 |
|
|
Post By The Hooded Hood takes the Saturday matinee approach to adventure writing Tue May 29, 2007 at 11:06:35 am EDT |
Subject
#314: Untold Tales of the Parody War: The Secret Life of Citizen Z - Complete | |
|
|
Next In Thread >> | |
| #314: Untold Tales of the Parody War: The Secret Life of Citizen Z Previously: Villainous Baroness Elizabeth von Zemo escaped her enemies by disguising herself as the heroic Citizen Z. She simulated superhuman abilities through use of her exotic weaponries and by wearing her pliable henchwoman Silicone Sally as a bodysuit. As a member of the Lair Legion, CZ has managed to get rid of Hatman, CrazySugarFreakBoy! and Sir Mumphrey Wilton, leaving her the de facto leader of Earth’s combined defence force. With the assistance of her unalive grandfather Baron Otto von Zemo and the prototype artificial intelligence HAGGIE she has prepared for a time when she can use her new position to conquer the Earth. Now that time has come. Previous chapters at The Hooded Hood's Homepage of Doom. Descriptions of cast at Who's Who in the Parodyverse. Locations explained in Where's Where in the Parodyverse.  I The reign of Baroness Elizabeth Sweetwater Dewdrop von Zemo began on a wet Wednesday morning at a high level strategy meeting in the Lair Mansion. Beth was at the head of the table dressed in her purple and red Citizen Z costume. Arrayed around her were Colonel Dan Drury, Director of the Super-Menace principle Undercover Directorate (SPUD), Contessa Natalia Romanza, his best agent, Amber St Clare, the Lair Legion’s liaison officer, Special Agent Herbert P. Garrick, the government’s advisor on metahuman affairs, Director Soames of the Office for Paranormal Security, Police Commissioner Don Graham of the Paradopolis Police Department, and forensics specialist Lee O’Callaghan. The working party met not in the usual Lair Mansion meeting room but in one of the rarely-used secure sub-basements. The contents of this meeting were very sensitive. “What do we know?” asked Citizen Z. “It’s a toxin,” reported Lee O’Callaghan. “Something very exotic with some very specific time-delay properties. The poison was designed to remain dormant for twelve hours or so before activating in Sir Mumphrey’s body.” “That would get around any of the standard protections from Sir Mumphrey’s temporal pocketwatch,” noted the Contessa. “Normally, if he takes any kind of physical damage his Chronometer of Infinity winds time back to the seconds before he was hurt, leaving him a moment of future awareness so he can negate the threat. The long onset time…” “Means he couldn’t save hisself,” Colonel Drury concluded, “Which means whoever designed this toxin knew enough ta get past his defences.” “And enough to mind-control Bethany Shellett to deliver it,” added Commissioner Graham with a deadly cold look on his face. This was twice that his estranged daughter had been turned into a weapon against her friends. He could still see the look on her face as he’d explained about it and taken her into custody. “Have we anything on the brain scans?” “NTU-150 hasn’t woken up after the Singularity Rider attack yet,” Amber St Clare contributed. “We’re desperately short of weird scientists. Well, weird scientists that we trust.” “Try Leticia Gahagan, the Idiom,” advised Natalia Romanza. “She has expertise in this area, I suspect.” “And Sir Mumphrey’s condition?” Citizen Z prompted. “Poor dear Sir Mumphrey.” “Comatose,” summarised Aaron Soames tersely. “No indication that he’s ever likely to wake up.” “This is an amazingly bad time for this to happen,” worried Herbert Garrick. Bad News Herb didn’t like the eccentric Englishman but without him the Earth defence coalition was fragmenting to ruin. “They’re predicting the Celestian barrier can’t stand more than another two weeks at most. The Lair Legion are missing, dead, or hospitalised. When the Parody Master breaks through there’ll be no way to stop him. No way at all.” Citizen Z shook her head. “On the contrary, we now have three methods to test that might give us hope. In addition to the power control frequency that the Librarian thinks we might use to disrupt his recharge we also have one method of possible containment that I’ll be checking on later today and one means of defending the planet that should be possible as soon as the additional equipment is installed across the globe. I expect