Scooby Doo Fan Fiction ❯ To All The Ghouls I've Loved Before ❯ Chapter 1

Author's Notes: Scooby-Doo and all characters are copyright 2014 Hanna-Barbera Productions/Warner Brothers/Cartoon Network. No challenge to their ownership is implied; I am not making any money from writing this story, I am just a fan and I am writing this simply for fun.

Chapter 1

As our story begins a large red and black aircraft soars through the skies above one of the most remote regions of the world, inside of which are the five members of the world famous detective agency Mystery Inc.; however unlike the hundreds of times they have embarked on journeys such as this, this time they are not planning on solving any mysteries involving elements of the supernatural; however while they relax in safety and comfort inside their custom built airplane, they are completely unaware that soon they will uncover a mystery unlike anything that they have ever encountered before, one that if they fail to solve could mean complete doom and destruction for the world as we know it.

Meanwhile thousands of feet below the red and black aircraft, stands an ancient temple among the ice, snow and ragged peaks of the Himalayan Mountains; inside the primordial temple two ghosts plot and scheme to delay our heroes on their journey, their names are Bogel and Weerd; and for hundreds of years they have made it their goal to lure mortals into their temple in order to open the Chest of Demons, which contains 13 of the most frightening ghosts, ghouls and spooks in the world.

"Here it is, the famous Chest of Demons; just think of it Bogel, 13 of the nastiest, scariest and most evil ghosts, ghouls and spooks on Earth " Weerd remarked, smiling evilly as he peered over at the sinister container; probably the best way to describe the chest was a somewhat maroon/dark red color with a fearsome looking carving of what looked to be an ancient demon set into the top of the box and the container's lock.

"Yeah Weerd, think of all the havoc and destruction we could unleash with it" Bogel replied.

"Right Bogel, and not only that if we can get it open all the ghosts that inhabit it would love us and give us respect," Weerd remarked.

"Yeah we'd be heroes to them, they'd throw us parades and everything" Bogel responded.

"Yeah that would be the life" Weerd commented.

"One problem with that" Bogel responds.

"What?" Weerd replies.

"The chest can only be opened by the living of which we are not, we are ghosts" Bogel responded.

"I know that Bogel!" Weerd declared, sounding clearly annoyed by his fellow ghost's comment; the smarter of the two spirits then showed his displeasure with the other specter by smacking him across the face.

"Ooh, ooh, what did you do that for?" Bogel asked, rubbing his ghostly face.

"Sorry Bogel, I'm just getting sick and tired of living in this stupid castle," Weerd replied.

"That's okay Weerd, hey maybe we can find some mortals to bring here and trick them into opening the chest for us" Bogel commented.

"That's actually a good idea Bogel, and its probably the most sensible thing you've said in well, forever" Weerd said complimenting his fellow ghost.

"Thanks" Bogel responded.

"Now, how do we get some mortals here and who should we choose?" Weerd thought aloud while trying to think of an idea that was evil enough to bring mortals to the temple, finally something clicked and he thought of just such a scheme.

"I just had a brainstorm Bogel, we can use the crystal ball here in the temple to locate just the right mortals to bring here and open the chest for us" Weerd said with a devilish grin on his face.

"Oh yeah, that's a good idea" Bogel replied.

"Now who do we pick?" Weerd thought; a few moments later he and Bogel floated over to a large gray pedestal, on top of which was a large crystal ball in a strange looking red claw-shaped holder.

"Let's see," Weerd said evilly as he peered into the crystal ball.

At first the crystal's reception was a bit hazy; but soon enough the haze cleared and the two ghosts saw a picture of a large crimson and black airplane.

"Hmm; this looks quite promising," Weerd said as he tried to formulate a plan to bring the plane to the temple.

The smarter of the two spirits then noticed that there was some writing on the side of the aircraft and attempted to make out what exactly it said.

"The Mystery Flying Machine, hmm; you know Bogel old buddy we may be in luck, look" Weerd said reading the name of the plane, before his fellow ghost came in for a closer look.

