Baron Zemo's Lair. - <font color="lightslategrey" face="Lucida Sans Unicode">The Hooded Hood Chronicles #13: The Hooded Hood and the Day of the Sentinoids</font>

Baron Zemo's Lair

The Hooded Hood Chronicles #13: The Hooded Hood and the Day of the Sentinoids
Friday, 03-Dec-1999 15:08:04
195.92.194.105 writes:

The Hooded Hood Chronicles #13: The Hooded Hood and the Day of the Sentinoids

Special Security Report from Dan Drury, Director of SPUD (Super-menace Principal Undercover Directorate) to the Chief Executive:

Lissen up, Mr President. We’ve activated those fershluginner Sentinoids and sent them out to bring in all known superheroes. Now I think this is a real bozo idea, but hey, half a billion idiots didn’t vote fer me to be in charge so I’m just gonna do the job,.

Yeah, yeah. I know that Jarvis, Lisa, and that PR suit came into your office and demanded that you hand over half the world to them, but if it wuz me I’d’ve checked a few things out before eradicating the joes what have saved the planet more times than you’ve had secretaries under yer desk. Fer instance, I’d’ve checked to see whut Zemo, my old sparrin’ buddy from the Big One, was up to, and if this wasn’t another of his scams.

On the other hand, Paradopolis is kinds reminding me of Berlin 1945 just now, so maybe we really should be bringing the Legion down. Jarvis claims that the LL wuz actually fighting that big rocky thing, not siccin’ it on the public, but so far we’ve had a dozen witness reports that the Legion was eggin’ it on and tellin’ it what to do. The Yurt has vanished now and all we’ve got to show fer it is some Russkie guy what we arrested cause his purple pants fell down. He’s locked away in one of the holding wagons right now, and he keeps tellin’ us not to make him angry.

Anyways, we’re about to send the Sentinoids in to take out the Lair Legion, so I hope the eggheads put them together better than they did with that Visionary project.

Drury out. Wa-hooo!

“Arrested? I’m being arrested?”
“That’s right, ma’am. On charges of treason and extortion.”
Cheryl frowned and tried her best sensible look on the FBI agents that were all pointing large calibre weapons in her direction. “This is something to do with my husband, isn’t it?” she asked dangerously.
“Just come quietly, ma’am. Don’t make us use the mace.”
There were two other women in the paddy wagon. “Hi, Cheryl,” Lisa greeted her. Tina fumed in silence.
“What the hell is going on here,” Visionary’s wife demanded as they shut the adamantium door after her with relief.
“It’s the idiot Lair Legion,” Tina spat. “They’ve apparently tried to take over the planet or something. Wait until I get Jamie…”
“That’s not fair,” Lisa protested. “Nobody in the Legion has conquered anything since Jarvis took over Japan briefly, and that was months and months ago. And they claim that you and I were with Jarvis at the White House making the threats, Cheryl.”
There were sounds from outside. “They’ve got Zebulon,” Tina sensed. “They’re putting him in a separate container. It’s being sent to… the Area 51 Dissection Center.”
“They’re probably confused by the ears,” Lisa judged.
“I have just two questions,” Cheryl announced. “What are we going to do about all of this, and how did Visionary cause it?”

