Next up, the Space Kook/Spaceman Ghost: - In their youth, Henry and Abe had always been playfully competitive w/ one another. It was your typical friendly rivalry between friends. However, with the passing of time. Abe grew sick of always being in second place to Henry; he being oblivious to his friend’s (somewhat obvious) jealousy. One of the childhood dreams they shared was to one day go out into space. That chance to live their dream came to fruition one day as a new astronaut training program was created. First, they needed a trail run of the program to see if it was safe or even doable. Without skipping a beat, the two were the first to sign up. In the end, after months and months of training, it was ultimately decided that Henry was to be chosen in favor of Abe. Not happy at all with this news and fed up w/ always losing out to his “friend”. Out of jealousy, Abe tampered w/ the oxygen tanks. Steadily emptying them more and more at a time. Replacing the emptied portion of the tanks w/ nitrous oxide a.k.a. "laughing gas". As to make it appear as though Henry is slowly going crazy and losing his mind to put fault on the space program. All of this to “even the score” for years of failure on his friend-turned-rival and to give a bad name to the space program that he felt wronged him. Henry was eventually sent up among the stars above on the planned 9 month long trip. His weekly video calls started off normal, but it was quickly noticed by ground control that Henry appeared to be losing his grip, possibly due to stress. Bursting into fits of laughter for seemingly minutes on end. On his final call, he cried out one last fit of laughter before he cut off the signal. Having died of asphyxiation. The space shuttle was left out in space adrift. Back on earth, the space program was heavily slandered and criticized and lost a lot of money from the lawsuit for Henry's death and was ultimately shut down as it became difficult to receive the funds necessary to continue on or make improvements. A looong time later, his ghost returned as the Spooky Space Kook, and has begun abducting people from a random small town out in the Kansas countryside. His crazed cackle was haunting. A majority of the time, he looked “normal”, but after a laughing fit his face switched to that of a skull. It looked as though the spooky kook was looking for someone. Mystery Inc. was called in to rid the airship field and neighboring town of the ghostly spaceman. Abe (now a farmer) was one of the residents of the town. He was nervous and had unintentionally tipped off the gang that he knew something he wasn’t. As the gang gathered more info/clues it was found that the space ghost was not in fact haunting some random town for no reason, but in fact had simply returned to his own hometown (in life before his death) and was on the hunt for Abe. It was soon found that Abe was the one responsible for the Spaceman’s death. When confronted by the ghost astronaut, he was simply asked “Why?” Had their years of being friends mean anything to him?” Abe, scared witless, broke down admitting he had indeed been responsible for this friend’s death and the closure of the space program. He had finally let his jealous nature get the better of him and had regretted that decision all his life since then. Begging for forgiveness. With this apology, the ghost was put to rest as it’s unfinished business was complete. Abe later turned himself in willingly afterward and faced the charges. He was sentenced 20 years. This was one of the more bittersweet endings to one of their cases they had solved, but they pressed onward nonetheless. As there were still mysteries out there to solve. "Scooby Doo: New & Groovy" art belongs to me (ArtMakerProductions).