that to be ready to on online by midnight tonight. Then it’ll be a whole new game.” “We need to identify someone to take charge of the defences,” urged Soames. “No offence to you, Citizen Z, but you’re not a well known figure like Sir Mumphrey. You’re only in that seat because you’re acting deputy leader of the Lair Legion in place of CrazySugarFreakBoy! in place of Hatman, and Hatman would only be there in Sir Mumphrey’s absence. I think we need someone with a little more experience.” “Who do you suggest?” asked Amber St Clare archly. “I’m still not convinced that Foxglove’s dead an’ gone,” Drury argued. “So he got zapped by the Doomwraiths an’ just evaporated. So what? Superheroes come back from stuff like that all the time, specially the kid.” “We might look to a Presidential appointment to lead the world at this time,” suggested Garrick. “I would be willing to…” “There’s no need to quibble about the chain of command,” Citizen Z interrupted. “Things are already taken care of. The odourless gas permeating this room will soon take effect and render you all as comatose as Sir Mumphrey; as it should do since it’s a variation of the same compound. Those lifelike robot decoys I commissioned for each of you should suffice to fill your posts for the critical twenty-four hours that come next. After that, who’s in charge should not be an issue.” The Contessa and Drury tried to stand, but nobody managed to actually make it to their feet except Beth von Zemo. Her mask was also a toxin filter. “No more objections?” she asked the roomful of sleeping power-brokers. “Excellent. Then I’ll get on with conquering the world, shall I?” Pausing only to release size-changing particles to shrink the room and its occupants small enough to slip into a pocket she went on to arrange part two of dominating the Earth. II “I’m not mourning,” Meggan Foxxx told Carl Bastion. “Why the hell should I mourn? My Dream’s been pronounced dead and gone more times than I care to remember, an’ he’s always found a way to bounce back, usually literally. You think this one’s any different?” “Well I sure hope not,” agreed the irritating archer. “Specially after it wuz CSFB! what took down B’Rath at the last minute and saved the day. But B’Rath did kind of rip Dream’s heart out too, and then according to CZ your son just… melted away.” “But Dream’s made out of impossibilitium now,” argued Alice April Apple, CrazySugarFreakBoy!’s wife. “He can survive all kinds of stuff. He’s probably waiting to reform right now. Any moment now.” Trickshot wasn’t sure it worked like that. After all, there’d been CrazySugarHeroes! before CSFB!, and they’d died; but he wasn’t about to say that the Meg and April. “Don’t you fret none about Dream,” Meggan told him. “Just you see about getting that Parody Master off our backs.” Citizen Z appeared in the doorway of the Lair Kitchen. “Of course you shouldn't give up hope, Meggan, no matter how futile and desperate the situation seems,” she comforted the worried mother. “Who knows right now if your little boy isn't struggling against insurmountable odds to return to your side, wracked with pain and suffering again and again? It's that thought that keeps me going.” “Yeah, CSFB! ain’t the kind ta give up easily,” agreed Trickshot. “But in the meantime we want to help,” April told CZ. “Both Meggan and I have been superheroes in our time.” “I’m giving some very special thought to what to do with both of you,” Beth von Zemo promised. “I’m sure I’ll find the perfect place to send you soon. In the meantime, I need to borrow Mr Bastion here. We’re testing some technology that might solve a lot of problems. This way, Trickshot.” “Keep ya chin up, folks,” Tricky encouraged CSFB!’s family. “Don’t pay no attention to those stories in the paper and the TV. It’s not over yet.” “Not quite,” agreed Citizen Z. The remnants of the Lair Legion gathered in Science Lab Three around a strange metal device that spewed off eye-watering black dots of energy. Yuki Shiro ran a standard sensor sweep over the gadget. “It’s BALD technology,” she reported. “Based on an old Zemo design, I think, but modified.” “Contains negativity zone energies,” added Mr Epitome, using his enhanced vision powers on the machine. “Judging by the micro-tool patterns on the rim it looks like it was assembled on behalf of Factor X. That’s the work of the Mender, and he’s exclusive