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Post By Never let it be said that the Hooded Hood isn't an obsessed completist who can't let go. Tue Aug 16, 2005 at 06:08:42 am EDT |
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Who Remembers the Hatman Roast? I think this is #11 | |
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| Who Remembers the Hatman Roast? I think this is #11 Previously: Hatman Roast #1 (Vizh), #2 (Messenger), #3 (DBS), #4 (Jason), #5(L!), #6 (JJJ), #7 (Dancer), #8 (Killer Shrike), #9 (AG), and #10 (DK)  The Auto-Censor watched the ceremony proceed through the mini-cameras he’d planted around the auditorium. He made notes of the number of blue jokes, innuendos, and rude words that were used to insult Hatman. He opened up special files on Messenger and Sarah Shepherdson. “You’ll pay,” he whispered to the monitor screens. “You’ll all pay for so belittling the only clean decent hero amongst you.”The plan was simple. One exploding cake later and Hatman would be a pure, unsullied martyr, an example of decency and politeness, forever saved from the wiles of Sorceresses and Night Nurses and ex-Spice Girls. And all those so-called friends who had defamed him would be silenced forever. “Get ready,” the Auto-Censor told the Caterers of Crime. “Wheel the explosive device on stage while Sir Mumphrey Wilton is making his big speech.” Mumphrey took the stage with the air of an experienced raconteur, drink in one hand and the other hooked into his waistcoat pocket. “Young Boaz,” he began. “Fine chap. Hero. Knight of the realm. Honest. Decent. Kind. No ‘side’ to him. Enough said about that.” “Supposed to say something rude or embarrass the chap. Not done in my book. But will mention time he missed a googly in the final over in the friendly with young Kipling’s British Intelligence Eleven. Planted his bat right in the wicket. And then when he told CrazySugarFreakBoy! about it the lad misunderstood what a googly was and we had to bang his back for about quarter of an hour to make him exhale the spork he’d been usin’.” “Of course, there was the time himself that young Boaz used the wrong knife for the fish course…” “Nearly over Jay,” waitress Sarah Shepherdson comforted the capped crusader. “I think there’s a surprise presentation and then you’re allowed to made a speech back.” Hatman suppressed a whimper. “He doesn’t seem to be enjoying it for some reason,” grinned Nats. “…fish paste all over the trombone, and we never got all of it out,” Sir Mumphrey concluded. “Get ready,” the Auto-Censor told his minions. “After the toast they’re about to call Hatman up to the stage. Be sure to get all of this on film. I can chop out the gory bits later.” “But the fact remains, ladies and gentleman, genderless pure thought beings, elder blasphemies, and Space Ghost,” Mumphrey concluded, “we can only joke about Hatman because we’re so absolutely certain that he’s a good man, and that he’s going to become a great man as he fulfils the promise of his early years. Dashed fine chap and a privilege to know and work with him. Please raise your glasses to Jay Boaz.” The guests duly rose and drank to Hatman. Jay swallowed hard, and Nats hammered him on the back. At least Hatty hadn’t swallowed a spork. “And now,” the compeer’s voice boomed over the tannoy, “ to present a special award to the capped crusader, we have Hollywood superstar Gary Coleman!” “Adam West had to cancel,” CSFB! told Hatman disappointedly. “Sorry, old chum.” But it wasn’t Gary Coleman who came onto the stage. It was the Hooded Hood. “Hold it!” the Auto-Censor screamed into his command microphone. “Abort! Abort! Do not trigger Operation Black Forest Gateau! Don’t trigger anything! The Hooded [censored] Hood has just walked onto the stage. Who invited him?” A quick check at the guest list indicated that the cowled crime czar had always been invited. “That Arnold has sure got taller now he’s all grown up,” Trickshot commented, reaching for his quiver. “What’choo talkin’ ‘bout?” muttered Messenger, head down on the table in a pile of his vomit. “I’ll be right back,” De Brown Streak promised the coterie of young ladies he’d gathered at the bar. “We appear to be at the obligatory super-villain attack part of the evening. Stay seducible.” “The Hooded Hood!” Visionary warned the people at his table. “Watch him!” “I already am doing,” Lisa promised dreamily. “Mmm.” “What is to be uncute Hooded Hooding to be doing at cute-Jay’s roast?” demanded Yo, waving a crab-puff as warning to the archvillain. “Yes, what do you want, Hood?” demanded Sir Mumphrey Wilton angrily. “This is hardly the time to…” “I have come to speak about Jay Boaz,” replied the Hooded Hood. “That is the purpose of this evening? To laud and mark his achievements through deprecating and mocking him?” “For his friends to do that,” Sarah Shepherdson insisted. “Such as Baroness Elizabeth von Zemo?” the Hood enquired. “Say your piece, Hood,” Hatman told him. “Then go.” The cowled crime czar nodded briefly. “Very well. Good evening. I am… the Hooded Hood.” “You have to admit, he says that with real