Saving the Future – Part 15: Change and Decay Previously:    The Lair Legion, their Mansion, the island it stood upon, and the SPUD helicarrier have all vanished in a bright flash of light. Our heroes have awoken scattered across strange savage lands filled with monsters and mystery. Previous Chapters ***     There was something new in the thirty-two worlds. Change had come. There were strangers, powerful strangers, and with them came threats and opportunities. The powers ruling the lands stirred and prepared to deal with the newcomers, each in their own way. ***     The Low Troll’s warriors attacked as soon as the long shadows turned into twilight, breaking out from tunnels they had carved beneath the camp where the human refugees were gathering. They avoided the newly-arrived temple with its dark ancient masonry and its strange actinic aura and instead concentrated on the place that the creatures of flesh had created makeshift huts from wood felled from the rainforest.     Jokk was the first to break out, bursting through the turf to seize the nearest victim. A dozen other trolls were right behind him, huge, wiry, terrible. The Low Troll had instructed them to show no mercy. Only a few survivors would be required to drag back to the mines.     But the human Jokk grabbed refused to be swept up and crushed. Instead his body transmuted to living steel. His hand closed on Jokk’s wrist, snapping it like a twig, and the massive troll was propelled by his own momentum head over heels into the nearby campfire.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Now!” shouted another human, clad in garish bright oranges and greens. He pushed backwards with all his strength on a flesh-coloured elastic sling spread between two trees, then allowed himself to be catapulted forward to tumble between the attack trolls like a pinball. The sling morphed into the shape of a woman and bounced after him, eager not to miss the fun.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“An ambush!” called the war shaman. “They knew we were coming!” He raised his magic-stick to strike the humans blind, deaf, and dumb.     But suddenly, between seconds, his magic-stick was gone from his hands and was broken over a knee and cast aside. In literally no time he found himself facing an elderly human with prominent whiskers, and a shining gold ornament at the end of a long gold chain was swinging towards his head. And that was the last the war shaman knew.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Over there, too,” called the neon-hued jester, indicating where his goggles indicated heat-signatures that warned other troll-tunnels had just been made. The man of steel shifted his headgear for a helmet with a lamp on it and easily burrowed down to break into the shafts. The elastic woman and the bouncing fury disappeared down to attack the ambush parties.     The troll attack became a hasty troll retreat. A number of creatures were left behind to be trussed up and eventually released with a severe message of warning for the Low Troll.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Everybody all right?” checked Hatman.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Sure,” agreed Silicone Sally, reattaching her bikini since it wasn’t of unpredictable molecules to stretch with her.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Absolutely fine,” approved CSFB! watching appreciatively.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“This was an obvious attack, easy to stop,” Mumphrey noted disdainfully. “We’ll probably have more trouble with those squid-head blighters.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Well I hope they get on with it tonight,” said Hatman. “Because in the morning we’re going to need to send out hunting parties to feed all these people.”     The archaeologist’s camp had swollen in size from four academic survivors to sixty or more SPUD agents, plus a hundred or so indigenous tribespeople who had come to render the Holy Item back to its master. Chad was very happy to have his accordion back.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Keep the fire going,” said Hatman. “We’ve still got plenty of strays out there.” ***     The Low Troll was unimpressed when his defeated and shamed warriors shuffled back with the dawn, released and sent home by the humans they’d set out to destroy. He sat his warlords round a stone table, hefted his metal-studded club, and walked around them.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“When a troll become pre-eminent he expected to have enthusiasms…” he began.     He never got to the bit where he pounded in the skulls of the warriors that had failed him and shamed trollkind. He was diverted by the disturbance as thirty or so trolls of the Wartcrust Clan shouldered their way into the tribal underhall.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What this?” the Low Troll demanded. “Who want to die so soon they interrupt me when I do big dramatic sol-il-oquy?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Ach, wisht!” snorted a squat broad uniformed bipedal hippo in a kilt. “Ah wants tae be ha’ing a word to twa with ye regarding yuir policies towards the humans up there in the ruins. Now we can do this the nice way or the nasty way, but both a’em end up with me blowing the heill outta yuis and setting up these other bogies tae be in charge, so I’ll let ye pick which one we go fra.”     Sergeant Argus MacHarridan gestured for his trolls at arms to show what he’d drilled into them over the last three weeks. “Come an hae a go with the hippo aggro!” he said, before the roughhouse began. ***     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Attention, mammalian scum!” shouted Hauptsturmführer Hathhh through a megaphone from his steam-driven command car. “The salvage you cringe within is the rightful property of the Saurian Master-Race. You will sstep outside and ssurrender or face the wrath of your betters.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Nazi dinosaurs?” Dan Drury, Director of SPUD, noted from inside the downed helicarrier he was trying to repair. “Are those dinosaurs and nazis?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Looks like,” agreed Ronald Beezleyhuztoy. “Again. Like that time with the stolen windmills.”     Drury flashed his newest (and only) agent a worried glance. “Well, I’m glad they put on the Nazi uniforms,” he admitted. “That makes things really nice and clear.” He slammed his fist down onto the helicarrier’s automated defence activation pad. “Wah-hoo!” ***     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Here come more of the monsters!” shouted the tree people, bearing down on Visionary, Dancer, Amber, Garrick, and Flapjack with burning torches and clubs. “Get them!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Stay back,” Bad News Herb warned. “I’m a U.S. Government official.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And I’m not a monster,” added Vizh. “I’m real, dammit!