Tales of the Parodyverse

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killer shrike
Sat Sep 16, 2006 at 02:03:49 am EDT
Subject
Twenty Questions
Originally
Welcome Home, part one of a still-expanding collaboration
In Reply To

by Visionary, Dancer and Al B. Harper
Thu Sep 14, 2006 at 08:37:48 am EDT
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Twenty Questions


“Mr. Epitome! Just the person I was looking for,” Dancer bustled into the kitchen with two small children caught in her frenetic wake, “Well, to be wholly truthful, I was looking for Vizh. Then Hallie. Then Hatty or Dream. Lisa. Then Donar. Yuki. Then that exploding hippo man. But they’re all busy, so it was down to Flapjack or yourself, and I flipped a coin, and here we are!”

Dominic Clancy, seated at the counter in civilian clothes, finished chewing the last of his linguicia grinder, “May I help you?” he asked, anticipating the worst.

He would get it: “Can you watch Maggie and Griff for a few minutes? I have a very important phone call to make and, uh, it’s liable to turn a bit Certificate 18, to borrow a phrase.”

If it weren’t for the presence of two impressionable adolescents the Star Spangled Splendor’s response would have required such a designation as well, “I don’t think-“

“Oh, I know: you worry this is going to turn out like all my other dates, where the man just toys with my emotions and casts me aside like a day old newspaper. But this time things will be different. I have a good feeling about Elihu.”

“That’s not-“

“Thanks!” the fit young woman in the peach leotard bent down to embrace the two siblings, “You be good for Mr. Epitome, little ones. He’s the type that’ll make you do sit-ups if you misbehave.”

The Paragon of Power felt his face go flush, “I would never-!” he began to protest.

His prospective charges seemed as reluctant to the proposed arrangement as he. Naari still clung to Dancer’s arm, her dark eyes focusing on the grim-jawed man with the closely shorn hair. Dominic, seeing their reactions, felt chastened. He wiped the mayonnaise from his hands, rose, and offered one of them to the boy, “Hello, Griffin. My name is Mister Epitome.”

The tow-headed youth exchanged greetings with the big man, “Hullo.”

“And, Magweed. It’s good to meet you as well.”

Maggie responded with a curtsey that made Dancer giggle. The Legionnaire bent down and whispered to the girl something Epitome’s enhanced hearing improbably could not make out.

“I’ll be back in a jiff,” Sarah Shepherdson grinned before vanishing.

Dominic was about to ask her what it was the Probability Dancer had said when he noticed out of the corner of his eye Griffin surreptiously sniff his fingers.

“That’s machine oil,” Epitome said, causing the boy to jump a bit, “I uhm, normally don’t smell like this.”

“Why do you smell like machine oil?” Magweed blurted.

“Because some protestors dumped a drum of it on me earlier today,” the Man of Might said darkly.

“Why did they do that?”

Dominic decided it wasn’t necessary to detail the intricacies of Robo-American/human relations and his role in them at this point, especially considering the children’s own parentage. So he answered as judiciously as possible, “They thought I was doing something bad.”

“What did they think you did was bad?” Griffin joined in the questioning.

“The people felt I was making them live somewhere they didn’t want to go.”

“Where?”

Epitome wearily rubbed his face, noting that even after three showers and the scrubbing off of a layer of skin, he still had the odor of a bus station garage, “It’s… sort of another world, where they can be safe from people who want to hurt them.”

“Oh,” Magweed leaned a bit uncomfortably on her game leg. Her brother was at her side with surprising speed, propping her up.

“Would you like to sit?” Dominic gestured to one of the high stools that ringed the kitchen’s island counter.

“Yes, please.”

The American Archetype awkwardly lifted the young girl onto a chair. Griffin hopped up into the seat next to her.

“What did you do to the people who dumped machine oil on you? Did you run them through or cleave them in twain?”

“Run them… why would you…?”

“Aren’t you a knight like our Dad?”

Dominic realized the boy was staring at the logo on his Holy Cross Crusaders jersey.

“No, I’m not a knight,” and I’m certainly not like your father he thought to himself, “This is a symbol of a mascot for a football team I played with.”

“What’s football?”

Relieved to be on a subject where he could fully exhibit his range of knowledge, Dominic’s tone became more at ease, “Football is a game played between two teams of eleven men on a field with goals at each end, in which points are made by carrying the ball across the opponent’s goal line.”

“You carry the ball with your feet?” Griffin said in awe, looking down at the man’s hiking boots, imagining how long his toes must be to accomplish such a thing.

“No, no. You don’t use your feet in real football, unless you’re the place kicker or punter. And they don’t count.”

“Did my Daddy play football?” Magweed spoke up.

“I doubt it,” Epitome muttered, more to himself than the children before him.

“But you know who our father is, though?” Griffin checked.

“Yes. We’re teammates… not football teammates,” the Paragon of Power anticipated Griffin’s next question, “Visionary and I are both part of a metacrisis response, er, super-, ah… we both protect people.”

“Our father saved us from Auntie and the gothemanders and from our old godmother,” Magweed said with some pride, “Did you know that?”

“Yes, I did. Though I imagine he had some help.”

Griffin nodded, “That’s true. We all helped. Even one of our mothers. Do you know our mothers?”

“I know one of them,” Dominic answered, in a voice that seemed very distant and tired.

Before the interrogation could continue the kitchen door swung open and Sarah was back, happily picking up Naari and dancing about the room, “We,” she said, “Are going shopping. Wooster’s is having a sale, and as cute as Vizh’s sweatshirt is on you, a young lady has to find her own look.”

The little girl smiled and hugged the woman who was part of the set of vastly superior godmothers that now watched over her.

“Sorry to learn your date fell through,” Epitome stated with a hint of a smirk

“Oh, why do I need Elihu when I’ve got a little sweetie of a man right here?” Dancer reached out to squeeze Griffin’s cheeks, “You’re coming too, Griff. If you’re going to stay visible we must expand your ensemble’,” she turned her attention to Dominic, “Thank you for watching the kids, Mr. E.”

“You’re welcome.”

“Next time we do this hopefully Glory will be around. I know Maggy and Griff would love to meet her. Glory is Mr. Epitome's talking dog. Isn't that neat?” Sarah explained to the children.

“I thought all dogs talked,” Magweed stated.

“Not here, not on Earth,” Griffin replied somewhat absently.

“Griffin’s correct. Glory is a very special dog.”

Dancer caught the edge in the big man’s voice, “I’m sure she and the other Juniors are fine, Dominic.”

“Of course she is,” the Man of Might agreed, busing his plate and glass to the sink, “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a mission report to file.”

Sarah waited until Epitome was gone before noting, “He normally doesn’t smell like that.”

“We know. He told us about the machine oil,” Griffin reported.

“And what else did you two learn about the mysterious Mr. Epitome, hm?” Dancer asked as she looked into Magweed’s deep, luminous eyes..

The formerly destined designate to the throne of the Many Colored Realms considered, “I think, he is very serious about doing what’s right. And that he can be very scary if you get him mad.”

“True enough,” the Probability Dancer nodded as she whisked her wards away for a whirlwind shopping excursion.

“We made him nervous, I think,” Magweed confessed softly.

“You probably did,” Sarah agreed again.

“Why would we make him nervous?” Griffin said as he trudged along next to her.

That was the question.



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