Posted by The Hooded Hood returns from vacation and takes you to the glittering gala event of the season with a finale to stop the show in: on September 02, 2001 at 11:33:05:
#89: Untold Tales of the Save the Paradopolis Variety Theatre Benefit Concert
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“Hello viewers and
welcome to our coverage of the Save the Paradopolis Variety Theatre Benefit
Concert in Paradopolis’ Off-Centre Park. I’m Lania and I’ll be your host for the
evening as we watch the glittering and the great turn out to do their bit to
preserve this fine old landmark.” The transdimensional vortex made kaleidoscope patterns which gave travelling
through it in a modified red London double-decker bus something of an Austin
Powers feel. “Groovy!” commented Al B. Harper, staring out into the mind-bending
void. “I see you finally got the paraphasic shift generator working?” “Welcome back after the break. I’m Lania, here life at Off-Central park’s
sparkling charity concert. Let’s go down into the backstage area and see if we
can find a few of the folks who have helped set up this glittering occasion.
You, young man. What’s your name?” On the upper floor of the bus, Cheryl ran Ziles’ sensory apparatus across
Laurie Leyton’s stomach and checked the readouts. They were the greatest heroes the Parodyverse had to offer, and they stood
watching as the bomb that would destroy their planet counted down. Fin Fang Foom
strained against the telepathic signals from the Skree supercomputer known as
the Supreme Interference, but found that the brilliant repository of a billion
Skree brain patterns had calculated the exact frequency of the anti-psi shields
he and the Dark Knight regularly used and had generated a counterwave. Ziles
struggled to resist the psionic imperative with her own limited telepathic
abilities, but she was up against the combined mental potential of an entire
culture. Hatman strained against the paralysis, knowing that if he could only
reach to his belt and don his Thinking Cap he might yet resist this attack, but
also knowing that he could never manage to move so much. The Sorceress by his
side struggled to regain control of her body, pitting arcane understanding
against brutal mental domination, but without the words and gestures which made
the mental gymnastics so much easier she knew she would take too long. Dancer
knew she could break the Interference’s hold if only she could move enough to
generate a probability effect, but any movement at all was denied her.
CrazySugarFreakBoy! struggled from an innate belief that heroes always overcome
these things at the last possible moment by supreme effort. Trickshot simply
amused himself by thinking the vilest curse words he could imagine, knowing that
the organic computer was monitoring his thoughts. The Dark Knight sought to use
mental guerrilla tactics to enter the Interference’s own mind, but his enemy was
too cunning and experienced to fall for his ploys. Donar raged impotently. Troia
strove passionately. Exile strained hopelessly. Two hundred talking Vesalian
apes were unable to intervene. “Welcome back again. I’m Lania and while the stage crew set up for the
Aerosmith set I’m here now with Roland Danninger, organiser of the Save the
Paradopolis Variety Theatre Campaign. Roland, could you tell the viewers a
little bit about the programme tonight?” “Josh! Where the hell have you been when all the hard work needed doing?”
dull thud demanded. “Get over here, man. We need to shift Michael
Jackson’s shoe collection before…” “Hold it!” Mumphrey shouted, hurling aside his newspaper and leaping forward
to the front of the bus. “Turn aside, man! Quickly!” “No, really. I am Mayor of nearly everywhere. I have nineteen hundred chains
of office. I can show you them! Brittany? Brittany? Damn,” snorted spiffy. It
was turning into another spiffy evening, and he could almost hear his fern
chuckling at him. “What happened?” Al. B Harper moaned as he picked himself painfully up from a
shining sliver floor surface. “Where are we? What happened to the bus?” “Well, it’s been a wonderful evening, and now we come to the glittering
finale, the son-et-lumiére laser and fireworks finale featuring the whole
glittering company performing Queen’s The Show Must Go On. This is the
moment fans have been waiting for all evening, and even the excitement we had a
little earlier when Mayor spiffy was assassinated is nothing compared to how
hyped the fans here feel about this big moment. I believe Paul, George and Ringo
are coming on stage now to announce the big finish. For those of you who are
only getting this on radio, there’s an amazing light effect happening in the
sky, with rainbow spectrum effects rippling from horizon to horizon as if a big
time/space hole is opening up. I don’t know how these special effects boys do
it.” The NORAD threat board was lit up like a Christmas tree. “Hi there, people of Earth. Sorry to interrupt the concert just at the
interesting bit, but there are a few things you should know. My name’s
VelcroVixen, but you can call me for dinner. You may remember me from such world
takeover attempts as Count Fokker kidnaps the President and Erskine Blofish’s
Adamantium Robot Army. I’m here to tell you that as of about a minute ago the
Purveyors of Peril - the varsity of the super-villain elite - have taken command
of all nuclear, biological, and other weapons of mass destruction on the planet.