to Gregor Vassilych.” “Factor X should not be commissioning dangerous weapons any more,” Glory. The mutt of might, communicated using yelps and paw movements. “There is supposed to be a truce amongst the supervillain underworld.” “Wilt it be necessary to smite yon device for the nonce?” asked Donar. “I hast found it best with all technological devices to thump them a few times ere they can explode,” he confided to his Queen Annj. “I had noticed,” agreed the Queen of Ausgard. “The life expectancy of toasters is really short around you.” “Actually, that might just be a survival instinct,” admitted Amazing Guy. “Those Bautistamat bread-grilling devices can be very dangerous if they’re misused. Or, um, used.” “They are quite fearsome,” agreed Marie Murcheson, former Lair banshee, now an out-of-time Victorian girl. “But they do produce the most wonderful crisp toast, so much more evenly done than with a toasting fork. And they make pretty sparks when they explode.” “They’re just a bit temperamental,” Yuki suggested. “You just need to know how to talk to them. And when to throw them at the enemy.” “But first you have to know your enemy,” noted Citizen Z, sweeping into the room with Trickshot. “Thank you for coming, everyone. Assembled here we have the most powerful heroes we can still muster, together in one room. I called you here to test a device I hope might give us a means of defeating the Parody Master.” “We found the Storyheart?” asked AG, referring to the missing artefact that powered the cosmic office holders. “She means this thing,” Glory yipped, sniffing at the BALD device. “I mean this thing,” went on Citizen Z. “It’s a hybrid of an old trap that Baron Heinrich Zemo used on the Lair Legion in their very early days as the League of Regulars and the Negativity Barrier Generator that the Abhumans tried to trap Paradopolis in a while back. It’s supposed to create an impenetrable barrier to trap a subject inside.” “And you think it might work on the Parody Master?” Mr Epitome asked, slightly sceptically. “We’re obliged to try any alternative,” CZ answered. “Everybody cluster together on the mat. When the Spectral Zone cube forms around you I want you to use every resource at your disposal to try and break free or escape.” “You’re gonna lock us in that thing?” Trickshot asked nervously. “You don’t have to go in there if it bothers you,” Citizen Z told him sweetly. “It’s really a test for the powerful heroes.” “Hey, I’m in there,” the irritating archer bristled. “I wuz just saying.” “So we art allowed to smite with maximum whompage?” Donar checked. “Tis good.” “I don’t understand why I am here,” admitted Marie a little shyly. Citizen Z frightened her. “Everybody else can do amazing things, but…” “You did your part in takin’ down B’Rath, sweetheart,” Trickshot encouraged her. “Those banshee gifts o’ yours might not be as gone as you think they are.” “I’m guessing Citizen Z wants you here because you might possibly be able to draw on mystic energies,” Mr Epitome suggested. “We need to test this thing from all the angles.” “Where did you get this thing from?” Yuki asked curiously. Something was bothering the cyborg P.I. but she couldn’t say what. “Answers later,” Citizen Z said. “Everyone in position? Hold still then. I’m activating the projector.” There was a humming, more black energy crackles, and finally a shimmering dark cube formed around the six heroes and dog on the lab platform. “There now,” Citizen Z told them. “That should hold you helpless to escape for all eternity. Try to get out, Legion.” Initial attempts proved futile. Even Amazing Guy’s multiversal energies were blocked, making sub-stratum jumps impossible. “This is an effective containment,” admitted Mr Epitome. “We might not be able to get out, but I think the Parody Master could,” judged AG, using his cosmic awareness. “He could just bull his way through the dimensional walls using his infinite power.” He shook his head. “This is good for holding us, but it’s useless against the PM.” “Ah well,” shrugged Citizen Z, “back to the drawing board.” “Could you release us now?” Annj demanded. “It is rather crowded in here, and my husband has been eating curry.” Beth von Zemo laughed. “No, I think I’ll leave you in there for now,” she decided. “Maybe forever. I have a world to conquer and you heroes would probably be tedious and object.” “Not funny, CZ,” called