(Opening shot: the city skyline during the day.)
Narrator: The city of Townsville…
(A large statue of the Mayor is hoisted into view near the camera. Pull back to show the entire thing: it stands on a pedestal engraved “Our Mayor,” and the little man holds a lyre in one hand and is naked save for a fig leaf and laurel wreath. It is being moved by means of a large crane; cut to a view of the city from ground level, the camera pointing up into the sky. The work of art is lowered onto the lens to black out the screen, whereupon the view immediately snaps to a large excavation that has been dug in a grassy area of the park. The statue slams down on this spot.)
Narrator: …is getting a little fix-me-up!
(Water spouts from the mouth. Pull back to the park entrance; a cheering crowd has gathered at the site, and the crane backs off. At the scene, the Mayor and Ms. Bellum survey the throng.)
Mayor: Oh, the likeness is uncanny!
(A dollop of bird excrement drops into view and splatters the statue’s head, and a second blast does the same to the genuine article. Pull back to another long shot and pan away slowly across the park, stopping on a hilltop where the Professor and the girls are seated on a blanket. They are seen from the back in this shot; cut to a close-up of the Professor and Blossom. The former drinks some more while the latter eats a sandwich and eyes a buzzing fly.)
Blossom: The likeness is uncanny.
(The Professor waves the fly away; pan slowly to follow it as it approaches Buttercup and Bubbles. Here the former drinks from a juice box; the latter spreads jelly on a slice of bread to make her own sandwich.)
Buttercup: It’s about time the Mayor filled that giant pothole. (She waves at the fly; it goes on to Bubbles.)
Bubbles: I think it’s nice that the Mayor is keeping Townsville nice.
Buttercup: Ugh. Filling potholes is his job, Bubbles. Being nice has nothing to do with it.
Bubbles: I don’t care.
(Close-up of her bread, on which the fly lands.)
Bubbles: (from o.c.) He’s still nice.
(She slaps some jelly over the insect and puts on the second slice of bread; extreme close-up of her mouth as she bites down, then pull back. She smiles tranquilly at Buttercup, but the sound of the fly buzzing inside her body soon makes itself heard. It bothers her sister, but not her, and soon enough Blossom and the Professor are giving her a funny look as well.)
Buttercup: Bubbles?
Blossom: You’re buzzing!
Bubbles: I’m what?
(It finally sinks in that something is amiss. A bite or sting is heard from within, and the view snaps to black.)
Bubbles: (voice over) YEOW!!
Professor: (voice over) Wake up, Bubbles. Come on, Bubbles, open your eyes.
(Fade in to the girls’ bedroom—Bubbles’ perspective of her sisters and the Professor, all of whom are looking down at her with much concern. The windows show that it is now nighttime.)
Professor: Oh, that’s it, that-a-girl.
(Close-up of her woozy eyes; she has been put in the bed.)
Professor: (from o.c.) There she is. There’s our Bubbles. (Cut to Blossom.)
Blossom: Gee, Bubbles, getting stung in the throat by that bee must have really hurt.
(The eyes again. Bubbles tries to say something, but all that comes out is a string of inarticulate squeaks due to her injury. The Professor stops her with a waggling finger in her face.)
Professor: (from o.c.) Ah-ah-ah. (Cut to him.) The doctor said no speaking for a week. The less you speak, the sooner you can get out of that, um…that, uh…
(The eyes again; now the camera has pulled back a bit to show something covering the lower part of Bubbles’ face. Pull back farther to expose all of it: a conical collar fastened around her neck. It is the sort of device used on dogs to keep them from scratching at their heads after veterinary treatment has been applied. She is in Buttercup’s section of the bed.)
(Back to the other two girls.)
Buttercup: …face brace?
(Blossom tires to stifle a laugh and loses control of it, and Buttercup quickly joins in the mirth Bubbles’ eyes show how miffed she is; a rising, angry squeal starts in her swollen throat, but the Professor puts an arm around her and addresses himself to the others.)
Professor: Now, now, girls, it’s not nice to make fun of your sister’s condition. (The laughter stops.) It’s not her fault that she’s stuck wearing this…this, um…
Buttercup: (as Blossom chokes back more laughs) …throat moat?
(This sets them both off all over again. Even the Professor smiles, but he thinks better of it when Bubbles gives him a very dirty look. The laughter soon stops.)
Blossom: Don’t worry, Bubbles. Look. (holding up a small slate with attached chalk) You can use this chalkboard.
(Cut to the bed. Blossom hands the slate over.)
Blossom: (from o.c.) If you have something to tell us, just write it down.
(Bubbles does so and faces the slate to the camera. It reads “I’m not speaking to you!!!”)
