Upon entering the first display floor, we quickly spread out to check out Neckro's legendary collection.  There was a low-rider buggy, the Groovy Buggy, the standard TUVs and Monster TUVs, the ATV, a one-seater buggy, and much much more.  Each were in pristine order and in mint condition, with the exception of the Dirt Devil TUV with mud already all over it.  He really put a lot of time into collecting these fine vehicles, setting up the display, and recording some of the histories of each version.  It really put into perspective how one man can spend his precious time doing great things like this for others to experience, while me and RavenTresses wasted most of last weekend staring at the bald guy on the Mr. Clean products waiting for him to come to life and help us with our chores.  I almost felt pangs of guilt tugging at my conscience, but I knew I could quickly get rid of those annoying indications of wrongdoing with a healthy dose of alcohol after we were back home.

The collection itself was spread over two distinct display areas, each housed in their own glass-paneled dome structure connected by a two-way door.  Some of the vehicles had books or scrolls you could read, detailing some of the history and characteristics of the unique versions of the buggies that were not available on the market any longer.

We had to work quickly.  There was absolutely no time to contemplate things like how Cletus Theodore Milk, widely known as the inventor of milk, came up with the idea to walk up to a cow, squeeze those dangly things hanging down, and drink whatever came out.   Neckromacr could stop by at any time to check on things, since most likely his guard had been able to radio or call for help after he had been stuffed into the Child Protective Services sedan and driven away to meet his new foster family.  We crossed the two-way door into the other display floor where the TUVs had been set out for visitors to view and read about.  There wasn't a pink or purple Monster TUV, so Raven pointed towards a red one that she thought looked pretty. 

"Can I have it?" she asked, again with the pleading puppy-dog eyes.

"Yes, honey, we'll take that one for you," I responded sweetly.  "Hatch, you know how to hot-wire one of these, right?"

"Even if I could get one to start up, Rick, how are we even going to get it out of here?" Hatch shouted back at me, scrambling for his tools and hopping up into the driver's seat.  His toolbag spilled out onto the floor below, clattering all over the wooden surface.  Sighing, he jumped back down to pick up the dropped tools, looking up just as a wrench hanging off the edge of the driver seat fell and hit him square on the forehead, causing his involuntary reflexes to release his grip on his tools and sending them all crashing to the floor again.  Rubbing his forehead to make the pain go away, he carefully picked up all of his tools one by one, put them back up on the driver seat, made sure nothing was going to fall this time, and then climbed back up into the Monster TUV.  He swung his toolbag off his shoulder and the fastener snapped off, sending his tools sliding out of the bag and dropping to the floor all over again.  "Oh for crying out loud!!"

"Just get it started, we'll think of something!" I hollered back, running over to the still-closed doorway to this half of the building and outstretching my arms to get a feel for how wide it was.  I then turned around with my arms still outstretched and ran over to the Monster TUV that Hatch was working on firing up to compare width.  Yeah, one of the front tires would barely fit through the door... that wasn't going to work.

RavenTresses looked confused as she watched me run back and forth with my arms straight out to measure.  "Why are you running around playing airplane, mister?" she asked me as she walked up to affectionately brush off a dried Froot Loop that had been stuck to my chin this entire time.  "We have TUV acquisition to do!"

"That's so cute how you use big words like that," I told her.

"Well I've been trying to increase my vocabulary so I can beat you at online Scrabble," she replied matter-of-factly.   "So every so often, I try to defecate a large word into conversation even if I'm not really sure what it means."

"You do what to large words?"

"Defecate them into conversations," Raven responded.  "Did I not use defecate right?"

"No, you did just fine, honey," I replied, trying to hold back my laughter and ending up squirting coffee out of my nose.   Which is odd because I don't even drink coffee.

"How the heck did he drive these in here?" I inquired aloud, completely clueless as to how Neckro got his collection through the doors.  Did he have to disassemble each vehicle, bring in all the parts through one of the doors, and then re-assemble all of them back on the display floor?  Did he have to remove a bunch of these glass panels and set up a ramp to carefully drive each of these buggies and TUVs inside?

Meanwhile, Hatch was under the dashboard near the steering column, locating the ignition wires, sucking on the exposed ends, fastening them together with chewing gum, and then twisting a paper-clip in the keyhole to start up the engine, or whatever MacGyver-like thing you have to do in order to hot-wire a car.  I wouldn't know because I'm not into stealing cars!   However, there's clearly some personal history about Hatch we don't know about!  Almost as if by some sort of automotive magic that Raven and I would never be able to comprehend, the engine turned over and then roared to life.   "Did it ever occur to you that he probably dropped these inside the domes from his inventory?" Hatch hollered over the noise of the engine he was revving up.

"I'm gonna drop YOU inside the dome from my inventory," I grumbled under my breath.

"What was that?" Hatch yelled back at me, not quite hearing my snide remark.

"I said... porcupine meat makes terrific appetizers because they come with their own little toothpicks."

"Ruh roh," Raven exclaimed.  "We gots trouble!"  We looked over to where she was pointing... Neckromacr was scowling at us through one of the glass panels from the outside.  Seeing what we were up to, he made a mad dash for the door and fumbled for his keys to unlock it, gain entrance, and stop us.  "OMG OMG here he comes, here he comes!" she squealed frantically, sprinting towards the Monster TUV and climbing up the passenger side.  This left me standing out in the open, and at this point I realized I was still standing there with my arms outstretched, so I put them down at my sides to somewhat minimize the humiliation of being caught red-handed jacking a TUV from the museum.  Thinking quickly, I slid a 5-person group seating in front of the door to buy us time, forcing Neckro to go around to the door that Raven had broke -- no, completely and utterly destroyed beyond any hope of salvage or repair -- while I raced over to the Monster TUV and hopped in next to my keen girlfriend who always gets me into all sorts of trouble like this.

"We've got to get out of here!" I yelled at Hatch, flailing my arms around madly.

"You don't say!" Hatch sarcastically replied at the top of his lungs.  "Where exactly do you want me to go?"

"Go here," Raven helpfully suggested from her seat in between us.  She mashed down her foot on top of Hatch's, which was already on the accelerator, and shifted the TUV into drive.  The truck lurched forward and snapped us all back against our seats as we peeled out on the wooden floor, caught traction, and then bust through the side of the glass dome like NigelBlackthorne through a plate glass window during his last arcade brawl he started over a heated Dance Dance Revolution competition.  Giblets of glass and metal framework crashed everywhere around us as we smashed through the wall and landed on the soft desert sand outside.  Bits and pieces of glass rained down upon us as we bounced off the ground once, kicking up sand behind us as the wheels spun out when we landed again, and then raced away from the museum.   Behind us, Neckro ran after us for about fifty yards clutching his fists and shaking them at us just like the villain would do to the kids at the end of a Scooby-Doo cartoon mystery for foiling his diabolical plot.  But then, unlike what happens on Scooby-Doo, he gave up pursuit and instead made a quick radio call for help to the local police SWAT team or some ninjas or something.

RavenTresses raised her hands and whooped and hollered with excitement.  "We're home free now with my present!" she shouted with a big grin on her face.  We cruised on through the desert valley at top speed, hoping that Neckro didn't have some special one-of-a-kind rocket car that he was going to chase after us with.  When I nervously glanced in the rear-view mirror (first I had to re-position it because it turns out that whenever Raven enters a vehicle, she directs all mirrors to herself so she can see how pretty she is from various angles), I discovered that the situation we were in was much worse...

TO BE CONTINUED...