out Yuki. “Let us loose.” “Look at her body language!” growled Glory. “She is not joking!” “Hey!” objected Donar. “Let us outeth!” “Bye now,” Citizen Z waved at the trapped heroes. “If you get hungry I suggest you eat Trickshot first.” Then she turned the lights off and locked the lab after her. III “And then I left them in the dark,” Beth von Zemo concluded her recounting. “You should have seen their faces when they realised they’d been betrayed.” “I did see their faces,” pointed out Silicone Sally. “I was there, remember. You were wearing me as your Citizen Z suit. I still have underarm stains to prove it.” The Baroness was sitting at a control desk in the hidden attic of the Lair Mansion that had once belonged to her late uncle Baron Heinrich Zemo, nemesis of the early Lair Legion. “They walked right into it, because it was good old CZ who was telling them,” she continued. She was on something of a giddy high. “What morons! Trusting fools!” “Yes, it all sounds very exciting,” cut in HAGGIE, waspishly. HAGGIE was one of the many experiments left behind when Zemo had decamped to his now-missing castle long ago. She was a prototype artificial intelligence, a Heuristic Accelerated Genius Generated Intelligence Entity created from the engrams of a dead woman to be a computer-based sentience; a forerunner of Hallie. “Is there any chance we could get past the gloating phase on to the destroying people phase? Specifically the destroying Hallie phase?” Beth was about to spit back a venomous reply when she caught herself. “Am I falling into cliché again?” she worried. “I think it must be genetic.” “There was a bit of cackle there, boss,” Silicone Sally admitted. Sally Rezilyant was enjoying some rare time not wrapped as a costume around her employer. She was sitting by the drinks cabinet trying to figure out which bottles weren’t poisoned. “But then again, if I was taking over the world I’d probably be quite juiced as well. Hey, can I have Brad Pitt as a body slave? Can I have Jennifer Anniston’s pelt on my wall?” “All in good time,” answered the Baroness. “Things are still at a critical stage just now. I still need to push four buttons.” “So push them,” urged Haggie. “Let’s get this show on the road.” “All in good time,” answered the soon-to-be-ruler of Earth. “Days like this only come once in a lifetime. They need to be savoured. Try to downplay your engram-donor’s thirst for blood.” “Hausa Gretchen never drank blood,” denied HAGGIE. “That’s a nasty slur put about by people she tortured and their grieving relatives. Do you think your uncle Heinrich would have copied her brainwaves for his first stage artificial intelligence experiments if she’d been an insane mass-murderer?” “Well, yes,” admitted Beth. “But I’m sure your engram-donar was a perfectly sane mass murderer. That’s why the war crimes tribunal executed her, wasn’t it?” “All I’m saying is let’s get past the I-caught-the-Lair-Legion moment and move on to the I-killed-Hallie-and-conquered-the-world moment,” advised the crude wire-frame hologram that was HAGGIE’s chosen form. “We have so many people to eliminate. We need to get started.” “I was hoping for some time off to have a date with Mitch once I don’t have to be your second skin,” admitted Silicone Sally. “And with Dirk and Tom and Akim. And maybe Troy. Ooh, and Gary. Mmm.” Beth von Zemo nodded. She pressed a fingertip down onto her command desk controls. “Emergency bioprotection measures activated,” she reported. “Every one of the remaining metahumans in the Earth combined defence force is getting the priority signal to swallow that anti-parody-radiation medication we issued to them. That’ll keep them dormant and docile and stop them being nuisances until it’s time to round them up.” Sally looked worried. “Do we need anti-parody-radiation medicine?” The Baroness shot her a venomous look. “Not unless you want to become a drugged-out helpless zombie,” she spat. “I mean more of a drugged-out helpless zombie.” “You’re mean when you’re conquering the world,” pouted Sally Rezyliant. The Baroness turned her attention back to the buttons and tapped a second one. “Earth’s weapons of mass destruction are now overridden to my absolute control,” she noted. “Too much resistance and it’s crispy friend continent.” “Can we blow up Belgium?” asked HAGGIE. “Or maybe Canada? It’s not like you need all those