Parodyverse Team-Up #2: The Naked Truth - Tales of the Parodyverse

When we last left our intrepid heroes (well, one hero and one disguised villainess), they had been lured into a deathtrap by Princess Annar of the Skunks, Bride of the Parodymaster.

Oh, and they were naked. That bit probably shouldn't be understated...

"I hope you're happy..." Citizen Z growled from across the pitch black room, grunting as she tried to hold the closing wall at bay.

"Not really" Visionary admitted, leaning against the opposing wall and trying to gain traction with his bare feet. "As far as naked times go, this is probably one of the least happy ones I've had." The wall ground on relentlessly. "Plus, if you really are Messenger without that suit and I'm about to be pressed naked into you, then this is probably also the scariest."

Citizen Z cursed. "If only you had sprung the trap yourself, I'd still be outside and fully equipped with all I'd need."

"You had a plan for getting me out of here with your Z-stuff?"

"I had a plan" she answered darkly.

"Well, pushing on the walls doesn't seem to be much of a back-up idea" the Regular grunted, his feet squeaking on the smooth floor.

Citizen Z's voice was strained as well. "Didn't Dr. Moo just give you a new body? Surely you asked for an upgrade to super-strength, or laser eyes, or something... Anything that would make you moderately less useless!"

"Hey now... no need to get testy" Visionary grumbled. "Whatever you had planned, we're in this together now, so..." He paused. "Hey, wait... that's it! The escape hatch has to be somewhere where only two people working together can reach it!"

"Don't be an idiot" she snapped. "Why does there have to be any escape hatch at all?"

"Because you said it yourself... This is but the first of a series of traps!" Visionary answered. "This one wasn't sprung until it involved two people. We're supposed to get out of the first one, and maybe the second one, and then maybe the third... That's the whole point."

"Please... Adding a hatch that can be opened from within the trap is moronic."

"That's villainy" Visionary replied. "I mean, if the skunk girl had wanted us dead quick, then why not just shoot us in the head?"

He heard her pause in her struggles. "Just... shoot you?" she asked, considering this. "In the head."

"Well, us... yeah" the Regular said, unsure of her reaction. "I mean, neither of us are bullet proof... we can't see a damn thing right now, so we're pretty easy targets. It'd be easier than dumping us into a disguised trash compactor and letting it slowly crush us."

"Just shoot you" she repeated. "Maybe dump your body into the river. The Legion would never know what really happened."

"Er... Us, yeah." Visionary agreed. "Luckily, it never seems to occur to them. I guess when it comes right down to it, villains just aren't very bright."

"Wait..." she replied dangerously, drawing the words out, "You... Visionary... a man who needs his fingers numbered in ink to count to ten... are suggesting that criminal masterminds are... Not... Very... Bright." She drew a deep breath with a snarl. "Oh, great and wise Legionnaire, from up on high your mountain of heroic knowledge, you look down upon those who meticulously plan every detail, painstakingly gather the resources, and finally execute scenarios of exquisite deception and... and... malevolent finesse with surpassing skill, patience, work ethic, and, oh yes... Quiet Genius... and you somehow manage to find the time to disparage their intellects through your gaping, stupid cruller hole full of fried dough? Yes, I can just see you sitting there on your throne of all knowing fakeness, alternating between embarrassing, half-baked prattle on saccharine cliche's about the measure of a person and kvetching about which fake/alien/dead/mutant/green bimbo you're going to be boinking next... Probably all while filling the Crossword answers into the Sudoku puzzle of the Daily Trombone that somebody else was going to play and had set aside quiet time specifically to do so when she wasn't squeezed into a costume like a sausage into natural casing! And, oh yes... We can't forget the important work you do of occasionally hiding under your desk from your obnoxious, flame-wielding, juvenile delinquent ward who you've done such an excellent job of raising that she's enthusiastically and noisily banging the Hooded Hood's son right under your clueless, idiotic, OH MY GOD I WANT TO JUST SMASH IT IN nose!!!"