You can probably picture a sentinoid. It’s fifteen feet tall, purple and gold and metallic, with really big guns for arms. It talks with amazing skill for a cybernetic creature, and has been programmed to go “ZAAARHHHHKKK!” when it is chopped in two by adamantium claws or laser blasts of whatever.
Fixed that in your mind? Good. Now picture two hundred of them, rising up over the shattered remnants of the St Aloysius’ orphanage in the shattered remnants of Slumtown, Paradopolis. And imagine them all pointing those arm-cannons which can shatter steel at a quarter of a mile right at the Lair Legion and demanding that they surrender or die.
Of course, the Legion didn’t need to stretch their imaginations, because they were there, surrounded by the two hundred robotic guardians of humankind against the superhero menace. “Um, is there another choice, please?” Rocket Raccoon asked politely.
Jarvis measured up his forces. Sersi, Hatman, and Space Ghost were missing in action. More or less ready to fight were Starseed, Fin Fang Foom, Banjoooo and Rocket Racoon. CrazySugarFreakBoy! was ready to fight once he could get that building off him. NTU-150 would be fine once he could unhook himself from all that equipment he was currently soldered into. The Dark Knight had somehow melted away into the shadows. Messenger was still alive but was busy burbling to himself that he didn’t want to go to school today.
And Donar? Donar was halfway through his fifth Sentinoid. “Vile armoured varlets, taste ye now the power of Mjalcom!”
“OK. So no negotiated settlement,” Jarvis noted.
The Sentinoids fired. At Jarvis. Who wasn’t there.
“I thought Jarvis just said he had no powers?” puzzled Rocket Racoon, taking refuge behind a pile of ex-orphanage (which is not, by the way, another mutant title, at least not until next month).
“When he’s being asked to go up against a radioactive Russian peasant hut, then he’s got no powers,” Fin Fang Foom explained. “When he’s being fired on by two hundred robot policemen…”
“One hundred eighty,” Donar corrected, happily.
“By one hundred and eighty robot policemen, then he’s got powers,” Foom responded.
“It’s not like that,” Jarvis argued, using those power blasts he didn’t have to cut another Sentinoid in half. “It’s just that the Yurt was composed of… of Jarvinite. Yeah. Jarvinite. It robs me of my powers. Well known. Ask anyone.”
Banjoooo was less than happy. “They’re firing on me!” he shouted, which was pretty obvious given that he was a seventy-five foot tall sea-monkey and the visual effects budget on his part of the fight alone would have bankrupted Industrial Light and Magic. “On me! I’m a king. I’ve got diplomatic immunity!” He swiped up a Sentinoid and used it to hammer three more sentinoids into the ground. “Me! Peace-loving monarch of a peace-loving nation! I’ll smash the lot of them, cheeky sods!”
The barrage had achieved some effect though. The building on top of CrazySugarFreakBoy! was completely pulverised. “Up, up, and away!” CSFB! shouted, bouncing between two more of the robotic enforcers using the classic get-them-to-shoot-each-other manoeuvre so beloved of athletic superhero-types.
“Hey look guys, if you undo this little nut on their shoulder-packs their jet-units go completely out of control!” NTU-150 pointed out. CrazySugarFreakBoy! and Rocket Racoon promptly declared a contest.
“Gaah! If this is the best you can do, you’d better start drafting us the formal apology now!” Starseed shouted as he ripped two more of the attackers into scrap metal. The Supreme GAAAHHH reckoned that now that he’d worked out the rhythm he could do about three of the robots a minute.
Dan Drury, agent of SPUD, lit his cigar on the burning remains of a sentinoid. “OK, you yahoos. No more Mister Nice Spy,” he promised. He spoke into his lapel badge. “Bring on the main force.”
And the other eight hundred sentinoids decloaked.

Andde downe beneath ye surface, beneath the greatest cittie of mannekinde, there dwelleth ye loathesome and terrible That Whiche Writhes Beneath, the blinde multi-tentacled Groper Out of Grossness, Shab’adabba’Dhu. Wake ye not the Groper, lest all mannekinde suffer from the wakening of the Cosmic Outer Orbit Tenacities (COOTs) which were olde when ye Parodyverse was as yette unbornne.

The Necronotticonn, vol II: The Slime Strikes Backke.