countries. You could spare Nepal. Or Equador.” “Taking over the world with buttons,” Silicone Sally said. “I somehow thought it would be more dramatic than this.” Beth tapped a third control. “This activates the mind-control projectors on my cloaked remote satellites. It’s not enough to make everybody my mindless slaves, because the Parody War’s damaged the network and it was never perfect anyway. But it’ll make most people just a little bit more docile and obedient, just enough to take away the edge to my absolute mastery. I’d never have been able to do it without the access Citizen Z had to the Ultizon materials.” “A-hem,” complained HAGGIE. “Exactly who cracked those control biorhythms?” “Somebody who wants a high-voltage circuit-frying for being a pain-in-the-ass interrupting my moment of glory?” suggested the Baroness. “Now it’s all over I’ll kind of miss hanging with the Lair Legion,” Sally considered. “Specially the breakfasts, when CSFB! would tease Epitome until he got pounded through a wall and everybody avoided Sir Mumphrey till he’d had his tea and Times.” “I’ll miss standing in front of them while they’re too stupid to recognise their greatest foe is there amongst them,” Beth admitted. “But payback will make it all worthwhile.” “You did have help in not being recognised though,” HAGGIE noted precisely. “You stole the karmic identity of that Laurie Leyton woman to fool the Mansion and there was that retcon help from the Hooded Hood to keep folks from noticing…” “I merely manipulated the Hood like I did everyone else,” the Baroness snapped quickly. “I needed him for a while, but now he’s gone. Everyone’s gone, and I reign supreme.” “Sir Mumphrey worked it out,” Sally ventured. “Sir Mumphrey needed someone who would get their hands dirty,” Beth argued. “He never understood just who he was dealing with, how dangerous a bargain he had made.” “Seems like by keeping you around he betrayed his team and doomed the world,” Sally pointed out. “Every time he tried to do differently the retcon gave him pause,” the Baroness replied. “As for his other reasons, they are of no consequence. Of no consequence at all.” She slammed her hand down on the final button. “Yessss!” exalted HAGGIE as the purge command surged through Hallie’s systems. Citizen Z had been very helpful in installing the safeguards after the Legion’s A.I. had been almost destroyed in a terrorist attack during the run-up to the Parody War. “Have we conquered the world now?” checked Sally. “We have conquered the world,” agreed Beth. “We just need to let them know it.” “Nuking Ecuador would be one way,” persisted HAGGIE. The Baroness rose from her console and went over to the wall where CrazySugarFreakBoy! hung in chains, still unmoving after his earlier injuries. She examined his healing head wounds, pulled her gun from her holster, and emptied six more bullets into the wired wonder’s temple. “That’s not going to get old any time soon,” she noted with a little smirk. “You don’t have to clean up the brains off the floor,” objected Sally. “And now I can finally say what every villain wants to, but few ever get away with,” announced Baroness von Zemo. “Nothing can stop me now!” The alarm klaxons went off around the Mansion. The Parody Master’s attack had begun. IV Fifteen minutes before the Parody Master arrived to conquer the Earth, Hallie was inventorying medical supplies at the Off-Central Park bivouac of the combined Earth Defence Forces. She had the former Caphan pleasure slave Miiri and the former sexbot Tandi with her. For some reason that combination always made military personal very eager to co-operate. “It was a nasty moment,” Miiri admitted to the others. “Meggan, April and I had been shopping for clothes for our children. We had purchased them with money belonging to us personally, without any need to refer to a master nor to defer to his preferences. But when we returned to Parody Island there was a guard cordon around the bridge and anyone who crossed the line died.” “That’s kind of harsh,” Tandi commented. “I mean, that’s the kind of thing you expect in Stalinist Russia, not the USA. Not unless you’re a robot lifeform anyhow.” “She doesn’t mean the soldiers shot intruders,” Hallie clarified. “She means that the Doomwraith attacking the mansion was eminating a death field that drained the lifeforce of anyone who came near. His energy drain had