Now they’re only going to go off if our demands are not immediately and
absolutely met, so please don’t panic yet. “…hell is going on? What are those big robot things doing hovering there with
the green lightning shooting into them from the spires and towers of the city?
Why can I hear screaming in my head? Huh? We’re on? Ah, hello viewers. I’m… I’m
Lania and this is… is…” Next time: Who shot spiffy? Who cares? Chronic’s riff, and what
happened afterwards. 101 uses for a dead Space Robot. Don’t mess with the
Messenger. A very unusual bus stop. How I learned to stop worrying and love the
bomb. What Jamie did next. Lament of the Supreme Interference. And the villains
triumphant with a planet at their nonexistent mercy. Don’t miss Untold Tales
of the Purveyors of Peril, or they may send Onslaughter round to get
you.
For those of you wanting a quick brush-up on the membership of the Purveyors
of Peril, take at look at #75:
Untold Tales of the Lair Legion Who's Who Special Edition: The New Purveyors of
Peril
(Cue: opening credits, with shots of famous
people getting out of stretch limos)
“Right now I’m with local historian and
antiquarian Abyssal Greye, who’s going to tell us a little about the place which
has brought such a glittering array of stars from far and wide.”
“Get that
light out of my face, wench.”
“Er, sorry. The history, Mr Greye?”
“Not
Mister. Abyssal. The Abyssal Greye. It’s a title. Do they teach you children
nothing in this miserable modern age?”
“We didn’t have much time to chat
before the programme. You were a really long time in
make-up.”
“Somebody is going to die for this. The things we do to preserve
our heritage! Very well, young woman, the Parodiopolis Variety Theatre was
designed and built in the mid 1800s by the famous architect Leyland Reed at the
commission of city father Wilbur Parody himself. The property was raised over
the old Shiverer Cemetary, and the lost River Eisner runs beneath it.”
“River
Eisner? How can you lose a river?”
“By building entirely over it’s
watercourse. It has long since become a glorified sewer, and even the route it
took down to the sea is now lost to use. Parodiopolis has a number of forgotten
and buried waterways. Do they educate you in nothing at all except preening and
sluttery in this modern generation?”
“Er, well I’d have to say that preening
and sluttery were my life. So you were saying about the theatre?”
“It was
modelled on the Paris Opera House. Over two hundred rooms backstage and a five
tier auditorium. Platform lifts could make whole elephants appear on the stage.
All the greats performed there..”
“Like Jumbo?”
“All the great
performers of the day performed there. Bernhardt, Irving, Terry,
Shepherdson. It was the place for the people of Parodiopolis to gather
and be seen, a bastion of culture and of more vulgar entertainments. And so it
remained for over a century, until it was slain by the advent of modern vices
such as television.”
“Ah. Right. Well thanks very much Mr the Abyssal, um, or
whatever you are. I’m afraid we’ll have to leave it at that, viewers. We’ll be
back after this word from our sponsors.”
“Don’t
speak to me,” Miss Framlicker of the Interdimensional Transportation Corporation
snapped at him. “Besides, this is only a prototype and only works because it’s
charged with Goldeneyed’s teleportation energies.”
“But is still to be very
exciting to be zooming to infinity,” Yo grinned. “And beyond.”