"Ooh, ooh, it looks like there are people inside the plane Weerd" Bogel said.

"Yeah it looks like you're right Bogel old buddy, by the looks of it I would say there are four mortals and what looks like a dog sitting inside" Weerd continued.

"I still want to know one thing though," Bogel said.

"What's that Bogel?" Weerd asked.

"What kind of mortals would name an airplane The Mystery Flying Machine?" Bogel answered.

"Who knows Bogel, but whoever these mortals are they're the ones that are going to open the Chest of Demons for us" Weerd responded as he and Bogel laughed evilly while continuing to peer into the crystal.

The scene now shifts from the strange temple to about 20,000 miles in the air as Fred Jones, Daphne Blake, Velma Dinkley, Shaggy Rogers and Scooby-Doo are on their way to another well-earned vacation or so they think.

At the moment Shaggy sits in the pilot's seat while Velma is in the navigator's chair; while this is going on Fred and Daphne are sitting behind Shaggy and Velma in chairs that they had installed in the Mystery Flying Machine some time after they had purchased it.

"Shaggy?" Fred asked from the side of the aircraft.

"Yeah Fred" Shaggy responded.

"Where are we?" Fred replied.

"I thought we were getting close to Hawaii" Shaggy responded.

"Boy Shaggy this is the last time I let you pilot The Mystery Flying Machine" Fred commented, folding his arms and looking somewhat annoyed with the pilot of the aircraft.

"Why?" Shaggy replied.

"Because we're nowhere near Hawaii!" Fred declared.

"Rawaii ries rover rhe rocean, rawaii ries rover rhe rea" Scooby sung, while dressed in a grass skirt and carrying a ukulele as he stood towards the back of the plane.

"Scooby, quit clowning" Daphne commented.

"I just can't understand it, I really thought we were getting pretty close" Shaggy remarked.

"Oh? Try looking again Lindbergh." Velma replied.

"OK I will," Shaggy said as he looked out the window in front of him.

"All right I looked so what's the big deal?" Shaggy asked.

"The big deal is that's snow, not sand," Velma replied.

Velma went over to take a look at the plane's radar and navigational equipment to figure out where exactly the plane was heading.

"According to our radar, we're over the Himalayan Mountains in Nepal" Velma explained.

"Zoinks, The Himalayas? Man are we ever off track!" Shaggy remarked, somewhat embarrassed at what was happening.

Back inside the temple Weerd and Bogel set their diabolical plan to bring the gang to the castle in order to open the demon chest in motion, the pair of specters then floated over to the sinister container; it started to glowed a mysterious yellow and then began to emit a strange beam which shot out of the castle towards the sky and the gang's plane.

"This should bring those mortals right to us" Weerd says laughing evilly.

"Right Weerd" Bogel responded as he high fived Weerd; the pair continue to laugh evilly as they watch the mysterious beam of light gets ever closer to The Mystery Flying Machine.

The unexplained light beam hits the plane's fuel tank; meanwhile at that exact moment Fred stood up and walked over to the window, however as he did so he noticed something that was very strange and somewhat unexpected.

Daphne and Scooby then unbuckled their seatbelts and joined Fred at the window, and after a few moments both of them unfortunately saw the same thing that Fred had noticed.

"Jeepers, it looks like some kind of weird energy beam." Daphne commented.

Suddenly Fred's attention is temporarily diverted from the window as he notices out of the corner of his eye that something is wrong with the plane's fuel tank.

"Shaggy, I think something's haywire with the fuel" Fred commented.

The cowardly college student then took Fred's advice and looked over at the fuel gauge, however after doing so Shaggy gasped and saw something that made his heart beat faster than usual.

"Zoinks! Our fuel tank just went from full to empty in the blink of an eye!" Shaggy yelled in horror.

"What? That's impossible!" Daphne replied, with an equally shocked tone in her voice.

"I thought we filled up the fuel tanks before we left" Velma replied.

"We did" Fred observed.

"Then, like why are the fuel gauges emptying?" Shaggy inquired.