already shut me down. It was lucky I had a remote HED offsite to jump to or I’d have been erased.” “Here’s all the manifests for the new equipment from Bautista Industries,” the Quartermaster announced, dumping newly-typed manifests on the counter in front of the three goddesses. “Is there anything else I can help you ladies with? Anything at all?” “That’s very helpful, Sergeant Brown,” approved Tandi with a little smile. “You could perhaps get us some coffee, do you think? And some of those little chocolate biscuits with the cherry bits in them?” “Chocolate biscuits are one of the wonders of this planet,” agreed green-skinned Miiri. “Although they are bad for one’s figure, requiring vigorous constant physical effort to ensure that one retains a desirable physique.” “Urk,” said Sergeant Brown, before exiting quickly in quest of cherry chocolate digestives. “Well, I think we’re about done here,” Hallie admitted. “Apart from stimulating poor soldiers to a state of sexual frenzy, I mean. The new equipment to replace what was lost in the Battle of the Conceptual Plane is coming through at as good a rate as we can expect given the necessary power brown-outs at the factories. The new recruits are most of the way through basic training. I can’t think there’s anything else we can… aaaaaaccckkkkkkk!” “Hallie! What’s wrong!” Mirri cried out as the A.I.’s form shuddered and dissolved in a spray of pixels. “Hallie!” “Something’s wrong!” Tandi warned, reaching for the acorn-sized Holographic Emitter Drone that carried Hallie’s core programming. It shuddered, smoked, then exploded into fragments. All of Hallie’s HEDs smoked and exploded, everywhere; just at the moment her main data banks back at the Lair Mansion and her emergency off-site backups were purged. Five minutes before the Parody Master arrived, thirteen year old Samantha Featherstone had been arguing. “He’s my grandfather. Why can’t I go in and see him?” “Because he’s been stricken by an unseen toxin,” answered the implacable military nurse. “It might be contagious. It might be airborne. If you go in there you’d be risking infection.” “You go in there,” Samantha’s friend Magweed pointed out. “You wear those plastic bags all over your body and strap those breathing tanks to it. Why can’t Sam have some plastic bags and see her grandpa?” “Because we don’t have plastic bags – I mean environmental security suits – to fit kids, that’s why. Now run along. This is a secure area and you’re not cleared to be here.” “This isn’t your mansion,” Sam objected. “It’s the Lair Mansion, and you’re a guest. My grandfather was leader of the Lair Legion, and he even lived here a long time before that. You shouldn’t try to keep me from my grandfather.” “Is there a problem?” asked Special Agent Garrick – or a plausible facsimile of him – appearing from the secured interior. “These children want to access the patient,” reported the military nurse. “Agent Garrick, why is my grandfather being treated by only military personnel? Same with Miss Night and NTU-150.” Samantha demanded. “Where is Dr Whitwell? Where is Nurse O’Mercy?” Where are the people we can trust? “Run along now,” Bad News Herb told them. “This isn’t the place for children. I’m making arrangements for you to be returned to England, Miss Featherstone, to the care of your uncle. If Visionary doesn’t come back soon I’ll have to send you to foster care as well, Miss, um, Visionary.” “My name is Magweed,” objected Magweed. “And your name is…” “We’ll be going then,” interrupted Samantha hastily. “As nice to see you as always, Special Agent Garrick.” The children retreated along the corridor and down to where the grandfather clock stood on the landing. Once nobody was watching they slipped in behind it and up the secret stair to another hidden garret; their hidden garret. The small room existed in one of the dimensional quirks that characterised the ancient site. In fact the yellow stone room predated the Mansion being built. It was small despite the massive hearth and cluttered with children’s’ treasures, with books and old toys and battered furniture spilling out stuffing. On one crowded bookcase were dozens of hard-bound fairy stories from a century earlier. The opposite cupboard was crowded with a collection of 1940s postcards, a knitted toy otter, and a dozen snow-globes. A colonial sampler on the wall read Lord protect us from