“And we’re
never going to get there is ManMan doesn’t drive us straight,” Amy Racecar
scorned. She was still cross because she hadn’t got behind the wheel so she was
stood behind Joe Pepper offering caustic driving tips and quietly heating up the
metal chair he was sat upon.
“I am driving straight,” ManMan complained.
“There’s some kind of distortion effect around Paradopolis.”
“That’s one of
the truest things you’ve ever said,” agreed Cheryl. “And that’s even without the
weird readings I’m getting on our scanners just now. Still, see if you can’t
possibly get us there before the Hooded Hood completes his plan to trap and
reprogram the Celestian Space Robots that run the Parodyverse, will you?”
“If
he can do it,” Visionary comforted his wife. “I mean, I have trouble setting the
VCR, and those Celestian things are bound to be even more complicated than that,
right?”
Visionary had trouble switching the TV on if it came to that. “Just a
little more complex, yes dear. But I think we can assume the Hood might have
taken that into account.”
“Darn straight,” agreed Flapjack, who had
previously hunchback-servanted for the cowled crime czar. “He doesn’t leave
nothing to chance, the master.”
“Yo is thinking that cute Visi may be putting
the batteries in the wrong way,” Yo suggested with his/her usual fine grasp of
priorities.
“There’s something more than turbulence out there,” Miss
Framlicker worried. “I don’t know what, but it’s messing up our transit.”
Sir
Mumphrey Wilton was sitting on the back seat reading a copy of the Times.
nobody spotted him covertly checking the readings on his most unusual
pocketwatch. “Could be some kind of temporal disturbance,” he suggested. “And a
powerful one at that. Most perplexin’” The keeper of the Chonometer of Infinity
frowned to himself. It was almost as if he had set up the barrier that was
thwarting them himself.
“Give me the wheel,” Amy suggested. “I bet I could
get us past it.”
“Let me check your calculations, De – Miss Framlicker,” Al
B. suggested. “Maybe it’s some side effect of the Hood activating the old
telluric alignments between the five key sites in Paradopolis.”
“The Variety
Theatre, the Cathedral, the Lair Mansion, the Municipal Library, the Twin Parody
Tower,” ManMan recited. “No wonder the Hood manipulated this concert to save the
Theatre until he could spring his trap.”
The bus shuddered and bounced as the
interdimensional turbulence increased.
“Gently,” Cheryl urged. “Remember what
they’re doing upstairs. I’d better get up there with these test results.” The
goddess of HTML picked up her laptop, untangled the mouse from Visionary’s coat
buttons, and took the pregnancy test results to Lisette.
“Me? Are you talking to me?”
“Yes. Your
name, for the viewers at home?”
“Wick. Jeremy Wick. Am I on TV?”
“Right
now you’re being watched live by millions of viewers
nationwide.”
“Eeep.”
“So you’ve been working on the stage crew that put
all of this together, Jeremy. Would you say it was a big task? Jeremy?”
“…..
Hello mom.”
“Jimmy, where the hell have y’got to lad? We’ve got to get
Madonna’s make-up tray to her dressing trailer and there’s nineteen bagsworth o’
the damn stuff! Oh, hello, I didn’ae know you’d pulled.”
“Actually, I’m
Lania, and you’re on national TV, Mister…?”
“Really? What, live?”
“That’s
right. What have you to say to the folks at home?”
“Bugger off an’ let us get
out work done. It’s hard enough roadie-ing th’ biggest concert on the planet
with two hundred temperamental superstars trying to kill each other without some
damnfool interviewer tripping us up and getting in the way. Isn’t it,
Jimmy?”
“…..”
“Aw, don’t worry Jimmy, Davie. You two get on with your
work. I’ll talk to them.”
“Och aye! Anything to allow ye to stand around
preening with that damn guitar rather than shifting Michael Jackson’s vanity
mirror with the special polarised glass to make him look more white. We’ve been
shorthanded ever since Josh vanished earlier, and now you want to stand in front
of the telly cameras all bloody evening.”
“Can you say bloody on the
television?”
