Tales of the Parodyverse

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J. Jonah Jerkson presents a story he's been stewing over since Thanksgiving and decided a cliche'd ending was better than none
Tue Feb 28, 2006 at 03:46:30 pm EST
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The Baroness, Part 41. Screwy-Doo in the Bayou (end) This takes place just before the SR 1066 arc.
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“Elizabeth, sweet, is that you?” Roger Wilton inquired of the bedraggled, soaking wet teenager standing before him.

“I told you, dum-dum, I’m Velma,” she grumbled.

“Right, sweets. You’re Velma. Definitely Velma. I’ve got it. Velma. Hullo, everyone, this is Velma.”

“Grrrr.”

Fred again exhibited his mastery of the obvious. “You’re all wet. What happened?”

“Well, I had this really weird dream that woke me up around sunrise. This man who looked like the professor was in something like a World War II German uniform and he was wandering around the bayou birdwatching. He kept calling, ‘Shrike, Shrike.” And then I felt this strange chill, like the one near that haunted house. So of course I had to get out of bed and go looking for it in the swamp without telling anybody and without knowing where I was.”

“Just like all the other times,” Shaggy murmured. “Good old dependable Velma.”

“Egad! Did you say a German officer! It must be my old foe, Baron Otto!”

“Huh?” Fred, Daphne and Shaggy chorused.

‘Ah-choo!” Velma chimed in.

“Er – he’s an old friend of mine from the Drones,” Roger Wilton covered. Fanatic whist player, Baron Otto. We’ve crossed swords on the velvet baize many times, don’t you know.”

“Drones?” Fred asked.

“What’s whist?” Daphne cut in.

“Velvet baize?” Shaggy was even more bewildered than usual.

“Elizabeth, did you actually see your grandfather?” blurted out Roger, in the tones of a confused foxhound announcing that he just might have found the trail.

“What are you talking about? My grandfathers are dead. They don’t go mucking around in the swamps, and I wasn’t looking for them anyway. And stop calling me Elizabeth!”

“Right. You’re Velma, Elizabeth. Ooops, Velma, I’ve got it now –“
“Hey, look, there’s Screwy up ahead!” Shaggy spared the group from the rest of Roger’s ruminations.

“Maybe he’s found something?” Daphne observed.

“Let’s go!” Fred led the group trotting up the path to Screwy-Doo’s observation point.

In the shack, Baron Otto was running out of arguments to convince Simon Maddocks’ shade to return to Parodyverse reality as the Baron’s indentured tool.

“And besides, we offer terrific benefits. Major medical with only a 50% copay, a pension after only 50 years of continuous service, three days’ time off for major maimings, and two weeks’ vacation time every 10 years.”

“Fugeddabouddit, f***er. I’m going back to the Shaper of Worlds. Maybe she has a gig for me. Hey, Jury, I wannouta here!”

“Nein, wait, wait! Ah! Shrike, before you go, did you know that someone is already impersonating you?

“What! What kind of motherf***ing bastard is doing that? Hey, Otto, is this just another of your little frimping jokes or something?”

“It’s the emess, Shrike. Take a look at this.” The Baron made a complicated incantation and a copy of the Daily Trombone materialized in his hands. “Last week in Gothametropolis York. Someone’s copying your modus operandi, not to mention that garish costume, and passing himself off as you.”

Killer Shrike scanned the article with mounting anger. “***%$&$%$^#$^#^#( ! Nobody passes himself off as me, especially after I’m dead! Who the hell has the micro-cojones to pull off a queer stunt like that, Otto?”

“I can find out,” the Baron replied smoothly in the cultured tones of a movie aristocratic villain, “but you have to do me a favor. Just a small lien on your soul, you’ll hardly miss it, and I’ll have you back to life in five minutes. And I’ll even throw in a line on your cheap duplicate there.”

“Do it, Baron. Nobody steals my identity.”

“Very well. Wait there.” Baron Otto busied himself inscribing pentagrams on the shack’s floor, while humming “Lili Marlene” to himself. As he completed the last one, the four teenagers, Screwy-Doo and Roger Wilton approached the shack.

“What’s that weird light shining out of the windows, Roger?”

“Swamp rot, perhaps? Why don’t you go in and check, Frederick?”

“It looks spooky,” Daphne observed.

“Then it’s gotta be a fake,” Velma declared. “I mean, isn’t this about the three hundredth time we’ve seen eerie glows coming out of buildings, and every time they’re part of some scam. You guys should have figured that out by now.”

“I say, since you’re so sure, Velma, you are the logical one to go investigate, right?

“Why do I always end up doing the investigating?”

“Because you always solve the mystery,” Fred Jones replied. “In 18 years of doing this, do you realize that Daphne and I have never cracked a case?”

“No, you two just go off together and come back at the end looking like a pair of innocents. Sheesh.”

“Oh, I almost forgot. Fred, why don’t we go around back to check things out, hmmmm?”

“O.K. We’ll go around back to look for clues. Shaggy will watch the front, and you’ll go up to the shack and solve the mystery, right, Velma?”

Velma sighed and watched Fred and Daphne head off together. Turning to Roland, she then snapped, “Well, are you coming with me?”

“Isn’t that more of young Shaggy’s remit, Velma? I should stay back here to coordinate, don’t you know. Serve as a point of contact. Eh?”

“Like, didn’t Fred say I should stay here? Besides, I like need to stay with Screwy here. He gets afraid. Right, Screwb? “

“Rats rite. R’I’m rared!” the dog whimpered.

Velma began plodding toward the shack. “Men. It figures. Serves me right for having a male agent. When I get back, I’m calling Virago Creative Management,” Velma groused, looking back. “Go to hell, Roger –“ except that Shaggy and Screwby-Doo were the only ones there. “Ahh, good riddance – you couldn’t even keep my name straight.”