truth and secrets. Magweed’s twin brother Griffin was already waiting for them. “Nice going!” he grinned. “While you two were keeping the adults busy I was able to slip right in and see Sir Mumph. They’ve got him on all tubes and stuff. It’s not looking good.” “What about Mr Bautista and Miss Night?” asked Mags. “Both of them have good hearts. They could help us.” “They’re being watched all the time,” Griffin reported. “I think they’re being drugged. They won’t wake up.” “It won’t do,” Samantha frowned. “Bad things are happening that grandfather would stop, so they can’t let him wake up.” “What can we do, then?” Magweed wondered. “Who knows when the Lair Legion will be back from their secret mission? Maybe if we went to Mother Miiri, or to Mother Hallie?” “They’ll have taken measures to stop both of them,” Samantha judged. “We don’t want to put your mothers in danger. But they might just have overlooked us.” She glanced over at Griffin. “Did you get it?” “I got it,” agreed the boy, handing over Sir Mumphrey Wilton’s gold pocketwatch, the Chronometer of Infinity. “Well then,” said Samantha Featherstone, “things just might not work out the way the ungodly have planned.” V “Situation report!” demanded Citizen Z striding into the Operations Room. “Why is that appalling noise disturbing my five minutes of downtime?” Kat Allen was at the situation globe. “We’re experiencing some very alarming peaks of E-M activity all around the world and in local space,” she reported, reading off the monitor information. “The sort of thing that happens just before there’s a breach in the Celestian protective barrier. But hundreds of them,” Beth turned to the robot simulacrum of Amber St Clare. “Get me EEE on line. Let’s see if that Framlicker woman can do more than read information off a computer screen.” “Where’s Dominic?” demanded Kat. “Where are the other Legionnaires?” “Top secret mission, need to know,” snapped Beth. “You don’t need to know.” Hallie seemed to blink in beside her; actually it was HAGGIE doing a reasonable impression. “There’s multiple activity traces of barrier incursion everywhere,” she reported. “I think this is it. The Parody Master’s big push!” “It can’t be yet,” Citizen Z objected. “Projections had the barrier holding for another two weeks now Goldeneyed had his beauty sleep. I need two weeks to finish… We were promised two weeks.” “Well it looks like we were wrong,” answered Miss Framlicker as the video-feed to Extraordinary Endeavour Enterprises flickered to life. “Those projections assumed the Parody Master wasn’t going to lean on the barrier with everything he’s got. He’s going to pop the bubble now.” “I’m heading down to G-Eyed!” announced Kat, removing her headset and racing for the door. “Get me a medical team there as well. Fast!” CZ turned to stare at the red patches blossoming over the holographic representation of the Earth. “HAG… Hallie, are we ready for Operation Brave New World?” “Not for ten days or so, like I said,” the A.I. replied. “Not if you want to have god mode ready to run.” Beth von Zemo looked around her trying not to panic. “Somebody tell me what our options are now, then!” she demanded. None of the Living Model Dummies were programmed for that. “We could try not to pee our pants,” suggested Silicone Sally. “Please? Since I am your pants?” “There’s an energy spike coming in!” warned HAGGIE. “Coming in here, right now!” Then the Parody Master appeared in the Operations Room before Citizen Z. “Who is in charge here?” he asked. Before Beth could stop it, the Contessa robot pointed to her. The Parody Master blasted every other being in the room to ashes. “Then you can offer me your world’s surrender,” he suggested to Beth von Zemo. “Madam, Miss, you’ll have to come with us,” the humourless security guards told Meggan and April. “You are being taken into custody on suspicion of sabotage and treason, and I am arresting you under OPS special war protocols.” “The hell you are,” snapped Meggan Foxxx. “Which genius came up with this dumb move, limpwad?” “The orders are from Director Soames himself, ma’am. Now please turn round so you can be handcuffed.” The security man nodded to his comrades. “Secure the children.” “Like %&£$!” said Alice, dropping the guard nearest to her. There was a spirited melee in which trained security men discovered the limits of their training before somebody had