“This is giving me so many bad date flashbacks!” Sersi complained as the writhing tentacles of the terrible Elder Beastie grasped out at her.
“I wish I could say that!” Space Ghost replied, trying to gather together his neophyte Gaahh! Power since his spank ray was buried somewhere in all that slime and he would rather have tried to get the soap out of John Byrne’s bathtub that dive down and try and find it in that gunge.
Hatman desperately fished around inside his sodden costume tunic for a headpiece which might resolve the awakening of Shab’adabba’Dhu. “OK. There’s only one chance,” he said as Sersi was hurled against a standard-issue non-Euclidean Cyclopean column. “We’ve got to get that thing back to sleep.”
“Right. A nice lullaby, maybe?” Space Ghost suggested facetiously, still trying to keep away those lesser tentacles which were trying to worm their way up the inside of his costume trousers.
“Good idea, SP,” Hatman agreed, pulling out a DJ’s mixmaster cap… which he put on with the brim facing backwards. He crossed his arms and stuck his hands under his armpits.
“If you say ‘Homey’ or ‘Bro’ I’m going to kill you myself,” Space Ghost warned.
“We’ve got to get this thing back to sleep. We just need some music,” Hatman argued. He twisted something at the side of his cap and the distinctive sound of Karaoke echoed around the vast, desolate vault.
The Groper out of Grossness paused in its relentless quest to devour and seemed to listen.
“It’s working!” Sersi exclaimed, pulling herself back into her costume. Then, thinking better of it, she molecularly altered her outfit to create an entirely new costume altogether. Her view was that there was no crisis so dire that a new ensemble wouldn’t help. “Crank up the volume, grandmaster,”
Space Ghost suddenly regretted all those times he’d laughed at Starseed and Visionary over the International Incident Karaoke event. “You’re not going to… sing, are you?” he begged Hatman, as the strains of Aggadu pounded his eardrums.
“Too busy keeping this stuff coming,” Hatman explained, desperately hoping that the laws of common sense wouldn’t catch up with this bizarre extrapolation of his power to assume the abilities of whatever person he wore the hat of.
“No problem,” Sersi promised, breaking into a perfect alto, “…push pineapple shake that tree…”
Shab’addaba’Dhu suddenly heaved in betentacled fury, a dozen bloodshot eyes the size of Japanese compact cars blinking open.
“Stop it!” Hatman called. “You’re too harmonious! It needs sanity-mangling discord to lull it to sleep.”
“Your department, Space Ghost,” Sersi judged. “Sing.”
“I can’t!” the tone-deaf hero protested. “I never sing.”
“You do all the time when you’re drunk,” Hatman argued.
The Groper twitched ever closer to full awakeness.
“Here,” Sersi prompted, concentrating and manufacturing a bottle of something green and alcoholic. “Swallow this. Quickly.”
It took half the bottle before Space Ghost realised that he was a pretty good singer, dammit, and he could show these phili… phlitti… phlottistines a thing of too, hic. And he sang. Hatman quickly modulated his accompaniment since Space Ghost launched into another song entirely. Sersi concentrated on keeping the alcohol coming as the inebriated sometimes-Legionnaire saved the world with his rendition of ‘Feelings’
Sersi began to realise that she might well need some of that alcohol herself.

“Four of a kind,” smirked the Voyeur. The fact that he was sitting cross-legged in nothing but his boxers in a pile of snow in a back-alley in Hell, Nebraska did not seem to affect the ten-foot tall bald former Observer.
spiffy, on the other hand, was chattering as badly as a sorority schoolgirl who’s just seen Betty-Lou Baker in the back of a Chevy with the Captain of the Football Team. He too was down to his last undergarment, and after that he had a nasty feeling that the Voyeur might want to play for forfeits. But just this once he had the last laugh. “R-read them and weep,” he shivered, laying his royal flush onto the turned-up beer crate that served as a card table.
The Voyeur frowned. He had even been using his ability to look at things from odd angles to make sure that he knew what was in spiffy’s hand. So where had that flush come from?
“I win,” spiffy declared. “Pay up and get em’ off.” Somehow it didn’t sound as good as it had before in spiffy’s imagination. Then again, there had always been a girl involved in the game when it played in spiffy’s head.
The Voyeur flexed his blubbery hands and prepared to drop the boxers.
“Unless…” said spiffy quickly, “You want to go for double or nothing.”
“What do you mean?” the Voyeur asked. He was wondering how it had come to this, playing naked cards with a dead superhero in a pointless netherworld, detailed to observe this futile mortal on the grounds that only he would do nothing of interest in the conflict which was now being played.
“Here’s the deal. You told me that my old Lair Legion buddies are being chewed up and spat out by some guy called the Hooded Hood, right? And as far as anybody knows he wins, ‘cause he’s got the power to retcon out any version where he doesn’t, yeah? But nobody expects me to do anything, and that might be enough to turn the tide. So I’ve got to try and get back to the Legion and help out.”
“That’s not possible,” the Voyeur argued.
“Well, I’m guessing that you could do something, even if it’s only temporary. So if I win the next hand, you get me out of here to one of my buddies so’s I can pitch in. Deal?”
“And if you lose?” leered the blubbery Voyeur…