"I don't know, hmm this is really mysterious" Velma replied.

Now as if the plane being sapped of fuel wasn't bad enough, it was at this time that one of the plane's engines began to sputter and stall, which is a sound that none of the members of Mystery Inc wants to hear.

"Jinkies, We just lost engine one!" Velma declared, with a great amount of terror in her voice.

"Well at least we have engine two," Daphne responded.

However, just as Daphne finished her sentence the other engine of the aircraft suddenly begins to sputter and stall.

"Jumping Jellybeans! Now we're really in trouble!" Fred declared, sounding rather worried as he spoke.

"Like everybody buckle up, we're going down!" Shaggy replied in terror.

Fred, Daphne and Scooby buckle and fasten their seat belts while Shaggy and Velma make sure their seat belts are fastened and tightened as Shaggy attempts to guide the aircraft down for a safe landing.

Meanwhile several thousand miles below, there lies a small peaceful village with shops, restaurants, hotels and other buildings, in other words fairly typical for this part of the world; a peaceful and typical village that is, most of the time.

"Get Him!" a man exclaimed.

"Grab Him!" another man yelled.

"After Him!" roared yet another person.

At that moment, a young Asian boy in a yellow sweatshirt looks around, and with good reason; he is looking for a place to hide from the residents of the village who are currently chasing him.

After a few minutes, the angry mob following the boy catches up with him, and a distinguished man wearing a blue top hat, dressed in a blue suit and slacks grabs the boy by the back of his shirt.

"Gotcha!" the man exclaimed, the boy struggled all he can but whatever he did, he cannot escape the man's grasp.

"Hey what's the big idea?" the boy responded.

"The big idea as you put young man is that you are a troublemaker, ever since you arrived in Ursylvania you have been a troublemaker and we as citizens of this town are tired of it" the man explained.

"Yeah, yeah! He's a troublemaker! Let's get rid of him!" various citizens yelled as the boy listened intently to every word being spoken.

"Come On! I'm not a trouble maker, I'm just a kid" the boy replied as he tried to explain himself.

"Yes you are" replied a distinguished looking man in a blue suit; in fact he was the same man who was speaking to the boy before, and as before he didn't look too pleased with the young man.

"Alright so what if I am," responded the boy.

"So what? I'll tell you so what, I want you out of this town!" replied the man, with a somewhat annoyed look on his face.

"I think I know what you and your town's problem is," the boy responded.

"What?" the man asked

"Your town's got trouble with a capital T and rhymes with B and that stands for bad luck" the boy replied.

"Bad Luck?" the man replied with a questioned look on his face.

"Sure, and nothing cures bad luck like, Lotsa Luck Joy Juice; nothing cures bad luck like Lotsa Luck Joy Juice, it removes curses, jinxes, hexes and it's a pretty darn good dandruff remover" the boy said as he pulled a large gray and white bottle out of his shirt pocket before winking to no one in particular.

"Oh no, we're not falling for that, we don't need your bottles and we don't need you!" the man said as he lifted the boy up by his sweatshirt collar.

"Well, if you don't believe me, just look behind you," the boy replied.

"Oh come on! That's the oldest trick in the book" the man responded.

By a very weird coincidence, just as he finished speaking the gang's plane begins to make it's decent, as a matter of fact it was landing right into the area where the man and the other townspeople are speaking.

"Like, hang on everybody!" Shaggy declared.

Meanwhile as the plane begins to land, the boy decides to take this golden opportunity to get away and grabbed onto the side of the plane and as he did so he yells to the populace: "So Long Sports Fans!"

The young boy stayed out of sight as Shaggy attempted to land The Mystery Flying Machine; thankfully he is successful and manages to guide the plane down onto an old cobblestone street.

"Phew!" Shaggy declared as reclined back in the pilot's seat.

"Boy was that close" Fred responded.

"I still don't understand what happened" Daphne replied.

"Me neither, maybe we should get out of the plane and see where we are so we can ask directions out of here" Velma responded.

"Good idea, let's get going" Fred remarked.