Visionary blinked and wiped some spittle off of his face. "Um..." he noted diplomatically and oh-so-carefully, what with her hands wrapped around his throat. "Is your back still pressed up against your wall?"

"..." Citizen Z paused. "Oh crap."

"Wait..." he added. "What was that about Kerry?"

There was the grinding shudder of gears and with a sudden mechanical screech the walls stopped moving, leaving the heroes trapped within a narrow three foot hallway between them.

"Oh" Visionary noted. "Well, hey... that could have been much..."

A new metallic grinding sound rang out from the far ends of the room as sections of the last two walls began to close in on them now.

"Well, yeah..." Visionary sighed. "That would figure, wouldn't it? At least the new ones didn't add..."

*SNIKT*

"...spikes or anything."

"How is it you haven't at least died in a friendly fire incident by this point?" Citizen Z snarled acidly.

"People generally really like me" Visionary offered pleasantly. "Ack... Z?.. neck... choking..."

"Oops" she noted flatly, although it seemed like it took more than a moment for her grip to relax. Visionary gasped for breath while she let out a frustrated sigh. "Fine... It looks like I'll have to bow to your experience in the hero game. You are the old one here. So where's this escape hatch we need to open?"

"Um..." the Regular answered quickly. "I'm really not that old, actually. It's just that my hairline kinda makes it look..."

"The hatch, Visionary."

"Yeah..." he answered, running out of stalling techniques. Time to display some deductive reasoning. "Okay, doors needing multiple people to open them. Right. Well, it could be above us, where only someone standing on another's shoulder's could reach. Or maybe the floor has a hidden trapdoor that needs the weight of two people, or at least a rather fat single person, to trigger it. Or there was that one time when Dr. Loveray captured Finny and Dancer and others, and the only way to escape his Love Rocket was to... Um..." He swallowed as he considered that last option. "That's probably not the case here" he assured her.

"Indeed" she agreed levelly. "I promise you, Mr. Visionary... you have nothing that would trigger a release for me." She took a deep breath in the darkness, and he could hear her clap her hands and rub them together. "Fine. Grab me by the waist and boost me up, and I'll see what I can find."

"Um... yes... okay" he replied nervously, pushing the Love Rocket thing well out of his mind and reviewing baseball stats. Aware of the warmth of her nude form and the skill at which she had demonstrated in incapacitating a man in the past, Visionary follow her directions very carefully. Placing one hand on each side of her waist to hoist her, he suddenly paused, confused, and rechecked his grip.

"What?" she asked dangerously, with a touch of defensiveness.

"Nothing... you're just more... um... I just expected, from what I've seen of you..." He swallowed hard, feeling her eyes burning through him despite the complete darkness. "Er... Nothing."

"Any time you're ready then" she growled.

"Urf!" Visionary exclaimed, hoisting her above himself and reshifting his hand holds. "Careful!" Visionary groaned. "Quit moving around up there before I..."

She shifted her weight, forcing him to scramble to catch her in the dark... a maneuver which elicited a rather undignified squeal from above. "Hey! Watch the hands!"

"Er... sorry, sorry..." Visionary replied, blushing furiously. "I, um... was losing my grip. Honest. I need a steady place to hold on to if we're going to boost you any higher..."

"There is not an option!" she warned him. "Here... let me help" she offered instead, bringing her foot down painfully into his collarbone. A second foot smooshed his face sideways as she strained even higher, making them totter sideways until she had one arm braced against the stationary wall. "There actually is something here on the ceiling... I think I can get out! I'm going to make a jump for it..."

"Wait..." Visionary grunted, his knees beginning to tremble. "Ehn... Will you be able to reach me to pull me out too?"

"On the count of three... One..."

Visionary staggered back and forth, trying to maintain his balance. "I'm not set!... Wait..." The grinding noise of the closing side walls was growing unnervingly loud.