From the Chronicles of the Cosmic, compiled by the High Order of Galactic Observers:
And it came to pass that the destroyer of worlds, the Living Death that Sucks, the creature known only in whispered legend as Galactivac descended upon the world of the Yo-beings. None could say him nay. Yet thereupon Yo-beings, entities of pure thought energy, didst appear before Galactivac and sayeth unto him, “Please to stop eating our planet, you uncute ugly person”.
Thus did Galactivac unleash the greatest of his heralds, the Cyan Cyclist, to descend upon the Yo-world and take the measure of the beings that he was about to eradicate. And there the Cyan Cyclist met with the being called Yo, who spake unto him and said, “Hello. Do you like bunnies?”

“Um. Bunnies?”
“Yes,” Yo smiled, indicating the fluffy little creatures who were enjoying an idyllic existence on the lush green imaginary meadows of the Yo-world. “Nobody can be not liking bunnies. They are so cute.”
The Cyan Cyclist parked his cosmic all-terrain velocipede and looked down at the rabbits. “What purpose do they serve?”
“They are to be making people happy,” Yo explained, hugging a random surprised bunny. “Are they not be making you happy, strange herald person?”
The Cyan Cyclist looked tragic and stared away into the Buscema-style cosmic skies. “Happiness is forever denied the herald of… Galactivac.”
Yo held out the bunny. “Don’t be sad, planet-destroying monster. Here, stroke this cute bunny. It will be making you feel so much better, Yo promises.”
The Cyclist idly rubbed the rabbit between it’s long floppy ears. Suddenly his eyes widened. “I do feel better,” he admitted.
Yo had always believed that he would. “It is because bunnies are so cute and nice. Now you are not to be hurting Yo-planet or you will make bunnies unhappy.”
The Cyan Cyclist was holding the rabbit up and staring at it’s little, twitchy nose. “It… it reminds me of the life I once lived… before my days as herald to Galactivac… those happy, mortal days before I sacrificed myself…”
Yo smiled contentedly. He/she like to help fellow sentients on the road to true enlightenment.
“It… it reminds me…”
“Go on, marauding herald person,” Yo prompted.
“It is so like my lost love, Shagga-Bal!”
Yo snatched the rabbit back. “Bad person!” he chided. “Yo does not think that is what for reason you should be liking bunnies!”
“I must save this world!” the Cyan Cyclist decided. “I must find a way to defeat my master the Living Death that Sucks!”
“Now you are talking,” Yo agreed. “But you are still not to be taking naughty liberties with bunnies,” Yo added sternly.
“I must distract Galactivac,” the Cyclist declared. “You must escape with these dear, wonderful creatures.”
“Yo promises,” Yo promised.
“To me, my velocipede!”
At speeds comparable only to how quickly a meter warden appears when you have parked for just two seconds, honestly, and I never even saw the hydrant, the Cyan Cyclist blurred away to engage the terrible Galactivac…that a bunny may live!
The Living Death that Sucks had almost drained the last of the Yo-beings protective barrier. The planet lay undefended before him. And then suddenly the cosmic vacuum cleaner was interrupted as he was rear-ended by a warp-speed bicycle.
“Quickly, Yo-friends!” Yo rallied his people whilst Galactivac was distracted. “Think! Think happy thoughts!”
And the entire Yo-planet shimmered and vanished away into the Happy Place. Dour, humourless Galactivac could never follow it there.
“They escaped!” the Cyan Cyclist exalted. “I won!” Then he noticed that Galactivac was looking rather pissed. “Um, this is where you exile me to a single, pitiful mudball planet, never to roam again the glorious wonders of the spaceways, isn’t it?” he said forlornly.
“No,” the Living Death that Sucks replied, in a really teed-off voice. Then there was a sort of splatting noise. One bent bicycle wheel span off in space. “This is where I squish you to death,” Galactivac explained.