“I dinnae ken, Jimmy, but I’ll be saying worse if we bide here
longer. Come on. We have to try and get Pavarotti winched onto stage.
“As you
can see, viewers, its all bustle and go here backstage at the Save the
Paradopolis Variety Theatre Concert. Right now I’m here with… um, are you a
performer?”
“I have a guitar. I have an act. Wanna see it?”
“And you would
be…?”
“I’ve got something to show the viewers at home that they’ll never
forget.”
As Chronic unzipped his jeans and bent over to the camera the studio
cut to commercials just too late.
“Well?” Valeria of Carfax
asked nervously. “Is she with child?”
“Just hold on a moment while I make
sense of these readings,” Cheryl responded.
Lisette swallowed. This was the
moment that would define the rest of her life.
“Stay calm, hon,” Meggan
reassured her. “It’s okay.”
“If you have quickened and are to bear his baby
then Bry will most undoubtedly wed you,” Valeria told Laurie.
“No he won’t,”
snapped Lisette. “Not like this. Not because I got stupid. I won’t let
him.”
“But Laurie…”
“Listen, all of you,” she glared at the women
assembled. “Whatever the result, positive or negative, as far as Bry Katz is
concerned it was a false alarm. Understand?”
“I don’t know if that’s a good
idea,” suggested Cheryl diplomatically.
“We can’t lie to him!” Valeria
gasped.
“Sure we can.” Meg contradicted. “We do it to men all the time. It’s
for their own good.”
“I don’t want him to know,” Lisette replied.
“Please?”
“Well, I’ve got the results,” Cheryl announced
uncertainly.
“And?” Laurie demanded.
“You’re going to have a
baby.”
“Oh.”
“What was confusing me was that I was picking up two foetal
lifesigns in the room,” Cheryl explained.
“I’m… I’m having twins?” paled
Lisette.
“No,” Cheryl answered carefully. She looked over at Meg.
“That’s
right, folks,” Meggan Foxxx replied. “I’m pregnant too.”
“Welcome back.
I’m Lania, here at the Benefit Concert and I’m speaking with the Mayor of
Gothametropolis York, and indeed of most of the rest of America, Mr Mark
Hopkins. Why are you here tonight, Mayor spiffy, and why don’t you have a
date?”
“Er, that last part wasn’t in on the rehearsal when we
practised.”
“You’re saying that you’ve never had a date?”
“No, no I didn’t
say that. I’ve had lots of dates.”
“With girls?”
“Of course. Sure. Girls.
Really. I am omni-mayor you know. Chicks dig that. They do. Honestly. I had to
fight them off tonight to come on my own so I could, um, yeah, appreciate the
music. That’s it.”
“And do you believe in the cause tonight?”
“Sure. Who
wouldn’t want to rescue seals? Er, we are saving seals and dolphins,
right?”
“Excuse me a moment miss, miss. I need to speak to the Mayor. Mayor
Hopkins, have you seen the Acting Mayor of Paradopolis? We have a little
difficulty we need him to settle.”
“Gee, I don’t think so, Commissioner
Graham. Was he invited?”
“This is Paradopolis. I think he probably
was.”
“Police Commissioner Graham is now conferring with Mayor spiffy.
Commissioner Graham, has tonight caused any special policing
difficulties?”
“You mean apart from the two hundred Sentinoid battle robots
those idiots of SPUD have deployed around the arena because they tracked a
mutate presence here? I need to find the Acting Mayor and get him to tell Drury
and his idiots to back off before there’s a major panic in a crowd of thirty
thousand people.”
“And now coming through the crowd I see the world’s most
famous secret agent, war hero and leader of the Super-Menace Protectorate
Underwear Dressers or whatever they call themselves, SPUD. Have you any words
for the camera, Colonel Drury?”
Cut to commercial again, quickly.
Nats didn’t need to move to activate his
flying power. Admittedly, he needed to move to steer, but he was able to zoom
upwards and bounce off the roof without any help. He tried to aim towards the
gene-bomb which was counting down past six minutes to go, hoping to smash it
with the impact of his body.