"Two..." she called, resetting her foot on the top of his head with determination.

"Ack!" Visionary noted, stumbling.

"Thr...eeeep!" she called as he dropped out from under her suddenly. The two tumbled through the darkness with equally alarmed cries until they came crashing to the ground together in an ungainly heap. Above them came a crushing, rending sound as the spiked wall segments of the room they had just been in came together, showering down enough sparks to illuminate the hole in the floor that they had fallen through.

Visionary groaned as the mechanics above finally came to a crashing halt, and even the dim light of the sparks faded, leaving them in complete blackness once again. "Ouch" he coughed. "Huh. I guess that one was the trapdoor in the floor with the trigger that needed a lot of weight to... um... Not that you were exceptionally... Um..." He swallowed as he reached to help her off of him and then realized exactly which parts of her he was helping with. "You're definitely not Messenger" he said carefully.

"Thanks for noticing..." she answered sarcastically, her face somewhere over his own. She shifted her weight, then paused. "That had better be a gun in your pocket."

He blushed again in the darkness. "Here, let me just..."

"Oh no... I got it" she replied, disengaging herself with a shove. If her knee jabbed into any sensitive parts of his anatomy in the process, it was surely all accidental. "Well... you definitely didn't ask for any upgrades" she noted smugly as she stood and brushed herself off.

Wincing, Visionary climbed to his feet as well. "Maybe we should just go back to exploring opposite sides of the room" he muttered.

"But this is such a lovely chance to get to know each other better..." she mocked as she nonetheless moved to explore the confines of their latest chamber. "I mean, now that I've had the opportunity to take the measure of you. As a leader, I mean." She sniffed disdainfully as she explored. "I kept hearing over and over how impressive it was that you manage to keep up with such extraordinary partners, trying to do so much with so little. Now I know what the rest of the team meant by that."

He bristled in the darkness as he felt along the steel wall. "Look, you put any guy naked into a room where spiked walls are going to crush him, and he might be a little, um... shy."

"Well, I admire your optimism in thinking that was all it was" she continued. "I mean, certainly with that Hallie program I would think you'd have fears about, well... coming up a little shy."

"Wait... what about Hallie?" he asked dangerously.

Her voice took on an exaggerated innocence. "Isn't that whom you're linked to romantically? That's the scuttlebutt around the mansion, at least."

"We haven't even been on a date yet" Visionary replied defensively. "Well, I mean... we have, but it was a long time ago, and we've... forgotten parts of it."

She clucked sympathetically. "That bad, eh?"

"No! It's just... she's a really dear friend, and I..." He sighed. "I think about her all the time, any more. I'm just... she's so close to being..." He hung his head and rubbed the back of his neck. "I can't risk screwing it up... not now. I can't risk losing what we have, so when I take the plunge... things have to go perfectly. She deserves for things to go perfectly."

"Yes, fine..." Citizen Z answered in a slightly bored tone. "I'm sure she has many admirable qualities beyond letting you fulfill the answer to CrazySugarFreakBoy's oh-so-delightful "Which cartoon character would you most like to screw?" quiz." She paused as a thought occured to her. "She doesn't take on the holographic image of others on the team when you two have sex, does she?"

"What? She would never..." Visionary sputtered. "We don't have sex."

"Not ever?"

"We haven't even kissed! Well, we have... but..."

She coughed delicately. "And, ah... this is among the things that you're hoping will go perfectly, are you? Your first time together?"

He sniffed defensively. "What of it?"

"You're not at all worried? How very brave. I mean, in light of your own shortcomings, of course" the newest Legionnaire rattled off. "I mean, here she is, with her only sexual experiences coming at the hands... and other parts... of a man named "Mr. Epitome", who by all government accounts is literally that in all aspects from training, stamina, perseverance, physique and girth..."

"Well, she... Waitaminute. Girth?" Visionary paused. Perhaps he should have taken more than a cursory look at the information on the www.epitome.gov page. He swallowed hard. "I'm sure that's all in the past."