. . .

“Step over there, Herr Maddocks,” Baron Otto commanded, having finished his preparations.
“Fine. But if you screw this up, you two-bit Baron, I’m going to be on your back for the next three eternities.”

“You have nothing to fear, Herr Maddox. You will come back from the dead whole and with all of your faculties.”

“Why the hell would I want to come back with all of my teachers, sauerbraten-breath?”

“All of your senses, I should say. And speech, although you seem to have lost nothing of your . . . unique . . . diction.”

“Blah, blah, blah. I’m in your stupid pentagram, all the candles are lit, go do that voodoo and bring me back, Colonel Klink.”

“Very well. Ignorant peasant. He’s so set on revenge he hasn’t even asked what I will take from him for this ‘favor.’ I now take the venom of a swamp adder mixed with semen of alligator and wolfsbane berries, anoint the altar – so! And begin the incantation:

”Agnoben aratimblus confinctiuram. Halachteli metzublictu purcarflet . . . “ Baron Otto droned on for about a minute, occasionally sprinking incense – or worse —on the candles, until interrupted.

“Not so fast, Herr Baron,” came Roger Wilton’s voice from an open doorway at the rear of the shack.

“Wilton, you nincompoop, what brings you here?” the Baron groused, setting his spell on hold to deal with the interloper.

“To thwart your plans for world domination, Baron, or should I say . . . oops, Baron.”

“I have no plans for world domination, Wilton. I am simply engaged in a consensual – and perfectly legal – necromantic ritual to bring a poor, lost soul back from the dead.”

“So that’s your story, Baron? Perhaps you will change your tune now that I hold your granddaughter captive!” Roger reached backwards and dragged a struggling, gagged Velma into the doorway for Baron Otto to observe.

“My granddaughter? Her? That pathetic kartoffelsack issue of mine? “ The Baron began a long, derisive string of laughter. “Elizabeth, my granddaughter, is in Washington today, you gormless fool!”

Roger Wilton removed Velma’s gag. “You mean you aren’t Elizabeth Zemo, the super-villain?”

“What do you think I’ve been telling you for the last two days, you stupid twit! Now untie me . . . blumph, mgggh, urggh.” Roger had replaced the gag.

“Blimey,” the abashed agent sighed. “And there aren’t any weapons of mass destruction, either?”

“Not a one.”

“Scheme to topple the world economy?”

“Wouldn’t think of it. My stocks are up 18% on the year already.”

“Maybe breaking and entering here?” Roger asked hopefully.

“I’m Madam Dessalines’ guest.”

“Would you cut the comedy routine over there and finish bringing me back, tall, grey and ghoulish? I’ve got an imposter to can.” Killer Shrike’s spirit was getting impatient.

“Very well. Now, all I need is the virgin to sacrifice, and Herr Wilton has taken care of that for us as I foresaw.” Extending his arm, the Baron ensorcelled Velma, causing her to stagger toward the center of the pentagram and the waiting Shrike.

Sehr gut. Now, drop your pants, Herr Maddox, and strip our little sacrificial lamb, hmmm?”

“Wait a sec, Baron. I have to pork her?”

“Either that or kill her. In either case, I cannot harm her; you must take the final step.”

“Wait a minute, I’m thinking.”

Velma was making a rather intense series of grunts, muffled curses and screams while this was going on, but to no avail.

“Groovy, baby!” Roger Wilton exclaimed. “Will it work if I do the shagging instead of him? I mean, I’m just the man for this kind of assignment.” He struck a pose.

Shrike, the Baron and Velma groaned in unison.
“In that case,” Roger blustered, “it’s time to take you in, Zemo. JUDO TOSS!” Wilton charged the Baron, who lightly stepped aside and watched the adenoidal Englishman run directly into a nearby chair, toppling himself and the chair into a tangle.

“Hurry, Maddox, the candles are burning low. We have little time.”

“Hey. Velma, are you in there?” Shaggy’s quavering voice came through the front door.

“Maddox, do it – her – whatever!”

“Aw, *&$&&^*%$, I’m not going to enjoy it.”

“Quit whining , when you’re back, you can pick up a couple of Visionary’s playthings!”

“You promise, Baron?”

As Simon Maddox’s shade began removing Velma’s pants, several things happened. Roger Wilton removed himself from the chair and stumbled toward the rear door. Meanwhile, Fred and Daphne arrived at the rear of the shack.

“Maybe there’s a place to wash up in here, Sugar,” Fred suggested.

“I hope so. This swamp was about the ickiest place I’ve ever done it with you, Freddy darling.”
“
Fred and Daphne shoved the door open into the shack just as the disoriented Roger veered into its path. The impact knocked Roger toward Shrike, who had just finished undressing the squirming Velma. The defrosted agent tripped, colliding with Shrike’s astral derriere. For a millisecond, an unnamed portion of Simon Maddox’s being passed between two intimate elements of Velma’s.

“Aha! Success!” the Baron crowed, watching the scene. “Finitus e----“

However, in the next millisecond, the now more tangible Killer Shrike was propelled by Roger’s follow-up pratfall out of the pentagram before the final syllable was uttered. As he left the mystic bounds, the Avian Assassin vanished. The Baron screamed.

“Hey, like what’s going on here?” Shaggy inquired, bursting through the front door.

Infuriated, Baron Ottokar Zemo intoned the traditional curse: “It would have worked, worked, if it weren’t for you meddling kids!”
> > >

As the Zemo Zeppelin approached Washington, Silicone Sally had some worries.

“You may not have anything to worry about this meta-registration bill, but I do. What are we going to do about it? Register? Hide? Get a waiver?”

“Sally, calm down. I’m going to do what any Zemo would do. Cheat.”




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