The Supreme Interference shut his mind down. It
didn’t take much effort. There was a painful-sounding crunch as Nats rejoined
the floor by way of an interposing wall.
Goldeneyed watched.
“What? What’s
going on?” moaned Peter von Doom, regaining consciousness after being kicked
into the traditional control panel by Dancer earlier.
“Ah, welcome back to
the end of the world,” the Supreme Interference bade him.
“Huh? Who are you?”
puzzled the slightly concussed villain.
“He’s the master, ‘master’,” the
Minion told him. The professional flunky was scratched and bitten and walked
with a painful limp after his encounter with a pack of aroused roboroos
earlier.
“Huh? What do you mean, my Minion?”
“Not your Minion, actually,
von Doom you useless little pipsqueak. His. He was behind your masterplan all
along.”
Von Doom paled. “What are you saying? What…”
“I sent the Minion
into your service and guided your planning along,” the Supreme Interference
gloated. “Thus I had you take all the risks of assembling this genetic rewriter.
However, instead of mutating the planet’s population to be your slave servitors,
it will instead transform the Earth to be the new homeworld of the reborn Skree
empire.”
“That’s not fair!” complained Peter von Doom.
“Life’s like that,”
the Minion smirked. “May I kill him now, master? Slowly and
humiliatingly?”
“Indeed,” agreed the Supreme Interference. “As you wish,
Minion.”
“Nooooo!” gasped von Doom.
While all attention was centred on the
terrified villain, Goldeneyed vanished in a flash of teleportation energies and
reappeared beside the bomb. Then he fell against the Celestian device and
concentrated for the build-up of power that would transport it
off-planet.
The Supreme Interference shut down G-Eyed’s mind too.
Finny
acted. He didn’t need to move to regain his true draconic shape and size, and it
did allow him to smash through the roof and collapse most of the secret lab. He
knew his team might be buried in the debris, but things were getting
desperate.
And now they were under an open sky. Donar Oldmanson, hemigod of
thunder, did not actually need to move to summon the storms that were his
birthright. They were more a function of his temper, and right now he was sorely
miffed. Donar had a limited understanding of technology, but he knew
televisions, and he knew from old experience what happened if you lightning
stuck them with a quarter of a million volts of electricity. And when you got
down to it, the Supreme Interference was basically a big spud-head on a TV
screen.
It only took a few seconds for the Interference’s safety interlocks
to cut in after the bolt from the blue, but in that time his paralysis of the
Lair Legion failed. “Wah-hoo!” screamed CrazySugarFreakBoy! diving for the
now-exposed computer banks. Dancer had his back, pirouetting behind him to make
sure he was pulling out exactly the right circuit boards.
The Minion decided
it was time to withdraw. Then he bumped into Troia and it all got
gory.
“Uh-huh! You’re staying till the end of th’ party too, Doomsie!”
Trickshot called. True, the irritating archer was pinned on his chest under a
pile of debris, but that didn’t stop three well-aimed daggers stapling the
villain to the wall by his cloak.
There was an explosion as Exile got DK,
Sorceress, and Hatman free from the debris.
“Goldeneyed is down for the
count,” Ziles shouted to Fin Fang Foom. “There’s no way to get him back up in
time to transport this bomb off-world.”
“We have less than three minutes,”
Hatman worried. “Let me try my bomb-disposal man’s helmet.”
“Stand back,” the
Sorceress commanded. “All of you. If we can’t get this thing off the Earth then
we’ll do the opposite. Get away. Really away.”
“Sorceress, we don’t have time
for…” began the Dark Knight.
There was a shudder across the Slurt National
Park as Whitney Darkness called power to her.
“Do as she says,” Hatman
shouted. “Emergency evacuation.”
Dancer made Exile and Trickshot bring the
prisoners. Donar snatched up Nats and G-Eyed. DK dropped something bright and
hot into the Interference’s computer core. “I hope he’s still under warranty,”
he snarled as the thermite slagged the equipment.
“Art thou sure thou knowest
what thou art doing?” Donar checked with Sorceress as the ground began to crack.