“The Yo planet escaped!” VelcroVixen complained, watching the whole episode through the Portal of Pretentiousness at Herringscarp Asylum. “They got away safely into the Happy Place!”
“Of course they did,” the Hooded Hood replied, turning away from the vast mirror and striking a shadowed pose. “The intention was never to destroy the Yo-people. Merely to remove them from the equation for the nonce. By the time they are able to return from the Happy Place victory will be mine. They will return to a universe where every thought – including theirs – will be dictated by the Hooded Hood.”
The cowled crime-czar listened to the booming of a majestic grandfather clock. “Ah,” he smiled to himself. “Time for my next appointment.”

Lisa, Cheryl, and Tina looked up as the door to the mobile special powers containment wagon opened again and another young woman was bundled inside. This one was unfamiliar to them all. She also seemed baffled and a little alarmed at being seized by armed security forces, placed in power-dampening shackles, and hurled into an adamantium paddy wagon.
“Um hello,” Tina ventured as the vehicle sped away to its rendezvous with the SPUD helicarrier.
The newcomer looked at the three Legionnaire women suspiciously. “Hello,” she said guardedly.
Lisa was trying to work out which supertype this might be. It wasn’t Cobra or Pegasus or Sorceress or Gurl; so who was it? “What are you in for?” she asked, her legal instincts automatically cutting in.
The young woman shrugged. It was clear that she was uncomfortable in the handcuffs.
“First time chained up?” Lisa asked sympathetically. “Don’t worry. After a while you get to kinda like it.”
“Speak for yourself,” scowled Cheryl.
“I know you two,” the newcomer realised. “They talked about you on the TV news. You’re the ones who threatened the President. You wanted to rule the planet.”
Lisa denied this. “Mistaken identity. It’s my sister who wants to rule the planet. And there’s hardly a family resemblance. Well, not from the neck up, anyway.”
“There’s something very weird going on here,” Tina declared. “All those SPUD people really do believe what they’re saying about the Legion. They do think that we intended to conquer the planet.”
“Framing the heroes never works,” Lisa said confidently. “If I know Jarvy, he’ll be out there now sorting it all out and getting everything back to status quo. We always manage it. Hell, we even got the moon back – eventually.”
“That still doesn’t explain why you’re here, though,” Cheryl told the newcomer. “What powers do you have? What did you do?”
The young woman looked blank. “I don’t have powers. I don’t know anyone with powers… except…”
“Except?” Tina prompted.
“Except my fiancée,” she confessed, as if she had betrayed a deep, dark secret. “I never knew at first. You know how it is. He seemed so nice, so normal. And then, when I found out that he’d been sneaking out, saving the world behind my back, I felt so…”
“Betrayed,” suggested Cheryl.
“Abandoned,” offered Tina.
“Irritated,” contributed Cheryl.
“Tried beyond all limits,” Tina ventured.
“Yes, all of those,” the young woman admitted. “But by then, it was too late. I was in love.”
Cheryl and Tina sighed in sympathetic unison.
“And now I suppose that he’s one of those Lair Legion people who is trying to take over the world,” the young woman concluded.
Lisa was very intrigued. Her gossip-sense was rippling for all it was worth. “You are the secret fiancée of a Lair legion member?” she declared. “Are you called Jami?”
“No,” the reticent newcomer confirmed. “Should I be?”
Lisa did a quick check of known romantic attachments. NTU-150 – sorted. Visionary – sorted. Foom – more sorted than he would admit. Starseed – no hoper. Spiffy – dead no hoper… “Alright,” she said at last. “I give in. Which Legionnaire are you engaged to?”
The young woman told her.