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And I think my grass skirt is flammable!” worried Amber     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And we already dealt with Dr Morbidius,” explained Dancer. “We’re not creatures of him. Look, we haven’t got a stitch on us. Er, I mean…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And that’s no way to organise a mob,” added Flapjack critically. “Haven’t you people even invented the pitchfork?”     The tree people were a little daunted. “Prepare to burn, spawn of evil!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I think they’re talking to you,” Vizh warned Garrick. “Amazing how these primitive people have such character insights.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Well it’s true they didn’t say spawn of idiots,” snapped the G-Man. “But they were looking at Flapjack when they mentioned monsters.”     Flapjack preened.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“They can lynch us if they must, as long as I don’t have to be the bride of somebody first,” decided Amber.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Get them!” shouted the tree people mob. “Pound them into – urk!”     And then suddenly the tree people laid down their weapons, turned about, and walked off through the forest.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And that’s pretty amateur too!” objected Flapjack. “Hey, come back here and get on with the mob scene! That’s cheating. And bring the wenches with the heaving bodices.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“That was… a pretty unlikely piece of choreography,” breathed Dancer. “I mean real precision movement, all together. Total synchronisation.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Where did they go?” demanded Garrick, scowling. “What did you do?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Well, it’s been a couple of days since I got a chance to shower,” suggested Vizh.     The Librarian strode into the clearing. “It was me,” he told them. He held up a gadget made from his PDA, a coathanger, a digital watch, some wild turnips, and a pulsating glob of living architecture. “A little present from Al B., based upon some stuff we examined in an alien city yesterday. Basic synaptoid-stimulus broadcast wave, very effective on mob mentalities in low education concept-associative cultures.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“That would have been my first guess,” responded Visionary.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Mind control,” grinned Flapjack. “Now we’re talking. Um, you want me to carry that gadget for you?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Absolutely not,” said Lee Bookman.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Absolutely not,” agreed Amber St Clare.     The Librarian carefully powered down the device for now by detaching the fermented coconut. “I take it you’re responding to Hallie’s pulsed locator signal and heading to the Lair Mansion?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We’re heading to your headquarters,” agreed Garrick curtly. “But we were apparently navigating by the twitching of Flapjack’s groin.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Let’s not go into how he can sense the direction of the Mansion,” Vizh suggested hastily. “Let’s just get home.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Or anywhere with shampoo and a shower,” agreed Dancer.     They pushed on through the undergrowth until the jungle line ended abruptly where a shingle beach began. Beyond that was the familiar terrain of Parody Island and the distinctive rambling shape of the Lair Mansion itself.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Quickly,” Flapjack urged them. “I have knockers to rub.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“They’re coconut shells and they were all we could find,” snapped Amber, overdefensively, before she realised the hunchback had been speaking more generally.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We need to get inside, and find out if any more of the LL are back,” Dancer decided. “And check they’ve not used all the hot water.”     As they approached the house a familiar green form fizzed into sight before them. “Hold, intruders. You trespass on the lands of the emerald enchantress! Flee lest I turn you into… Visionary? Vizh, is that you?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Hallie. Hey. How’s things?”     The hologram shrugged. “Oh, you know, kidnapped to an unknown location and not able to remember anything since 1999, so I… Good grief! What the hell happened to your hairline?” ***     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Hey there,” Al B. called out to Yuki Shiro as the net he was in was released from the pterosaur’s claws to drop him in a heap on the cliff shelf atop the pirate stronghold of Lost Tavan. “I picked up your radio message.”     The Lair Legion’s cyborg P.I. and the advanced android Anna had used the lofty altitudes of the fortress peak to erect a makeshift broadcast mast to try and contact their scattered comrades. “Good,” replied Yuki. “These corsair guys keep trying to renegotiate the deal. Can you believe they took me and Anna on at a drinking contest last night?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And then these people picked up me,” Al B. concluded. “Interesting to see Hatzegopteryx so close up though. Nobody had realised that those dorsal fin ridges were shaded with…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“The slave will be silent!” ordered Bootleg Bran Boscome, the archscientist’s new legal owner. “Arrr!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Did he actually say Arrr?” asked Anna wonderingly.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“That’s not a slave,” Yuki told the pirates that were gathering round. “He’s my comrade. He’s with me.”     Pirate king Mad Will Hancock smiled slowly to himself. “Yours, ye say? A challenge for ownership is it, under the pirate code?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“So far nobody’s been able to provide a written copy of this code,” Anna pointed out. “And really, if the information isn’t readily downloadable…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yes, it’s a challenge,” sighed Yuki, who was experienced enough to know where this was going. Hancock had just been looking for an excuse to renege on his original agreement with the ‘foreign wenches’. “Al’s with us. If anybody can refine our transmitter to operate through those ‘stitch gates’ you people keep going on about then it’s him. So who do I have to clobber this time?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Don’t worry,” Anna comforted the captured archscientist. “Killing pirates is easy.”     Al B. frowned. “Easy? What do you mean?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Oh, I eliminated quite a lot of them when we first came here,” the android confided. “They’re only baseline human.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“The Moor is yours, ye say?” said Captain Hancock. “But I say he’s fair pirate booty, my share o’ Boscomb’s haul. So if you wants him then ye’ve got to beat me in single combat, yellow girl, and devil take the loser.”     The other pirates gathered round. This was the sort of stuff they liked.