“To summon thus mine mother ist…”
“Get… out…” Whitney told him, in a voice as
ancient as womankind.
“I art getting out,” the Ausgardian assured her.
“Ma’am.”
Suddenly the Earth split. The crack became a gap and the gap widened
into a chasm, until the Celestian artefact toppled into the crevice. The shaft
deepened and deepened until it met the magma beneath the planet’s mantle. The
suddenly-freed molten lava sprayed under pressure until it burst free under the
Worraplonka Falls Research Centre. Australia gained its first currently-active
volcano.
Still the device sunk, deeper and deeper to the core of the Earth.
Even at these pressures and temperatures the Celestian device was unharmed, not
even warmed by the raging fire of the world’s core, but as it descended and the
countdown timer ticked down to zero all the other supporting technology was
seared away. Programming, radioactive power source, everything was evaporated in
the furnace heart of the planet.
“Okay,” Finny gulped. “Volcano evacuation
procedure.”
“Are you okay, Whitney?” Ziles asked the trembling Sorceress,
“Only your shoes have melted.”
The Sorceress folded back and collapsed into
Hatman’s arms.
“Note to self,” Flapjack muttered, looking at the steaming
crater where Peter von Doom’s base had been. “Don’t annoy Mistress Darkness
again. Ever.”
“Is the bomb destroyed?” Exile wanted to know, choking on the
clouds of black fumes and grey ash. “Did we do it?”
“Time is up and we
haven’t all been mutated,” Troia pointed out. “Except that Flapjack was a
deformed little troll anyway. So I’d guess that we won.”
“Good,” the Dark
Knight said tersely. “Now we only have to cap this new volcano and we can get on
with the next part of the plan.”
“Well Lania, we have a star studded
evening ahead of us. There were plenty of suggestions for who we might get on
the bill, and of course performers from all over wanting to contribute to this
vital and worthy cause, but ultimately we went for only the best.”
“I recall
there was something of a scandal when controversial girl-band the Wicked Pixies
offered to perform tonight?”
“Cinnamon Rain did offer to take part at one
point, but we felt her, um, her message wasn’t right for the occasion, and as it
turned out she sent word that she had another gig anyway. But let’s just
consider who we do have tonight: Clapton, the Stones, McCartney, Sting, Elton,
Tina, Michael…”
“It’s amazing how strongly the celebrities feel about this,
isn’t it Roland.”
“I admit that I was surprised by the response. Our
anonymous benefactor who is sponsoring this event must be very persuasive to be
able to put a line-up like this together.”
“And that’s another thing, Roland.
We’ve all heard that some mysterious sponsor stepped in at the last minute to
save the concert when it looked like it was going to fold. Will we be finding
out who was behind the eleventh hour rescue tonight?”
“I’m afraid even I
don’t know who our mystery man or woman is, Lania. But if they’re watching all I
can say is thank you. You are the real hero of Paradopolis!”
The Hooded Hood
flicked channels and waited patiently for the urgent news flash to break on CNN.
“Never mind Michael Jackson,” De Brown
Streak told his memory-wiped comrades.
“I know what you mean,” Jimmy Wick
admitted. “He’s not really done anything much since Thriller, and even
then…”
“I mean there’s things going on here that you don’t
understand.”
“Like how Kylie Minogue got on the talent list?” Chronic
snorted, looking out onto stage.
“Like how the Hooded Hood is using us to
take over universe,” DBS answered.
dull thud looked at DBS
suspiciously. “Have ye been at the illegal substances, Josh?”
“Just listen.
We’re all superheroes. Well, super-powered people. Well, super-powered people
and one parasitic tapeworm.”
“Whatever he took, it was good,” Chronic
noted.
“We’re all superheroes inside,” Jimmy agreed sympathetically. “Sure we
are.”
“The Hooded Hood took our memories of our powers and true identities
and set us up here as roadies in case his adversary Peter von Doom sent someone
to try and disrupt the concert. Otherwise we might have tried to stop him doing
whatever it is he needs a massive build-up of human life-force for.”