On a throne of burning onyx in the four hundred and thirteenth level of the Pit, the demon-lord Mefrothto sat in state amidst the wailing of the damned souls. One by one they were brought before him for judgement; and one by one they were dragged away, their terrible punishments made even worse in ways they would never even have dreamed possible. Mefrothto was on a roll.
There was a small, polite cough from the side of his throne.
Mefrothto looked around. A fat giant in a toga and a damned soul were standing there waiting to speak with him. “Who intrudes upon the demesnes of Mefrothto, Lord of Damnation?” he boomed.
The toga-wearing cosmic being put up a timid hand. “Um, we do, sir. We have… that is, we would like…”
“I need to get back to Earth,” spiffy interrupted. “I’m needed. I must get to the Lair Legion. I’m their only hope.”
There was laughter in Hell for the space of ten minutes.
spiffy sulked. “I am their last, best hope,” he muttered.
“Why do you come to me?” Mefrothto demanded. “Do I look like I’m in the hope business?”
“I… I owed him a debt, dread lord,” the Voyeur admitted, gesturing to the deceased Legionnaire. “Although I still reckon he cheated on that last hand…”
“Word on the slime-pit is,” spiffy pitched, “that if I get back to Earth, I’ll be going up against a guy who’s one of your special interests… the Hooded Hood.”
“Ah,” Mefrothto answered. “That’s different. The Hooded Hood… my special hobby.”
“So you can grant him a return to Earth?” the Voyeur said hopefully. Once spiffy got what he wanted, perhaps he would return the Voyeur’s underwear.
“Of a kind,” Mefrothto leered. “For a limited time. But not in his own body. That is mere ashes, scattered on a landfill site in Delaware.”
“I thought my ashes were in at least two places of honour with two mighty fighting teams!” spiffy objected.
“That was before the accident with the conga line and a handy ashtray,” Mefrothto explained. “If it’s any comfort there are some ashes in the trophy rooms. Just not yours.”
“How can I get back if I don’t have a body waiting for me?” spiffy asked, trying not to be too upset about his mortal remains.
“The old fashioned way,” grinned the demon-lord. “Possession.”
“Possession?” spiffy puzzled. “As in, heads spinning round, projectile-vomiting possession?”
“How else do souls from the netherworld get any holiday in?” Mefrothto asked. “All we need do is find a mortal vessel that has a… shall we say a soul deficiency? Then we send you to temporarily possess them, and you may conduct your business to the detriment of the Hooded Hood.”
“I’m nor sure,” spiffy worried. It sounded quite nasty to him.
“It’s probably the only way,” the Voyeur assured him. He’d worked out that he could whip back his underwear whilst spiffy’s spiritual essence was elsewhere.
Mefrothto leaned forward and held out a red, taloned hand to spiffy. “Do we have a deal?”

From the Personal Files of Heinrich, thirteenth Count Zemo:

The Hooded Hood, that buffoon of a cowled crime-czar, continues apace with his plan to conquer the Parodyverse. His strategy does contain some elements of interest, and I may be able to make use of certain members of his Purveyors of Peril once his machinations have come to naught. However, I have detected the single flaw through which his plans may yet come to naught.

Only one of my genius could have discerned the error. The Hood mentioned in conversation with myself and Moo [note to self, cancel milk whilst visiting S. America this weekend] that he had cunningly converged one strand of the Parodyverse continuity whilst there was a transfer of power amongst the celestial forces. He is, of course, referring to the investment of a new Chronicler of Stories, and the consequent activities of the Shaper of Worlds, Hollywood V, and those others who have delusions of godhood. The Hood reasons that by isolating these powers from this fragment of the Parodyverse he can prevent their interfering with his victory; and a victory here would infect all other continuity lines, making him supreme ruler of the Parodyverse.

Except for the flaw. In establishing this one divergent line, the Hooded Hood cannot afford to diverge away from it. In other worlds his power is now limited. He has committed himself to this one plan, at this one time, in this one place. If he fails now, he fails forever.