(Dissolve to the crescent moon in the night sky and pull back slightly, then tilt down to the park entrance. The Mayor statue is visible through the gate; a squirrel runs up to its base and snuffles around a bit, chittering excitedly. A few seconds later, other squirrels gather around the statue and start to jump onto it. Close-up of the base; three of the animals are digging feverishly at the earth around its edge. Elsewhere, one calls to another, which pokes its head from a hole in the ground. The word soon passes from one to another—something very big is afoot. One of them leaps onto the statue’s nose and tries to dig into the stone, but with no luck. This does not deter others from trying to burrow into various parts of the face and head. Now rodents swarm over all parts of the statue, ultimately hiding almost completely behind the mass of their furry bodies. All that can be seen are the top of the head and the water pouring from the mouth.)
(Cut to an alarm clock on a table. It rings and is promptly silenced; the owner is revealed as the pajama-clad Mayor when the camera shifts. He stretches and yawns, having been awakened from a sound sleep. Cut to the hall, along which he plods while scratching himself; he is seen from the neck down in this shot. In the bathroom, he is heard walking in, and he reaches up into view and turns on the faucet. Splash of water, faucet off, towel pulled down from ring to wipe face—and then he finally stands up into view to look in the mirror. A squirrel is perched on his head. Pull back across the room; more of them are chittering and watching from all sides.)
(Cut to the city; it is now the next day. A yelling, panicked man runs into view, with a squirrel on his head. He stops and flings the creature off, only to be beset by a second on that sinks its teeth into his scalp. More citizens rush about in the throes of the squirrels’ attack; an occupied phone booth is quickly covered with the little furballs, which start trying to dig into it.)
(All over the city, squirrels are biting and burrowing into the architecture from all angles. The top of a telephone pole falls free, having been gnawed through. Even Townsville Hall is not immune—the rodents have inflicted considerable damage to its various wings and the dome. Inside the Mayor’s office, squirrels have overrun the place and are on the floor, desk, and bookshelves. One has even made itself at home atop the Mayor’s chair.)
(Close-up of the buzzing hotline, then pull back to put Bubbles in view. Still in bed, she answers it; the noise of the crazed animals can be heard under the next line.)
Mayor: (over hotline) Hello, Powerpuff Girls? Are you there? (Bubbles tries to speak and cannot.) Is anyone there? You must hurry! The city of Townsville has gone totally nuts! If anyone’s listening, please pass this along to the Powerpuff Girls!
(The line goes dead, and a dial tone is heard. Bubbles looks at the receiver, then off to her left. Pull back slowly to show her sisters fast asleep; Buttercup has taken Bubbles’ section of the bed.)
Blossom: (yawning) Was it important, Bubbles? (She drops the receiver; back to her.)
Buttercup: (from o.c.) Well? Who was it?
(The afflicted blonde sweats nervously; back to Buttercup, now partly awake and very cross.)
Buttercup: Bubbles! (She sits up.) How many times do we have to—oh! (stifling laughter; pull back) You’re not supposed to talk.
Blossom: (handing slate to Bubbles; she writes) Don’t mind her, Bubbles. Just write down exactly what happened.
(The scribbling continues for several seconds—during a close-up of Bubbles, and then in a cut to her sisters. Realizing that they might be here for a while, Blossom whistles idly; Buttercup, meanwhile, shoots a very annoyed look back at her and Bubbles. Finally Blossom speaks up.)
[Animation goof: In this close-up, Bubbles is in her everyday dress, not her nightgown.]
Blossom: Okay, okay, not exactly! Just the facts!
(The slate is held out to face the pair. Close-up: the word “EXTRA” is across the top, with a star at each end and “Townsville’s gone NUTS!!!” below it. Pull back; all three girls are fully dressed for action and standing on the bed.)
Blossom: All right, girls. Let’s get cracking!
(She and Buttercup take off, heading straight up. Bubbles tries to follow suit, but the collar throws off her aerodynamics and she ends up veering crazily all over the room. Bouncing across the bed, she comes to rest standing on her head. She is on her feet in an instant and strains at the collar for a moment; finally she manages a vertical takeoff that still wavers a bit.)
(Cut to an empty patch of sky. Blossom pulls into view first, then Buttercup; Bubbles, however, still cannot keep a level course and tumbles head over heels as she flies. Buttercup grimaces at the sight. From here, wipe to a city block that has been badly damaged by the squirrels, with a bit of flaming wreckage on the sidewalk and many windows boarded up. Pan to the girls, standing in the middle of the street and surveying the scene.)
Blossom: Who could have done this?
(Their perspective. A man runs into the street and toward them, screaming incoherently at first; after a moment, he gets out a recognizable word as he passes o.c.)
Man: SQUIRRELS!!