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Let me fight him, Yuki,” Anna offered. “I am a superior combat machine to you.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“No, you’re not,” the cyborg P.I. replied. “You have better equipment, that’s all. Leave this to me.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You could get me out of these ropes, Anna,” Al B. suggested. “And tell me what you meant about eliminating lots of pirates.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Fine, Mad Will,” Yuki called. “If I need to kick your corsair butt round your eyrie then that’s what I’ll do. Anna, hold my jacket. I don’t want to get bits of pirate on it.”     The sun-browned corsairs hastily vacated a wide circle as Yuki and Hancock strode down to face each other. Released from his net, Al B. fumbled with the makeshift tracking device he’d made out of quartz, bits from the cephaloid city of Ur-Vakir, and another fermented coconut battery.     Yuki blurred in to take down the pirate kind with a single kick.     Mad Will slapped her away hard with the back of his hand. “Ye think ye’re the first to come here and challenge old Cap’n Hancock?” the corsair gloated. “Think ye again!”     His hand unfolded, becoming a red and black construction that crackled with dots of energy.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Apokalyspian tech!” Al B. Harper recognised. “Yuki, watch out!”     But the cyborg P.I. was already rolling aside from the energy blasts that Hancock was spraying at her with pinpoint precision. She rolled low under one of the shantytown huts but the pirate kind blasted it to splinters.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Come on, wench!” he called. “Ye thought ye were the only one with magic powers? Nobody pulls a fast one on Mad Will Hancock!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Let me help her!” Anna said, moving forward; but Al B. stopped her: “It’s a duel. Get involved and it becomes a war.”     Hancock’s energy glaive doused the fires around the demolished hut with a burst of negativity energy so he could find his target again. “Up here!” Yuki called just before she released the chains on the pterodactyl bars above the cliff edge. She shooed the released beasts in panicked flight down towards Mad Will.     The pirates depended on their trained rides for their power. Hancock couldn’t just blast the pterosaurs aside. That gave Yuki cover to slip in close and aim a punch at the pirate king.     Hancock caught Yuki’s fist in his glaive. “Not fast enough, little girl. My devil’s hand is stronger and quicker than ye.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Probably so,” agreed the cyborg P.I. “Good job I’ve got another hand.” She brought up her left fist and slammed it into Mad Will’s face. The pirate king went down.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Hail the new pirate king!” the corsairs began to shout. ***     Silcone Sally watched Sir Mumphrey Wilton cautiously. “You knew about me,” she noted.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Fascinating, this,” the eccentric Englishman mused. “According to my chronometer here, a few of these black stones are several billion years older than the Earth. Dashed peculiar, what?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You knew about me,” Sally repeated, stretching up to join Mumphrey where he squatted beside the ancient carvings. “I know you did.”     The eccentric Englishman looked up from investigating the Peruvian ruins with his pocketwatch. “About Elizabeth von Zemo’s masquerade as Citizen Z and you quite literally supportin’ her? Absolutely. Some of the Legion would have worked it out sooner or later too, except I can’t shield all of them from the Hooded Hood’s retcons the way I protect myself, dash it.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You knew but you went along with it. You made a deal with the Baroness and she put you in charge of the whole Earth for the Parody War.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Not quite that simple,” the old man snorted, “but often the manipulators are the best folks to manipulate. And in war you need some people who don’t stop to worry about the morality of things.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“People like the Baroness or people like you?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Maybe. Everything got out of hand there towards the end though.”     Sally paused. “So do you think that people who have done bad things can ever become good people again? Or… for the first time.”     Mumphrey paused in his examination of the ancient carvings. “I think you could, Ms Rezilyant,” he told her. “If you chose to.” ***     Hatman pulled off his jeweller’s cap and folded the armature with the magnifying lens back onto the headband. “Interesting,” he mused, moving away from the rune-carved black rock that formed a buttress of the ruined city where he sat.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yeah?” promoted CrazySugarFreakboy! “And?”     Jay Boaz pointed to the notes they’d assembled about the ancient site that had somehow been transported to this strange land a few days before the heroes had been likewise shanghaied. “We’ve got Dr Loring’s notes on the findings at Callejón de Huaylas and its history. We’ve got the measurements and observations Champagne made before she… vanished. Mumphrey’s given us some very precise dates for when this place was created, and has identified the stones used in amongst the ruins that are older than the formation of planet Earth.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And how does it all fit together, Indy? You do have an Indy hat, right? Please tell me you have an Indy hat.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“The problem is that this site has been triggered. It was meant to come here, wherever here is. Or at least those oldest stones were meant to bring something here, and they were positioned round this city at the time of its building. But the triggering has wiped away the information we most need, like… like a firework burning up its gunpowder.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“These stones look just like the ones that were growing up round Parody Island.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yep. And they seem to have had the same purpose. If only we could find Al B. or the Shoggoth to look at them we might get somewhere.” Hatman pounded his fist on the black stone in frustration.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We’re planning to head out soon to find them,” CSFB! reminded his best friend. “There are those faint intermittent radio bursts that my eerie earring picked up…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“But first we have to see to the safety of dozens of refugees,” Hatman noted. “In a place filled with trolls and zombies and dinosaurs and who knows what else.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yeah,” agreed Dreamcatcher Foxglove enthusiastically. “But then we have to go off and find the Dharma project.”     