gravitas,” Beth von Zemo conceded to Silicone Sally. “I wonder what devious scheme this will turn out to be a part of months or years from now? I expect he’ll drop in some insignificant comment that’ll turn out to be the key to a complicated plot long after everyone’s forgotten this.” “You wish to know the reasons why Jay Boaz is a fool?” the Hood continued. “Very well. Some time ago, through an apparent accident, Jay Boaz was infected with Serious Matter, one of the five fundamental building blocks of the Parodyverse, a rare element intended to be used by the champion of Order to impose cold sterile conformity on the world. Mr Boaz had a grand destiny before him to play a key role in the literal reordering of the universe. He chose not do so, not to become rich and powerful and impose his will on the world; but rather to play the role of a hero.” “What’s wrong with that?” CrazySugarFreakBoy! asked. He couldn’t think of any other way to express having super-powers. It all seemed perfectly logical to him. “Later this role caused him pain, hardship, and heartbreak. All of you know that Hatman was considered dead for some months when a shapeshifter who had taken his place was slaughtered in his stead. Instead Boaz was tortured for a timeless period in a far dimension, frozen in agony and horror, abandoned by his allies. Being a hero brought sorrow and suffering to Jay Boaz’s family and friends, and near destroyed his lover Whitney Darkness.” “You manipulated her over the edge,” Lisa Waltz accused the Hood. “You wanted her for your Transworlds Challenge gambit and to deal with the Hellraisers!” “Indeed,” agreed the archvillain. “But it would have been unsporting not to give her and Hatman a choice. Hence I arranged for Boaz and his Sorceress to be reunited in a retconned world where they could be happy together. Neither would have affected this reality any more, for eventually their reality would have replaced this one as the core continuity of the Parodyverse.” Hatman’s face was pale and taut. He hadn’t explained this to his comrades in arms. He never wanted to think about it again. “In that reality Boaz and Whitney Darkness were wedded and they conceived a daughter. Hatman led the Lair Legion, and had almost all that he wanted. It was his perfect happy ending.” “Except that half the LL were dead in that reality, and the world wasn’t as it should have been!” Hatman accused, rising from his table. “Holy devil’s paradox, Batman,” CSFB! muttered, the first to understand what had really happened. So much of the break-up of Whitney and Hatman made sense now. “He made you choose, didn’t he Jay? Either save the world – the real world – or have everything you and Whit ever wanted!” “You… you had to choose us, didn’t you?” Dancer remembered. “Over Whitney and the baby you were having?” Lisa realised. A horrible thought occurred to her. “Whitney doesn’t remember any of this, does she?” “Yes,” admitted Hatman. “All of it. And the choice I made.” “You want to hear a funny story about a foolish man?” the Hooded Hood declared. “There it is. A fool who gave up heaven on Earth because it was the right thing to do. The heroic thing.” “You, sirrah, are an utter cad and bounder!” snarled Sir Mumphrey Wilton at the Hood. Only the cowled crime czar himself knew how his speech had thrown off the Auto-Censor’s timetable and moved the various heroes into the right positions for later. “I am an archvillain,” he answered the eccentric Englishman. “It’s in the job description.” He turned back to the white-angry Hatman. “Many of the same definitions apply to a fool and a hero,” he advised the caped crusader. “But while all heroes are fools, not all fools are heroes. And sometimes foolishness attains a splendour and honour beyond the rational values of the world and carries deeds into legend.” “I did what I had to. I’ll do what I have to when you need stopping again,” Jay Boaz vowed. “Excellent. Proceed,” replied the archvillain. “Until then, know that your foolishness has earned you the regard – and attention – of… the Hooded Hood!” He raised the glass of 13-year old 19th Century Chateauneuf du Pape to the man of the hour, and then he was gone. “Right,” the Auto-Censor declared, “before we have any more interruptions, have the announcer call Hatman to the stage. Let’s get Operation Black Forest Gateau underway.” He watched as Jay Boaz walked through the applauding crowd to take his place at the podium. “Wait for me to shout ‘cut’,” the Auto-Censor called, “and then let everything fade to black…” *** To be concluded by Hatman … Eventually. Original concepts, characters, and situations copyright © 2005 reserved by Ian Watson. Other Parodyverse characters copyright © 2005 to their creators. The use of characters and situations reminiscent of other popular works do not constitute a challenge to the copyrights or trademarks of those works. The right of Ian Watson to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the UK Copyright, Designs & Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. |
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