(Right on cue, a horde of the little brown critters thunders into view and runs after him. Pull back to a longer shot of the area; the girls are engulfed in the tidal wave of wildlife. Cut to the colonnade of Townsville Hall, past which the squirrels are stampeding. Blossom pulls herself loose and jumps to safe ground, and Buttercup does the same before reaching back in.)
Blossom: Bubbles! (Buttercup pulls her free.) Townsville’s been overrun by mad squirrels.
Buttercup: But where’s the Mayor? (A knotted-bedsheet rope drops into view.)
Mayor: (from o.c. above, softly) Psst! Hey, Powerpuff Girls!
(They look up; cut to just behind them. The camera is pointing toward the dome, where the Mayor is balanced on a ledge. The rope hangs down from here.)
Mayor: (still softly) Up here!
(Cut to inside his bathroom; the window has been boarded up, and the rope’s upper end hangs from it. The tops of the four heads are visible over the edge of the bathtub, where they have taken refuge. Now the Mayor returns to normal speaking volume.)
Mayor: Oh, Powerpuff Girls. (Cut to him, Blossom, and Buttercup.) I’m so glad you made it. (Pan to put Bubbles in view; he turns to her.) Without you—
(He cuts himself off when he notices her collar, then turns back to her sisters.)
Mayor: Uh—without you, I don’t know what Townsville would do! (Blossom files to the window.)
Blossom: Don’t worry, Mayor. (looking out) We have experience when it comes to squirrels. (Buttercup and the Mayor join her.) Using Bubbles’ special squirrel-talking powers, we’ll find out what’s making these squirrels nuts. Right, Bubbles?
(Silence as the third sister peeks over the windowsill. She tries to speak in squirrel language, but once again she cannot get out any intelligible words. This blindsides the other three.)
Buttercup: Oh, this is just great! I can’t believe this! The one time we need to use Bubbles’ only special power, and she can’t even do it!
(Bubbles has slunk away, unbeknownst to her sister until right now.)
Buttercup: Oh, perfect. Now where’d she go?
(Cut to the sun in a clear blue sky and tilt down quickly to a beaver gnawing a fallen tree limb in the forest. Its facial features make it a near-perfect match for the Mayor: white mustache, top hat, monocle-like ring around one eye. It even babbles something like the Mayor as it chews. After several seconds, it sits up and looks behind itself; pan slightly in that direction to show Bubbles standing there. “Mayor” gibbers; Bubbles turns angrily away at those words; “Mayor” addresses her placatingly; she relents and goes to work with her slate. She holds up the completed message—a picture of a crazed squirrel in front of the city skyline.)
(This sinks in for “Mayor” right away; it starts to panic and babble quickly before running o.c. Cut to a flower with a small firefly perched on its petals. “Mayor” runs up and speaks to it, and the insect flies away. Close-up of it in flight, then cut to just inside a window that has been cut or gnawed into a tree trunk. The firefly enters and lights on the wooden arm of a chair that has been drawn up before a blazing fireplace. A brown hand is seen resting on the arm in this shot.)
(The insect’s rear starts to flash red—the wildlife equivalent of the hotline—and the hand tenses up. Cut to Bubbles in flight through the forest; she has mastered the art of level flight with her collar in place. After a moment, a small brown figure pulls in next to her. She looks down at it—and the large brown eyes and yellow light trail mark it as Bullet, the squirrel she nursed back to health with Chemical X in “Stray Bullet.” It was this creature’s home and hand we just saw.)
(Bullet dives o.c.; cut to a slow pan through a city block under siege. Bullet lands and holds an angry conversation with one squirrel. In the bathroom, Blossom and Buttercup have their backs against the boarded-up window in an attempt to fend off the rodents trying to break through it.)
Buttercup: Blossom, I can’t hold off these squirrels any longer!
(Bubbles and Bullet crash in through the ceiling and land to face the two girls and the Mayor; the latter has jumped back into the bathtub.)
Blossom: It’s Bubbles!
Buttercup: And—and— (Close-up of a beaming Bullet; she continues o.c.) —a squirrel?
Blossom: (from o.c.) Get him!
(Bullet’s eyes go wide with shock. Pull back as everyone but Bubbles charges toward it; she throws herself in their path to protect the girls’ old ally. She tries to give an explanation, but cannot get it out. Cut to Buttercup.)
Buttercup: Get out of the way, Bubbles! (Pan to Blossom.)
Blossom: Wait a minute. That’s not just a squirrel— (Cut to Bullet, ready to fend off a blow; she continues o.c.) —that’s Bullet!
(It chitters happily at being recognized and then says something to Bubbles; close-up of her as it continues o.c. She listens intently.)
Buttercup: Well, Bubbles?
Blossom: What did he say?
(The squirrel monologue ends. A large vertical piece of chalk is drawn across the scene; behind it, wipe to a shot of Blossom, Buttercup, and the Mayor sitting on the edge of the bathtub. The transition is accompanied by the screech of chalk being dragged across a blackboard.)
