin said. Genie rubbed his hands together and started manifesting droppers for everyone. He had more than enough magic to spare, so it was unlikely he would run out of color droppers before the night was through, and the night was still young.

‘Is this gonna work ?’, Kim asked, tentatively.

‘We have to fight fire with fire !’, Genie responded. He was a bit frightening when he entered chaotic mode but he was bound and determined to stop this psycho before matters became any more out of hand then they had currently.

One by one the toons took their brushes, pallets and other sources of media and began fighting back against Splatter’s animated forces. She simply sat back in a lawn chair she had painted herself, reclined with her arms behind her head and lackadaisically watched her goons pounding the crap out of everyone.

Merlin used his magic to summon sketchbooks to trap the animated lackeys in. From those enchanted books, the doodles could no longer do any harm. The once relaxed Splatter started to feel the pinch of panic.

Chapter 4—Color Droppers, Fire Away

Clarabelle Cow pointed to Genie to continue replicating her color drippers. Each of the Lyoko Warriors, the Tapwater Titans even so called ‘out of commission’ or obscure heroes like Symbiotic Titan battling it out with color droppers. With the sketchbooks sucking up Splatter’s manifestations of darkness, Aisha had the perfect solution. She had an empty dropper and squeezed the bell on the back, landing directly behind Splatter. Before the insane artist could retaliate she released the squeezer and Splatter was sucked inside.

Zatanna saw the trapped Ms. Phoenix and held her tightly within a magical force field.

‘I think it’s time we phoned St. Canard police. We have their main escape artist detained.’, she said. Diana couldn’t help but smile. Zantanna had thought quickly, as she did in many occasions. It was like she had been able to see into the future. She had admitted that working with Stephen and other ‘wielders of the Craft’ that her abilities had even expanded and she was far more powerful. Like with Merlin and Genie, the crew breathed a sigh of relief knowing that these chaotic agents of good were on their side.

Epilogue

The incident had long since passed and it was forgotten as quickly as it had begun. This time, Splatter was put in a maximum security vault where she had no access to any sort of media or paintings. It would be a very sparse and mundane experience for her but she was incredibly dangerous and deserved to be treated as such. As far as the Rangers were concerned, they had said goodbye to their friends for the day and there were high fives, hugs and fist bumps all around for exemplary teamwork.

The charity event continued as if nothing had occurred. People’s memories had been slightly tweaked by the magic users and even agents of MIB had come to secure the event. The question is, why had J and K come in so late and unannounced, even if Snyde was the only one who noticed them come in. No one else even took it as unusual that they were even at the event. Something was definitely going on. Something of galactic importance had entered into the Rangers’ arena but only the MIB was aware of it and they knew they had to work together if this intergalactic menace was going to be stopped once and for all…

To Be Continued…