I go now to plot my revenge, and to prepare for an assault from an adversary who is almost worthy of my hatred. When he is dead I shall prepare him a magnificent monument, erected in the ruins of civilisation as I stride forth as supreme ruler of mankind.

Must go, the microwave is pinging.

“How is it that Godzilla makes this look so easy?” Fin Fang Foom complained, swatting at the aircraft that were firing at him. He didn’t feel able to use his fiery breath on them. They were law enforcement agents after all.
“The irritating part about this,” Starseed pointed out, “is that it’s my tax dollars that built this stuff we’re breaking.”
“Strawberry ice-cream is lovely in the spring,” Messenger contributed, smiling at his fingertips in happy concussion. Rocket Racoon gently led him to shelter before he got trodden on by a Sentinoid.
“We’ve got to get out of here!” Banjooooo pointed out. “We’ve probably taken a third of them down, but it’s only a matter of time before one of them gets in a lucky shot.”
“We need to locate our mission members then,” Jarvis reasoned. “CSFB!, distract the main force of Sentinoids.”
“Righty-ho, fearless leader. I’ve always wanted to say that. Avengers – um, Legion Assemble!”
“Starseed, clear us a path out of here.”
“GAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!”
“RR, get down that big hole that Sersi made and find out where she and the others got to.”
“Down, down and away!”
“Foomy…”
“Yeah?”
“Just keep being big and draconic.”
“Gotcha.”
NTU-150 was having a good fight. There were technological creatures attacking him, so he got to (a) test out the new adaptations to his armour, (b) analyse the equipment on the opposition, and (c) improvise interesting new things out of the wreckage of (b). “These things are very powerful for their size, you know,” he commented. “They probably depend upon transmitted power from somewhere. Somewhere nearby. If we could find that and blow it up, they’d all go off line long enough for us to make a getaway.”
“Good thinking, Enty,” Jarvis answered. “Now if we could only get someone out of the fight long enough to locate the generator…”
“Sorry, Jarv,” NTU-150 apologised. “I wasn’t listening. I was talking via micro-transceiver to Dark Knight.”
There was a whumph from nearby as two billion dollars worth of Starseed’s taxes exploded into tiny pieces.
“So I see,” Jarvis approved dryly.
The Sentinoids went limp. This did not stop Donar still smashing them into piles of scrap metal. “Get up and battle, feckless clockwork felons! Stand up and be smitten!”
Sersi and Rocket Racoon flew up from the sewers carrying Hatman and a very happy but getting sleepy now Space Ghost.
“Drunk again,” Jarvis commented, disgusted at Space Ghost’s unprofessional behaviour. “It’s behaviour like this that kept me from including him in the new line-up.”
“That man’s drinking has saved the planet,” Hatman said cryptically.
“Angry SPUD Director at six o’clock!” CrazySugarFreakBoy! pointed out. Whilst Jarvis hustled the team out of there, CSFB! bounced over and planted a big Bugs Bunny-style kiss on Dan Drury’s stubbly mouth. “Yeuch! Lose the cigar breath, dude!” Then he was gone after the rest of the Legion.
“There’s nowhere you can run, you no-good, traitor-totin’ yella-backed four-flushers!” Drury called after them. “The whole world’s after you! The whole world’s against you! You can’t hide!”
“We’re sure going to try,” Jarvis promised.