the wit to detonate a neural interrupt grenade to bring the women down. The second surprise was that little Iris and young Oliver weren’t in the nursery any more. “They’re so lovely,” beamed Magweed, cuddling Iris happily in the secret garret. “Do we really get to take care of them now?” “They’re on the team,” agreed Samantha. “Griff, your next mission out there is to get some diapers. Fast.” “You again,” said Baroness von Zemo as she faced the Parody Master in the Lair Mansion Operations Room. “Haven’t you got the hint yet that you’re not wanted around here?” “I’m a man who takes what he wants,” replied the conqueror of galaxies. “So I hear. Did I mention how offended I was not demanded as one of brides? Not that I’d want to come anywhere near you, you sad pathetic specimen of overcompensating manhood, but I hate to be left off the A-list.” “Um, boss,” whispered Silicone Sally, Citizen Z’s costume, “could we save the insults to the all-powerful mega-villain for some time when you’re not wearing me?” “I will receive your surrender now,” declared the tall man in the red and black battle armour. “Kneel before the Parody Master.” “I can’t surrender to you now, you idiot!” Beth tutted. “You’ve just fried half the people I’d need to consult with in your fit of dramatic entrancing. Now I’ll have to track down their alternates, get them together, form a consensus…” “You will yield this world to me, or all will die.” Citizen Z shook her head. “It just doesn’t work like that here. If I said we surrendered it would be meaningless right now. I need to get agreement. I need some time.” “Your time, and that of your world, has expired,” promised the Parody Master, raising his axe. “Okay, okay!” Beth said quickly. “I can short-cut all of this if you really insist. HAGGIE?” The crude green hologram blinked to life in her own form, a miss-happen crone-like figure with a rough wire-frame construction like a bad early video game. “Yes, o mighty cornered-by-the-Parody-Masterness?” she cackled. “HAGGIE, the Parody Master wants Earth to surrender. Do you have all the necessary projectors on line?” “You mean the… um, the projector projectors? Well, ninety percent of them, but the control matrix coding’s not quite finished yet, like I said, and…” “What is this babbling?” demanded the Parody Master, raising his axe. “Yield, or spend eternity screaming inside my weapon in ultimate agony.” He gestured, snarled, and popped the ragged remains of the Celestian barrier like a bubble. Outside the skies were filled with dimensional dreadnaughts. “We don’t have time to wait,” the Baroness decided. “HAGGIE, activate Operation: Brave New World. Now!” HAGGIE concentrated and fired up the Movie Gun. The Movie Gun translated video images to reality, and reality to digital data. Long thought disassembled and lost, now it was complete again and hooked into the transmitters that Citizen Z had commandeered on the Earth and moon. The amplifiers changed the gun’s range from a few hundred yards to a few hundred thousand miles. HAGGIE screeched as raw control data coursed through her processors. Suddenly she was holding the entire world in her hands. It was like giving birth to an elephant. “What is this?” demanded the Parody Master as the Earth began dissolving around him. “Goodbye, cretin!” the Baroness told him. “You lose. I win. I rule the Earth, not you.” Then the world and its moon vanished in a sparkle of pixels, leaving the Parody Master hanging impotently in empty airless space. In the Virtual Realm HAGGIE reformatted the entire Earth and made the adjustments necessary to ensure Baroness von Zemo’s absolute control. Next Time: The Baroness has stolen the Earth and now she intends to rule it. The only people free to stop her are a bunch of darn kids and some unconventional and dangerous allies. Join us and special guest stars John Cleese and Hugo Weaving as Elizabeth von Zemo undertakes Virtual Command, or Three Things To Bear In Mind When Conquering the World. Dancer’s Tie-In to Untold Tales #314/315: “I wish I hadst not consumed yon three jars of pickled eggs ere the adventure began. Original concepts, characters, and situations copyright © 2007 reserved by Ian Watson. Other Parodyverse characters copyright © 2007 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. |
| Follow-Ups: |
|
| Generation-3™ v1.0 beta © 2003-2007 Powermad Software |
|
|