Hatman smiled at his friend’s irrepressible optimism. He wished he could match it. “I didn’t manage to prevent this. I was supposed to be in charge and instead I was in a SPUD holding cell while some shape-shifter did murder using my face. Now we’re stuck goodness knows where and most of the team and all the support staff are missing, as well as hundreds of SPUD personnel, and the stragglers we have found are surrounded by monsters waiting for the sun to set. I’m supposed to do better than this!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yeah. All you did was damp down a situation the rest of us provoked that nearly got us in a war with the world’s governments and then keep a bunch of people alive and safe after we got scattered across the Beyonder’s Secret Wars planet and pulled us together and worked out a way forward so we wouldn’t die from undead and dinos so we stood a chance of getting back home to our loved ones and making hot toffee-fudge love with our wives and older women friends,” CrazySugarFreakBoy! told him. “You can get to the tough stuff tomorrow.”     Hatman glanced at the old setting sun. “If there is a tomorrow,” he said. ***     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I don’t really understand,” Magweed admitted as Yo made a fuss of her Visi-friend’s daughter. “How did you come to be here?”     Koom, Chelema, and Ophelo, the three young adventurers who had successfully found and delivered the lost child to the ruler of the free city of Golgamoria, beamed with pleasure at the happy reunion.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“One day the Wise One just appeared from the many lands,” Chelema explained. “She came to the marketplace, where there was a dispute between the Swamp People and the Deep Miners, provoked by an agent of the Uberfuhrer. She solved the whole thing in minutes and made peace between the tribes.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And she showed us who was really responsible for the trouble,” added Koom. “She showed us a better way,”     Ophelo took up the story. “And after that had happened ten twenty, thirty times, people here started to pay attention. When the dark days came to the city it was only natural that we looked to the Wise One for leadership.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Dark days?” Magweed was still confused. The Mouse Guard were just happy to have some grain.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Is to be not good time for these peoples,” Yo explained in his/her inimitable fashion. “Is to be too many uncute badlings in these worlds. Yo is not sure how Yo is to be coming of here after Yo is fighting of Parody Master, and Yo is not being able to leave. But Yo is happy to be helping of cute-Golgamoria when villainings are to be plotting.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You can’t leave?” Magweed worried. “Not even to get to the Happy Place?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yo can get to Yo’s Happy Place,” the pure thought being assured her. “Just not to the rest of the Happy Place. Yo doesn’t even know if this place is having of Happy Place till Yo comes here.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“But you knew Visi – I mean Visionary – I mean daddy was coming?”     Yo beamed happily. “Yo is always knowing that Yo’s friends will be coming to be helping of Yo!”     The pleasant scene was interrupted by the appearance of a pale-faced messenger girl. “Wise One!” she bowed. “An emissary has arrived demanding to speak with you.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“The Wise One is busy just now,” chided Ophelo. “You should not disturb…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Is to be all righting,” Yo interrupted. “What is to be of the matter, cute Navali?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“It’s an emissary from the Master-Brain of the Spawn of Umshath, all the way from Ur-Vakir,” the messenger swallowed nervously. “He has come to demand we surrender that little girl to him… or we shall be destroyed!” ***     The Nazi Raptor assault upon the helicarrier had been going on for a day and a night now, and while the lizard casualties piled up the automated defences of the downed vessel were running low. The downed airship lay skewed to one side in the swamps of Zothar, and it usually required rather more than two men to operate it.     That was why a little after midnight on the second night of the assault the first small group of lizard stormtroopers got past the point lasers and managed to blow one of the external docking hatches and pour into the interior. And hour later when the reinforcements had taken parts of decks nine to twelve they brought down one of the internal defence nodes and could push forward again.     At four fifteen they broke into secondary fire control and found a mammal refilling the missile projectors.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Name, rank, number!” shouted Sturmscharführer Fahhhthh, his rancid jaws spitting saliva across the captive’s face.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Whose name?” asked Ronnie, confusedly. “Whose number? I know the one for Mystic Morgana’s One Minute Horoscope, but it’s never got any advice for people born in the Year of the Lame Pigeon.”     Fahhhthh slapped the prisoner hard across the face. “You will answer all and any question!” she screamed. “Who are you? How many are you?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Well, I’m Ronnie. Ronald Arnold Gerrimoto Beeslyhuxtoy. And there’s one of me. I don’t suppose you’ve seen my friend Chad, have you? Or an accordion?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Ve will ask the questions! Ve are the master now! How are the weapons aboard this vessel deactivated?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You do the questions? I’ll take European Wildfowl, please Bob. And I’ll phone a friend.”     Fahhhthh hit him again. “Talk!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I am talking. These are words coming out of my mouth right now. Here are some more. Plectrum. Sprocket set. Effervescence. Bus ticket. Hobbyhorse. Duck.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Are you mad? Do you know what I can do to you, mammal?”     The artillery shell sorter that Ronnie had been loading when he’d been captured and which he’d primed but not had time to lock into its wait position exploded behind the raptors, shredding them with shrapnel. Only Ronnie survived, shielded behind a solid steel emplacement.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I told you to duck,” he told the dead Nazis sadly. ***     Night had fallen at the ruins of ancient Callejón de Huaylas, transplanted from Peru’s Ancash regions to the realm that the natives here called Umarr. It was now one of over a hundred ruined cities dotting the thick rainforest. A big yellow moon edged over the trees to add to the light from the signal fire that had been burning for almost a week.     Sir Mumphrey Wilton stared into the flames while the locals slept peacefully nearby. The site archaeologists under Professor Loring and the thirty or so SPUD agents that had straggled in over the last forty-eight hours preferred the cover of the ruins. Sergeant MacHarridan’s trained attack trolls patrolled the perimeter.     