The President rose from behind the desk of the Oval Office and shook hands with the Hooded Hood and VelcroVixen. “How delightful to meet you, Mr President,” the cowled crime-czar declared in his urbane Latvian accents. “And how expedient that we have mutual concerns which we can assist one another with.”
The Chief Executive indicated that the Hood should sit, but the archvillain instead chose to stand with his hands clasped behind his back, staring out of the window over the lawn. VelcroVixen sat down, but the president tactfully suggested that she use a different chair to the one that he was on. He had enough problems at the moment. “I understand from my security boys that you might be able to help us with our little superhero problem?” the President ventured.
“I believe I might, Mr President,” admitted the Hood. His green eyes glowed. “As I understand it, you believe that the Lair Legion has gone bad, has sought to demand control over half the world by extortion and menaces. They have consequently caused massive property damage and possible loss of life in Paradopolis itself and have resisted arrest at the cost of many billions of dollars worth of government armaments.”
“We have a negative result on the ongoing Legion internment scenario at this time, yes,” the President admitted.
“Then I may well be able to help you,” the Hood promised. “You see I have been assembling my own team of… costumed adventurers. And we seek government recognition. What better way for my colleagues to begin their professional career than by bringing in those treacherous turncoats, the Lair Legion.”
“This is the paperwork,” VelcroVixen smiled. “This is the arrest warrants. Here is the special clearance for our team. These are the deniable Presidential kill-orders.”
The Hooded Hood looked out over Washington whilst VelcroVixen tied up the minor details; but it was not too long before he could speak into his radio-transmitter: “Let the hunt begin.”

The Purveyors of Peril traversed the Portal of Pretentiousness to seek the deaths of the Lair Legion.

There was a horrible, nauseating whirring. spiffy had a sensation like being a sock in a washing machine and then like a pair of underpants in a wringer. And then he opened his eyes again. He had eyes. They just weren’t his normal ones. He raised his hands. Those were different as well.
“Hey! Hey are you OK?”
spiffy looked around to see where the voice was coming from, but he couldn’t see anyone. He wondered what soulless creature he had been sent to possess.
He wondered what he was doing surrounded by all this corn.

In our next instalment: Discover, subject to the response of relevant individuals, the identities of the nice young woman and the fake man in the cornfield! See Lisa face off against Dan Drury… and worse! Thrill to the first, and possibly final, battle between the Lair Legion and the Purveyors of Peril! And learn at last the fate the Hooded Hood has in store for our heroes! All this in just five short days from now! Don’t miss it!

And the board said:

The Hooded Hood and the Day of the Sentinoids (The Hooded Hood) (11-May-1999 19:26:57)

All bow before the magic keyboard of Ian!!!!! (n/t) (Lisa... shocked at how good this is... ) (11-May-1999 20:21:58)

Note to self: Never give Space Ghost my alchohol again! Great work Ian! (n/t) (Sersi) (11-May-1999 22:26:38)
Ahhh! Silly little h...get out of there! *techxt cansnt speel* (n/t) (Sersi) (11-May-1999 22:29:01)

Foul Felon!! Thou didst make me laugh up a lung. PLEASE keepeth yon excellent tale going!! (n/t) (DONAR, agrees with Lisa...dammit.) (11-May-1999 22:47:07)

Hey! I do too have a soul, dammit!!!! (11-May-1999 22:55:55)
What a good idea! The person in the cornfields in the story... we could make it be Visionary! (n/t) (The Hooded Hood, always delighted when people raise unexpected plot twists.) (12-May-1999 13:19:38)

Neat-o keen! I feel like Havok in the first issue of Mutant X, facing off against alternate universe versions of both Sentinels AND Nick Fury! Does this mean I get to score with parallel timeline knockoffs of Madelyne Pryor, Elektra, and the Invisible Woman, too? (n/t) (CrazySugarFreakBoy!) (12-May-1999 07:27:37)

My name's Melissa.And this should be very,very interesting. (n/t) (Melissa,courtesy of Tim's computer) (12-May-1999 12:50:16)
Hi Melissa! We bid thee god welcome, and all that other Dungeons & Dragons type greeting stuff ... "Well met, traveller." Heeheehee. :) (n/t) (CrazySugarFreakBoy! does not know anyone named Tim, except for our Jarvis and that magician fellow who helped him find the Holy Grail with the rest of Monty Python ...) (12-May-1999 12:57:51)
Don't scare her away,dammit! And what's a 'god welcome'? (n/t) (Jarvis) (12-May-1999 13:04:57)

The Hooded Hood continues to gloat over the past travails of his adversaries