Blossom: Mount Rushmore!
Mayor: Colonel Sanders!
(Cut to the source of their attention: a slate, larger than the one Bubbles has been using, on which she has drawn the new Mayor statue. The others have been trying to guess what she has depicted, without much luck.)
Buttercup: (from o.c.) Oh, oh, oh! Uh, I know! A Pez dispenser!
(The artist boils over and tries to cuss her out, but Bullet offers some advice. She starts to make an addition to her drawing; the Mayor leans in closer as some of the window’s boards fall away.)
Mayor: You better hurry, there’s not much time!
(Close-up of the slate’s upper half. Several angry squirrels have been drawn in around the statue.)
Blossom: (from o.c.) Oh, wait! I think that’s the Mayor!
Mayor: (from o.c.) You’re right!
(Tilt down to the lower half, where a pile of circles has been drawn in under the base as if buried. Each has a line through it.)
Mayor: (from o.c.) See, the squirrels are all mad at me. (Zoom in.)
Blossom: (from o.c.) Marbles!
Mayor: (from o.c.) I don’t play marbles. (Pull back; Bubbles steams, Bullet stares dumbfounded.)
Blossom: (from o.c.) What about gumballs?
Mayor: (from o.c.) Mmm, I like gumballs.
Buttercup: (from o.c.) They’re not gumballs! (Cut to the bathtub.)
Blossom: Bombs?
Mayor: Or rocks.
Buttercup: I agree with Blossom.
Blossom: There’s nothing dangerous about rocks, Mayor. (All turn to camera.) Okay, Bubbles. We’ll go with bombs. The Mayor is sitting on bombs.
(Cut to the slate, which has been abandoned by both Bubbles and Bullet; the chalk lies near it.)
Buttercup: (from o.c.) Where’d they go?
(Cut to the two in flight. They climb and then go into a sharp dive, descending on the statue. The squirrels desert the area in short order as they approach. Long shot of the area, then cut to Bubbles as she knocks the head off with one punch. Bullet smashes away the section with the covering fig leaf, and Bubbles dispatches the lyre. The squirrels cheer wildly and dive into the hole in the ground that had been covered by the wrecked artwork. One after another, they come out with acorns—stashed here before their access was cut off—and the camera cuts to a slow pan across the park, now filled with happy nut-laden rodents. Stop on Bubbles and Bullet, who trade a satisfied look, then cut to just outside the bathroom window. The truth has finally hit home for the other two girls and the Mayor—now they know what Bubbles drew under the statue.)
Buttercup: Ohhhh, I get it! The squirrels were storing their nuts in that pothole under the Mayor’s statue!
Mayor: Does that mean I’m not sitting on any bombs?
(A pile of acorns tumbles across the screen; behind them, the scene changes to the same spot in the park. A crowd has gathered, with the Mayor and a fully healed, collarless Bubbles at the front of it. The Mayor holds one end of a rope that runs up over a pulley and is tied to a cloth covering the top half of something on a stone tree stump. Some of the squirrels are here as well.)
Mayor: And so I, the Mayor— (Bubbles translates for the squirrels.) —am proud to dedicate this statue to all the squirrels of Townsville! (Bubbles translates.)
(Close-up of the covered object. The cloth is lifted away to reveal statues of Bubbles—with her collar in place—and Bullet standing side by side. The squirrels cheer and raise their acorns in triumph. Back to the statue and tilt down to the stump, which is now seen to have a counter embedded above a knothole and a lever protruding next to this. A squirrel tosses a nut in and pulls the lever; the counter reading increases from 054 to 055. Pan away from here to show many others lined up with acorns ready to deposit, then cut to Bubbles and the Mayor.)
Mayor: Also, let’s put our paws together for Buttercup and Blossom… (Bubbles tranalates as the crowd cheers.)
(Cut to these two; they are gloomily cleaning up the statue debris. Blossom wields a broom, Buttercup a dustpan.)
Mayor: (from o.c.) …who, feeling bad for teasing Bubbles— (They start in surprise and force smiles.) —have volunteered to help clean up the mess from the last statue!
Buttercup: (sourly, to Blossom) Well, at least it’s not raining.
(A sudden flash of lightning, and two very grumpy girls find themselves soaked to the skin as a thunderstorm kicks up.)
(The background for the end shot comes up.)
Narrator: And so Townsville is safe from squirrels once again— (Bubbles appears by herself.) —thanks to Bubbles—
(Her slate slides into view in front of her; it shows the crazed squirrel she drew earlier.)
Narrator: —and…and…uh, a bowling ball! No—uh, bunny! Q—Q-Tip! Uh, cheese! Boogers? Ugh!
The End