Of course, none of that had stopped Champagne from disappearing without trace the night before. Sir Mumphrey scowled and worried some more.     He turned round and surprised the three vampires who had just transformed from bat to human shape behind him. Setting his chronometer to detect sentients of more than a hundred years of age was on old trick. “Yes?” he barked at them.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I am Lord Deathscream,” announced lead undead.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Bet you are,” snorted the eccentric Englishman. “And you’d be here with some kind of demand or threat, yes? Well spit it out man!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You do not tremble,” noted Lady Darkwinde, shocked and puzzled. “You do not show the nightkind proper respect.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Oh, I know what respect to show you bounders,” Sir Mumphrey told them. “Lost count of the number of you I’ve staked to dust. Was it you who stole away the young lady Champagne?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“She was desired by the Eternal Empress.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“She’d jolly well better get undesired and returned here then,” the eccentric Englishman warned. “Now say your piece and be gone from here, sirrahs.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You will yield to us,” Lord Deathscream explained. “We will harvest from you such tribute as we see fit, and take the rest of you to where you can serve us best.”     Sir Mumphrey snorted. “Or?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Or we shall tear your flesh and souls away and give you an eternity of torment.”     The old man shrugged. “Is that it? Is that the best you can manage as a threat? Good grief, man, how many years have you had to practise and that’s all you can come up with? Been threatened worse than that by my nanny, for getting treacle syrup on the carpet.” He stuck his thumbs in his waistcoat pockets. “Would you care to try again, and this time try and make it something intimidatin’?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“He mocks us!” hissed Darkwinde.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Nah!” CrazySugarFreakBoy! said in her ear. She hadn’t heard him approach. “I do the mocking around here. Hi!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You were warned,” Lord Deathscream screeched. “Now you shall pay. You shall…”     He paused there because somehow without appearing to move the eccentric Englishman had lodged a burning branch from the fire through his chest. At the same moment the unbreakable wire of CSFB! go-go yo-yo looped around Darkwynde’s neck and sliced. The third vampire never even got to announce his pretentious name. Silicone Sally simply hardened her hand into a sharp point and slammed it through his heart.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Well that was easy,” the pliable playmate grinned.     The cloud of bats that flew in from the forest darkened the moon, and the camp awoke screaming as a hundred vampires fell upon them.     Hatman pulled on his Suns cap. There was a flare and screaming. Most of it wasn’t from the rudely-awoken humans. ***     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What did they do?” demanded the Eternal Empress as she felt dozens of her minions seared from existence. “How did they do it?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What can we say?” asked Champagne, captive in the midnight stronghold of Abadonn, city of the undead. “Humans are tricksy.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“They do not know what they face here,” the Empress snapped, pale and beautiful and dead. “Like all newcomers, they understand nothing.”     Grace O’Mercy had been mostly silent since she’d been led here by her vampire captors, but now she stirred. “All newcomers? There have been others?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“From time to time,” sniffed the Queen of the Dead. “Most die quickly. A few prove useful. Some become minor nuisances, like the Wise One of Golgamoria.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“But people arrive here, in these… thirty-two worlds?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Thirty-two now,” replied the Empress. “There were more, of course.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“There were?” Champagne was keen on information. “What happened to them? Who created those stitch-gates between them? Where is this place anyhow?”     The Empress looked at her coldly. “These are dying worlds,” she answered at last. “Of the hundreds that were once linked by the ancient who dwelled in the tower of light these are all that remain. The stitch gates were merely conveniences once, short-cuts. Now they slowly fail and none can repair them. The mortals cower as the darkness gathers and doom comes upon them all.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“But you’re not at all bothered by the doom?” Grace challenged. “You’re just parasites feeding on the dying.”     The Queen of the Dead turned her piercing gaze upon the Night Nurse. “You remain only because you may have some use to the Empire of the Dark. Do not presume that your stolen blood will protect you from me.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And I remain because you need me as well,” Champagne surmised. “So what’s the problem you need solving?”     The Empress managed to look a little discomfited. “All others in these realms shall fade and pass when the Grey Walkers come. The Nightkind shall escape.” She pointed at Champagne and Grace. “You shall solve the puzzles of the tower and gain us access to the instruments of the ancient. Then we shall truly command the realms and nothing shall be beyond us.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Or you’ll do bad things to us,” guessed Champagne.     The Night Nurse knew better. “Or they will do bad things to everybody.” ***     The squid-headed telepath knew better than to try to link its mind with the Wise One’s to influence his/her thoughts. A previous attempt had not ended as well as the Spawn of Umshath might have liked. A few still wore flowers in their tentacles. Instead the emissary simply delivered its message – for now.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“There is change in the thirty-two worldsss,” it projected. “An alliance hasss been formed between the Deep Thinkers of Ur-Vakir and the dead of Abaddon.”     Magweed was quietly watching from near the back of the room, still flanked by the young people who had led her to the free city of Golgamoria. She felt Chelema tense and heard Koom mutter, “Oh shit.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“The terms of your sscity’s existence have now been redefined,” the emissary went on. “You may continue under due sssupervisssion, but you will yield up tribute to your masters.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Never,” muttered Ophelo, his hand moving towards his sword.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You will sssurrender the child Magweed to the Master Brain. It is commanded.