“What
human life-force?” Jimmy puzzled.
There was a massive cheer as Phil Collins
stepped onto the stage.
“That life force,” hissed DBS. “Thirty thousand
people all cheering and shouting at the same time, all focused on the same
thing, in an artificial arena we helped build that is jam-packed with psionic
amplifiers, at an event that is being broadcast internationally to an estimated
twenty million households worldwide.”
dull thud was lagging behind in
the conversation. “What parasitic tapeworm?” he puzzled.
Joshua Clement
sighed. “Well,” he mused, “it worked for me when Messenger tried it.” Then he
hit dull thud on the chin and started in on Jimmy and Chronic.
As a
plan it was working quite well until Jimmy Wick, Dynamite Boy, exploded.
ManMan has been
struggling against the local dimensional turbulence, trying to find a way to
rematerialise the bus at Off-Central park though unprecedented intervortex
currents. Now it was clear why. Sir Mumphrey had finally worked out why the
chronal readings his temporal pocketwatch had detected were so familiar. They
had come from his own time-manipulating instruments, but from a time when they
had belonged to another.
“What’s the matter?” worried Visionary, as the
vehicle lurched and spilt his coffee into his lap. “Aaaagh!”
“It’s a trap!”
Mumph warned. “Symmetry of Synchronicity. But how…?”
The red double decked
bus ploughed straight into the hidden timeweb, sending it spinning end over end
through the fourth dimension. The people inside were hurled over and over,
bouncing off the furniture and each other.
There was hardly time to scream
before the vehicle winked out of local reality altogether.
“That should keep
them out of my hair,” the Hooded Hood murmured, watching the scene through his
Portal of Pretentiousness. The bargain with Madame Symmetry had proved most
useful after all.
It was about to get worse. “Perhaps if you let the weed do
the chat-up lines?” Messenger suggested.
spiffy yelped, leaped in the air,
and spilt a slushee down his pants, which was going to help in his quest for the
ladies no end. “You! What are you doing here?” the ferned phenomenon asked the
shadowy postman.
“The usual. Fighting evil, saving the universe. I need your
help.”
“It’s that bad?” spiffy worried. “No, that’s not what I mean. I mean
not that it’s so bad you have to resort to me to help you, but that things are
bad enough that…”
“We’re on a deadline here,” Messenger noted. “Could you
save the rest of this incoherent sentence for later if there is a
later?”
“Are the Abandoned Legion with you?” Mark Hopkins asked plaintively.
“Only they’ve stopped returning my phone calls.”
“The Hood’s got them. Who
knows where he’s zapped them to, along with nearly every other random superhero
around town? We’re on our own here, and it’s all down to us.”
“Oh crap.
What’s happening then?”
“The Hooded Hood is trying to use the psionic energy
of the concert-goers as the final element in his plot to trap and reprogram
Celestian Space Robots. We’ve got to stop the concert. You have to stop
the concert.”
“Me?” spiffy panicked. “How?”
“And now,” the speakers
boomed, “in a special addition to the schedule, Mayor Hopkins will perform a
song and dance routine with tunes from Cats.”
“It’s all taken care
of,” smirked Messenger. “Get out there and stop the show.”
“What? I can’t… I
don’t… you bastard…”
Mercifully, the bullet hit spiffy before he could begin
to perform.
“Last
I remember was this shimmering web thing, and then… clockwork?” puzzled
ManMan.
“Yo is thinking that we are not to be being in Kansas any more, or in
any of cute states in United States of America.”
The stranded heroes looked
up. And up. And up. And up.
“Oh drat,” breathed Visionary.
“Lania! You’ve got to let me at the camera! I need to talk to
people.”
“And, um, here’s one of the technical people we talked to earlier.
Johnny, isn’t it?”
“Jimmy, Jimmy Wick, but that’s not important right now.
You have to tell the folks at home to switch off! Now! Don’t watch
this!”
“What do you mean? Get off my microphone you little pervert! And, er,
now the middle of the lightshow has some big silver shapes appearing in it, and
it seems as if the whole city is glowing, from the Twin Parody Tower to the east
to the Cathedral to the west. Massive strands of burning light are shining along
the old streets as will you let go of that mike? Security!”
