By Thamanda Crompson
Fauxhasset Paroder Staff Reporter
[Read the Punxsutawney Punk’d saga from the beginning]
[Catch up on the latest installment]
Fauxsutawney Fil is finally gone, and his prisoners – your reporter and Rookie Ranger Devan Branch, Part-Time Jedi, Part-Time Pirate, Part-Time Wandering Minstrel – freed.
Fauxsutawney Fil with two of the deacons of his church, the Temple of RALPH – caught on flip phone camera by Orion Vanta. Photo credit
The Punxsutawney Phil impostor, claiming to be the reincarnation of the original groundhog RALPH, had set up a church of sorts within a dimensional rift at the heart of the Womp, which is now known to be the source of the strange womping sounds that can be heard in and around the state park at night.
Within the rift, woodland creatures became capable of human speech and were using their gift of tongues to sing praises to the omnipotent raccoon. But now the Temple of RALPH has fallen, and the false god sent back from whence he came (or at least to go be someone else’s problem for a while).
Your reporter and the full-time part-timer spent six days in Fil’s prison, eating scraps of food brought to us by the Womp’s friendly pig-bear and its cub. We feared that my last article had not reached the outside world and despaired of ever being saved.
But this morning, a rescue party came. Our heroes included Police Chief Stephen Quill, Two Men (looking for Their Dog), Fauxhasset newcomers Monica Moniker and Orion Vanta, ϨΔиϮα, Dooey Lembas, the Panic Brigade, and my colleague, Crime Correspondent Sobby Raint-John.
This motley crew charged into the moonlit clearing. Yes, it was moonlit in the morning. It was always moonlit, even when the sun was out. I shudder just to remember the cold, colorless light, the high, discordant keening of the stars, and always, the womp-womp-womp coming from we knew not where.
The moon is not right in this place. Photo credit
The rescue squad fought their way through RALPH’s worshippers, each brandishing an indestructible porcupine that police had apparently confiscated from the Clandestine Auto Regulators (CAR) earlier in the week. The congregation scattered, and Fil fled down a scurry hole at the sight of the porcupines.
For their part, the porcupines gave a metallic gleam and a mechanical roar and pursued him, their quills spinning like tiny mammalian buzz saws. None emerged from the Accursed Burrow, though it took some time for the rescue squad to work out the strange locking mechanism of our prison.
Police and the Panic Brigade were unable to locate the LAW, who had been carried away by RALPH’s followers our first night in the rift, but Two Men were successfully reunited with Their Dog, who claimed he had been coaxed into the rift by the smell of frying bacon.
The Town is now working with Radiation State Park officials and paranormal consultants to determine how the rift may be closed or neutralized. The Womp will be closed to the public until further notice.