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“The Master Brain and the Eternal Empress of the vampires hate each other,” Chelema whispered the Magweed. “That’s always been our greatest advantage. They kept each other in check.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Until now,” added Koom gloomily.     Yo frowned. “And if we are to not be doing of that?” s/he asked.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Our forcesss are numberless, and rule wherever we will it.” The emissary decided to assay a simple mind-probe to test the Wise One’s defences. “The Raptor Lordsss and the Low Kingdom and the Corssairs and the Underminersss and many other forcesss follow our lead. All the thirty-two realms are ours.”     Magweed read the malice in the creature’s heart, and something else: fear.     Yo rose and faced the being who was pushing at his/her mind with the combined power of the Spawn of Umshath. The peoples of the free city watched nervously, knowing their fate hung in the balance. Yo shook her head and kicked the emissary back down the steps. “This. Is being. Golgamoria!” ***     The raptors pressed forward, wave upon wave of them, fanatic in their determination to capture ordinance which could replace and better their lost zeppelin and give them air superiority in their quest for universal domination.     Dan Drury clung to the main console on his helicarrier’s bridge as the last of the automated weapons fell silent. He unshipped the safety on his machine pistol, checked his grenade belt, and prepared for a last stand. The ship self-destruct codes were entered, awaiting a final command.     A small green-hued boy appeared next to him on the bridge and looked around. “Now this is cool!” Griffin admired. “Hello!”     Drury recognised Visionary’s son in time not to blow his head off. “Kid, what in Sam Hill are you doin’ here?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I am bringing you a message from Agent Romanza,” Griffin explained diligently. “I’m sorry it took a long time. There are all kinds of traps here to catch invisible intangible people, and some of them might work on griffins too, so the Contessa said I had to take care.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You came from Talia?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yes. She said to tell you the flowers they are blooming in Novsgorod, which I think is one of those secret identification messages you have in that private file in you omega directory under codewords\top_encryption\most secret\personal. And she said to tell you that the reinforcements are here so please turn off the non-discriminatory automated systems.”     Drury had to make a snap decision about whether to buy this unlikely apparition and his unlikely story. “No bad guy has got this kinda sense of humour,” he decided, shutting down the last weapons systems. “Go tell the Contessa that she’s good to go.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“It’s not the Contessa I should tell first,” Griffin suggested. “Glory’s the one in charge of all your agents. I’ll go say ‘Wah-hoo’ to her, shall I?” ***     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Okay. Vampire princes,” noted CSFB! “That’s so not good.”     The darkness had brought the wrath of the Eternal Empress on the encampment amongst the ruins of the pre-Incan Peruvian city. The elite forces of the Empire of the Night had fallen upon the human defenders and things were getting rather rough. At least Chad had stopped playing that damned accordion for a while.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We deal,” Hatman replied, pulling on his bishop’s mitre to bless a new batch of holy water. He didn’t like vampires. He’d had a bad experience. “We’ve got too many people here depending on us to fail now.”     Swordwights shimmered from the jungle, ignoring the weapons fire from the SPUD agents perimeter, sending the guard trolls screaming away as the fear aura hit them.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Those things look like they might hurt,” worried Silicone Sally. Maybe now was the time to rethink her new altruistic streak.     Sir Mumphrey Wilton checked the charge on his Chronometer. It was almost gone. Somehow in this place his primal artefact pocketwatch was not recharging. “These are the oldest things they’ve sent against us so far,” noted the eccentric Englishman. “Probably makes them the post powerful, what?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“The Suns hat exhausts me,” Jay Boaz warned. “It really a last resort.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“It probably wouldn’t work on these guys anyhow,” suggested CSFB! “They know that trick now. That Empress of theirs will have found some guys who won’t be bothered by it. You got a Buffy cap?”     The fear aura washed over the heroes, forcing them to grit their teeth just to remain standing. “Right then,” snarled Sir Mumphrey. “Let’s show ‘em who should be scared of who.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“There’s an awful lot of them,” squeaked Sally, seeing ten then twenty then thirty of the ancient dead gliding out of the shadows.     Hatman selected his Jets cap for maximum velocity plus flame trail. “This could get bad,” he warned.     The front swordwraith exploded from inside, showering his comrades with bits of dead flesh and armour.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“That’s their secret power?” Sergeant MacHarridan snorted. “Tae blow up and not reform?”     A second and a third and a fourth swordwraith detonated like the first, and so on down the line.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Okay,” CSFB! said, watching in surprise. “They finally found a tactic we didn’t anticipate: bursting before they fight us.”     A tall man dropped from the skies, levelled a bazooka at the nearest swordwraith, and blew it to pieces before it could even explode by itself.     The human form of the Manga Shoggoth watched disapprovingly. “You are doing that wrong, Killer Shrike,” the loathsome elder beast explained. “You are not flying backwards into the bushes.”     Sir Mumphrey gazed upwards with the other defenders of the ruins as the new arrivals flew down from the night skies. “Samantha?” he gasped.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Hello, grandfather,” the girl replied, gliding down through the air with a cool grace. “I’m glad you’re alright. I brought some reinforcements.”     The last of the swordwraiths was telekinetically burst by someone who could sense undead because he’d once absorbed the essence of the Psychostave. Nats lowered himself and Uhuna to join the others. “Um, hi,” he waved.     CrazySugarFreakBoy! leaped into his arms. ***     Ã¢â‚¬Å“It’s wonderful to see you!” Marie Murcheson cried out, clapping her hands in excitement. “Hallie and I were getting worried!”     Visionary entered the Lair Mansion and flopped down in a big armchair. “It’s great to be back. I know everybody must have been looking for us. Poor Maggie and Griffin must have been fretting too.”     Hallie shifted uncomfortably. “Yes, Marie told me about them, Vizh. They’re not here. We don’t know where they are. Nobody is here, except for Marie and I. And a barbarian hero and his companion down in the holding cells, of course.