“I’ll deal
with him, ma’am.”
“Aah! Get off, Big Rancid Dwayne. thud! help. He’s
got me!”
“And, erm, what appear to be life-sized replicas of those giant
silver robots that appeared over all our cities a couple of years back to herald
the end of the world are appearing out of the lightshow. It’s very
realistic.”
“Yiu again, Big Rancid Dwayne? Right, I’m having Cassandra turn
ye into a jellyfish!”
“And now around two hundred mutate-hunting Sentinoids
are invading the stage and seem to be trying to grab one of the technical team…
who is avoiding them at amazing speeds.”
“Use confinement pattern delta you
mother-huggin’ diaper-soilin’ frog-lickin’ yahoos!”
“Stop watching! You’re
bringing them through! You’re bringing them through!”
“Some… some
enthusiastic fans in trenchcoats appear to be engaging in mock battle up on the
lighting scaffolding.”
“So Messenger, you have chosen to face me… and
die!”
“Shut it off! Cut! Cut!!”
Then the screen changed.
“We interrupt
this live broadcast for a newsflash…”
“What is it?”
screamed the general in charge. “What the hell is going on?”
“Sir, all
Eastern Bloc nuclear missiles have just gone into pre-launch sequence!” a very
worried master-sergeant reported.
“What the f…? Then go to Defcon Three. Now!
And get the President. Where the hell is he?”
“Paradopolis, sir, at the
benefit concert. We’ve got a city-wide communications blackout there.”
“Then
get me the Vice President. Get me the Chairman of the Rotary Club. Get me Dan
Quayle for heaven’s sake, but get me somebody who can tell us to launch our own
birds before it’s too late!”
“Sir, they’re launching anyway.”
The general
swung around as the doom klaxon started sounding. “Launching? What do you mean,
launching?”
“Sir, our own systems are being overriden. Our own nuclear
weapons are going to the fire cycle too.”
“Sir!” a panicky lieutenant
shouted. “Sir, the news bulletin!”
“Enough prattle, VelcroVixen. I am
Professor Manyarms, the greatest scientific genius of the atomic age. As of this
moment all world governments will dissolve. If any of you attempt to meet to
give commands we will detonate enough nasty things in your vicinity that your
nation of origin will be glowing in the dark in a thousand years time. If you
attempt to disarm your weapons we will likewise set them off.”
“I guess all
that arms proliferation stiff doesn’t seem as smart now, huh? As well as what
Manyarms said, all laws are suspended. There are no laws. There are no rules. Do
what you like, when you like, to who you like, until further notice. All prisons
will be opened and all criminals released and given a handgun of their choice.
The Purveyors will come amongst you and ensure a few key targets are dealt with,
and anybody who gets in our way is welcome to die.”
“Any law enforcement
official who attempts to prevent our new regime is to be slaughtered like a pig,
of course. We will pay a handsome reward for every police officer’s head brought
in once our new rulership infrastructure is established, so please feel free to
start collecting now. We’ll even give you a 50% credit for traffic wardens.”
“Oh, this offer is void in Paradopolis, where things should remain pretty
much business as usual except for an incursion of Celestian Space Robots. We’ve
reactivated the old Skree force-field around the city to prevent anybody from
leaving or entering. So behave yourselves, you people in the Big Banana. We’ve
got a special treat in store for you. Now you can all panic. And now back to
your regular coverage of the Paradopolis Benefit Concert.”
A low chord thrummed through the most powerful sound
system on the planet and grabbed every member of the crowd by their guts and
demanded their attention.
“Good evening, Paradopolis,” the scruffy young man
in the black leather duster bade the stunned crowd. In the crackling green light
of the struggling Space Robots his own eyes seemed to glint a fiery red. “My
name’s Chronic, and I’d like to welcome you to the end of the world show.” He
ran his fingers over his demonic guitar Steve and grinned a thin, wicked smile.
“Let’s rock!”