With that the gang opened the side doors of the plane and each of the five members of the group exited one at a time.

"I wonder where we are?" Shaggy thought aloud.

"Beats me" Daphne replied.

Suddenly the gang hears a male voice coming from the side of the plane.

"Hi!" the voice said; hearing this the gang walked over to where the voice was coming from as they wondered who or what it was; as the five of them reached the side of the aircraft the teen sleuths and their Great Dane can see who it is: specifically it is a young boy with black hair and a yellow sweatshirt.

"Hey! It looks like we picked up an extra passenger!" Fred said, with a surprised look on his face.

The young boy who had jumped onto the side of the plane now jumped down and joined the gang.

"Who are you?" Daphne asked.

The young boy then smiled, clearly pleased that he had hitched a ride with some friendly people, so he decided to introduce himself to the group.

"My name's Flim Flam" the boy said.

"Flim Flam? That's an interesting name" Velma remarked.

"Sure is, well now that you know who I am, I would sure like to know who all of you are" Flim Flam responded.

"We would love to; my name's Fred Jones, this is Daphne Blake, Velma Dinkley, Shaggy Rogers and Scooby Doo" Fred said as he introduced the gang to the young boy.

"Cool" Flim Flam remarked.

"By the way Flim Flam, why did you jump up on the side of our plane?" Shaggy asked.

"Easy to get away from them!" Flim Flam responded pointing to a large crowd of angry people walking towards the gang.

"Alright, what's going on here?" asked a neatly dressed man wearing a red uniform, blue hat and brown shoes.

"We're really sorry about the plane sir, we somehow ran out of fuel and had to make an emergency landing" Shaggy replied.

"A likely story" the man responded.

"But sir that's the honest truth" Velma said, clearly trying to avoid any trouble with the local authorities.

"Right, why in the world would we make up something like that?" Fred asked.

The man then looked around at the gang with a stern and angry look on his face.

"I don't know, maybe the five of you are troublemakers" the man remarked.

"Troublemakers? We're not troublemakers, we're just lost, " Daphne replied as she tries to reason with the man.

"I'll have you kids know that I am the chief constable of this village and that the five are of you are indeed in a lot of trouble!" the man said, still with a unsympathetic and irritated look on his face.

"Alright what exactly did we do?" Fred asked.

"For starters crashing an aircraft in a no-crashing zone, disrupting the peace and.," the constable remarked walking over to Flim Flam and grabbing him by the shoulder.

"Harboring this, this riff-raff," the constable continued.

"Hey, that riff-raff as you call him happens to be our friend" Velma responded.

"Oh really?" the constable asked with a look of non-belief on his face.

"Yes really" Daphne replied with an impatient look on her face.

"Raht's right" Scooby responded.

"Yeah, he's our friend; let him go" the rest of the gang said in unison.

"Ah, this changes everything; a moment ago I was probably going to let you five off with a warning, but now you six are under arrest," the constable responded with a definitely serious look on his face.

"You're kidding" Daphne replied.

"Yes really, now come on I'm taking the six of you down to the village court house for your trial" the constable said.

The constable then motioned for the gang to follow him which the gang does as Fred, Daphne, Velma, Shaggy, Scooby Doo and their new friend Flim Flam are led to the Court House, not fully knowing what to expect considering a few hours ago they were on their way to Hawaii for a vacation and well earned rest during Coolsville University's spring break, which the four members of the group all attended; but now the five sleuths, after having taken a wrong turn, are on their way to possibly spending time in jail in a small village in the Himalayan Mountains, right now the four teenagers probably wished they were back in Ohio and probably wished they were in the midst of their respective studies: Velma, in biology, science, chemistry and crime detection, Daphne in journalism, Fred in journalism and athletics and Shaggy in culinary arts and crime detection; however it was all for not, as Mystery Inc. decided to go to Hawaii for spring break and as a result they were now heading for the Ursylvania Court House where they would learn their fate, and where they would also begin their investigation of a mystery unlike anything they had ever encountered before.