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Of course,” echoed Garrick weakly. “Well, if you can just get me a line to the White House we’ll get this all sorted out.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Because that usually solves all our problems,” muttered Amber.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I can’t get communication with anywhere,” Hallie admitted. “I can’t ping any of the Lair satellites or pick up any sort of comms signals at all. And for some reason I’m suffering a slow power drain that the toaster is struggling to keep up with.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“But the showers are still working, right?” Dancer checked urgently. “And the hot tub?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We’d better take a look at that,” agreed the Librarian. “Er, the power drain, not the hot tub.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I can keep an eye on the showers and hot tub,” Flapjack offered. “In case any needs their back scrubbed. Or anything scrubbed.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And the door-locking systems are still working, right?” Dancer checked cautiously.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“But before we start the long-term data searches first we need to get Hallie’s memories logged back online,” the Librarian pressed on. “I think we need full capacity Hallie for this one.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You’re… Lee Bookman,” Hallie identified the archscientist from her files. “Have we met?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We’ve met,” agreed the Librarian. “And I think my gift of reading data could probably help get your memory working again.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And then maybe you can help me find Mags and Griff,” suggested Vizh. “And the others.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I don’t know that we need to fuss about installing every single memory,” Flapjack mentioned casually. “No need to bother with the internet usage logs and stuff like that, or any streaming video content from any websites not associated in any way with Lair Mansion personnel.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You think you can restore Hallie?” Marie asked the Librarian hopefully. “Even without Dr Harper?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Al B. Harper?” Hallie checked her data banks again. “He seems familiar.”     Flapjack winked disgustingly at Hallie. “That’d be because your engram-donor and him were supposed to have had a wild fling back in college although actually the truth turned out to be far less interesting than that.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“He’s especially familiar if you’re a robot-girl, cat-girl, or psycho-bitch from the future,” Amber mentioned dryly.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“My engrams-donor?” Hallie asked, flustered. “What do you mean?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Best I just restore your memory capacity,” the Librarian judged. “Otherwise the footnotes for that could take weeks. I’ll see you down in the main computer core.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Take me to your operations room,” Garrick demanded of Flapjack and Amber. “I’m going to find a way of contacting the appropriate authorities no matter what you people have screwed up now.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And I’ll be in the Lair Jacuzzi, if anybody needs me” Dancer announced. “Except Flapjack.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And I’m going to check the cruller supplies,” Vizh suggested. “You never know when that might be vital information in our struggle for survival.” But Hallie’s look of appeal forced him to trail along behind Lee and Marie to join Hallie in the computer core. ***     Colonel Drury reviewed the three hundred plus SPUD troopers that had just repelled the raptor Nazis seeking to invade the helicarrier. “Not bad boy an’ girls,” he grinned, chomping down on his stogie. “I kin see the exercise has done all of ya some good. Now git yourselves cleaned up in yer quarters and report fer duty in fifteen minutes. Vacation time is over.”     Glory barked her thanks to the brave men and women who’d followed her through the swamps for the last four weeks.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And you did pretty good too, honey,” Drury told the pooch of power. “I owe you the juiciest t-bone ever cut, and don’t think I won’t pay up on it.”     Glory wagged her tail in approval. She’s only been doing her job but she wasn’t going to turn down a treat. It sounded much better than a medal.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Good going, Talia,” Drury told the Contessa as she rejoined him on the command deck. “You managed ta find the carrier and some guys ta get it in the air.” He looked at the unusual air cover the airship had acquired. “An’ some flying dinosaurs.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Oh, that wasn’t me,” Contessa Romanza admitted. “Glory heard your radio transmissions and brought the troopers she’d gathered in this direction. Griffin found Glory somehow, don’t ask me how. Al B. Harper picked up your signals too, and his group caught up with us just this morning, including the air cover.”     Drury looked up as the archscientist, Yuki Shiro, and Anna climbed onto the command deck.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Anna’s not here as a prisoner,” Yuki told him. The android had been created in and escaped from a SPUD research facility. She’d claimed sanctuary with the Lair Legion while her legal status was determined.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“That robot’s not stable,” Drury warned. “There’s classified stuff I can’t tell you about how those science guys managed to make her, but she’s not what you think she is.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I’m more stable than you are,” Anna answered. “Compare our psyche profiles, Colonel Drury.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“But you took down those pirates without a thought,” Al B. noted. “I’m really sorry Anna, but I think you should take a nap for a while.” He pressed a small device to the back of her neck and watched her concertina to the ground.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What are you doing!” Yuki shouted at him.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What are you doing?” Al B shouted back, “Letting her go crazy like that and rack up an unnecessary body count!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You weren’t there to make a judgement call!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You were there but didn’t show any judgement!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What did you do to her? She trusted us?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I just closed off her brain/body interface. She’ll be fine later on. And so will anybody else she might have popped off and slaughtered in the meantime!