"Of course. But then, that's the thing about artificial intelligence, isn't it? Photographic recall, and all of that. Why, I'd imagine she could even replay old memories over and over and over again. Or even play them while she was doing something else... But then, I'm sure women never think of someone else while they're enjoying another man's attentions... or even go so far as to fake orgasms." She paused thoughtfully. Hmmm... if she simply replayed an actual orgasm she achieved with your teammate while you and her were in coitus together, then would it still count as fake? I don't know... you're the expert in that department... what do you think?"

The Regular was about to snarl back a reply when his hand closed over a cold metal handle along the wall, causing him to blink in surprise. "I... I think I found a door!" he called out, opening it to find more inky blackness inside.

"Yes, I found one on this wall a while ago" she answered. "You were babbling about perfect love at the time, and I thought it would be rude to interrupt."

Visionary ground his teeth but kept any comment to himself. "So which door should we take?"

"You're the expert... I thought your advice was to play along with the game to get out of here. Two doors, two people... obviously we split up."

He hesitated. "Maybe it would be safer to stick together..." he argued.

"Oh, good..." she answered with a sharp smile in her voice. "We can talk more about your relationships."

"Then again, it wouldn't do to pass up a perfectly good alternative route..."

"It's settled then" she answered brightly, the sound of her own door swinging wide. "Be sure to scream loudly when you invariably wander into your next catastrophic and fatal mistake. I'll definitely want to hear it." There was an audible click as she shut it behind her.

With a scowl, Visionary exited through his own door. "Be sure to scream loudly..." he mimicked bitterly. "Gee, I wonder why you haven't made many friends in your time with the Legion." His feet padded along a cool hallway, about five feet wide, judging by his initial exploration. He wandered along with his hands held out in front of him, his ears straining in vain for a sound in the darkness. The complete lack of sound was, itself, unnerving. "It still beats her running commentary" he told himself out loud, just to hear something. He paused as he suddenly realized that her voice had sounded different without her costume... Somehow familiar, yet he couldn't quite place it. Maybe she wasn't a complete stranger after all, (even if she wasn't Messy...)

He sighed as he began to feel slightly guilty for the bitter thoughts he had been having. He was supposed to be the experienced one on this mission... Obviously, things weren't going as well as one could have hoped. Being dumped naked into a deathtrap was bound to make anyone rather snippy. Hell, half the team behaved worse when they didn't get their morning coffee fix... "She was just nervous" he realized with a sigh. "You can't really hold it against her that being put in an embarrassing, dangerous situation would make her all defensive. Plus, she's obviously more comfortable as a hero with her suit and her gadgets... Here she is, still trying to prove herself on the team, and she ends up fumbling along helplessly in the dark, looking as foolish as... um... me." He cleared his throat and wished he hadn't quite said that last part out loud, in case the Skunk girl was listening. As if she didn't know how foolish he looked at this point. "I guess I really just needed to see things from her perspective. Walk a mile in her..."

There was a flash that left him blinded, even as he ducked and rolled, covering his head from the whirling sawblades he knew must be extending from the walls. When no spinning, bladed death diced him into julian fries he opened one eye, squinting and blinking in the now well lit room. The hallway had ended in a circular chamber with multiple doors lining the walls and a large iron gate which had crashed down, blocking the way he had come. In the center of the room was situated a large, person-sized glass display tube, the kind that only super-villains and heroes with a lot of free space in their secret lairs tended to buy. More importantly, inside the trophy case, and under tastefully positioned lighting, stood the complete Citizen Z costume.

In the glaring light of the room, Visionary had ample time to consider his complete lack of pants. "Well..." he decided, opening the case, "At least she doesn't dress like Lisa..."

to be continued by HH

Post By Visionary Tue Feb 06, 2007 at 01:02:01 am EST	Subject Parodyverse Team-Up #2: The Naked Truth

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