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“So the idea of talking reasonably to her never occurred to the mighty brain of Dr I.Q. Harper?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Can it!” roared Drury over their mounting argument. “Lissen up, bozos. We chased off them Nazi dinosaurs fer a while, but it ain’t gonna be forever. They’ll be back with more of ‘em and meaner, and they’re gonna keep coming. So I want this tub in the air and ready to meet ‘em when they call. That means no grandstanding and all this Anna crap gets put on the back burner till afterwards, capeesh?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Anna could have helped us prep the helicarrier,” Yuki noted angrily.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I can fix the helicarrier,” answered Al B. Harper. “Give me a couple of hours to restart the engines and I’ll have it completely under my control.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And I’ll stay here with Anna and see that she’s okay,” Griffin added prudently. ***     Ã¢â‚¬Å“This is pretty simple,” the Librarian decided after half a minute’s cursory checks over the hardware down in the Secure Computer Room using his data absorption abilities. “Looks like when all of us got yanked to that strange interplanar inspection we all sensed before we got dumped across the planet you got checked too, Hallie. But because your systems are embedded here a bunch of your memories got shunted off to long term storage and then the datalinks fused. It’ll get cleared by a main Mansion systems reboot. Just load yourself into this remote Holographic Display Unit while I restart the banks.”     Hallie slipped out of the mainframe and animated the floating bee-sized remote drone, activating its holographic circuitry a little uncertainly since this was an upgrade since the time she remembered. “This is certainly nice,” she admitted. “Very nice technology.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“The advances of science are remarkable,” agreed Marie Murcheson, who’d been born in the mid nineteenth century.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Technopolitan,” the Librarian answered absently. “Adapted by Dr Harper to facilitate your remote operation. But I bet you didn’t know it has an over-ride function in case you ever went rogue and tried to take over the world?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“In case I what?” Hallie asked, surprised. “I’d never do that. I couldn’t do that. Could I?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What over-ride?” demanded Visionary. “Why wasn’t I told about that?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Because you’d react like you are doing,” answered the Librarian. “And as for what the over-ride does, it locks Hallie into one HED then freezes her form and function leaving her entirely helpless. I’ve just activated it.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You’ve what?” demanded Vizh, stepping forward.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I’ve paralysed Hallie and left her helpless,” the Librarian explained more clearly. “That way I can wipe her from the mainframe and leave it under my complete control. Oh, and you’d better go down too.” He absently brushed his fingers against Visionary’s cheek, ramming overwhelming data into the possibly-fake man’s head. “I imagine Dr Seuss is a bit taxing for you,” Bookman sniffed as Vizh spasmed to the floor.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Lee, what are you doing?” Hallie demanded. “You’re shutting down the automated defences and opening the front doors. And there are intruders out there!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Why yes there are,” agreed the Librarian as the squid-headed psionics floated into the Lair Mansion. “They’d be the ones that psionically altered my brain and Al B’s to serve them and who realigned our personalities to absolute evil.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Stop it!” Marie Murcheson ordered. She drew in a breath to scream, then found that control of her larynx had been denied to her.     The Librarian held up the mind-control node he’d demonstrated earlier. “I forgot to mention that the secret ingredient was Spawn of Umshath.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Run, Marie!” Hallie called. “Get help! Warn Flapjack and Garrick!”     Marie turned and fled.     Hallie gasped in horror as Lee Bookman pulled a pistol from beneath his robe of office and shoot Marie in the kneecap. Then he shot her in the other knee for good measure.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Lee!” screeched Hallie, horrified.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I’m just directing the masters to where their new victims are inside the Mansion,” the Librarian noted. “And then we’ll get on with the cruel stuff.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Lee, this isn’t you! Fight it!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“It is now.”     Hallie could only watch as he shot Marie in the chest and the head. Lee Bookman was laughing. ***     Ã¢â‚¬Å“How’s it coming?” Natalia asked Al B. Harper as the archscientist crawled out from under the helicarrier’s primary reactor.     In answer the archscientist plugged together a pair of heavy duty cabled and the main lights came on all over the ship. The motors whined as they powered up. Auto-repair systems came online. “How’s that?” Al asked.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Good work,” agreed the Contessa. “Drury can stop chewing the carpets now.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Not yet,” Al admitted. “There’s still one more problem.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And what’s that?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“There’s a telepathic relay enhancer wired into the main energy core,” the archscientist explained. “That means that somebody could pulse a telepathic signal from the Spawn of Umshath over the entire ship and take down everybody with an organic brain, rendering them quite helpless.” He pressed a button. “Like this.”     And everybody in the helicarrier screamed and fell unconscious. Only Anna might have resisted; but Anna was neutralised.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Heh,” said evil Al B. “Easy.” ***     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Word from our allies, perfection,” a slim white-haired vampires reported to the Eternal Empress. “The haunted manse and the fallen sky-ship are taken. Only the survivors in the ruins continue to resist us.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“They too shall fall,” promised the Queen of the Dead. She glanced over at her captives. “And then all is mine.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What allies?” asked Champagne. “Those squid-headed telepaths, the Spawn of Umshath, under their Master Brain? Yes, I did some reading in the Tower of Laments.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“The Spawn of Umshath, yes,” agreed the Empress. “Under their new Master Brain.” ***     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What are you doing, Amber?” demanded Bad News Herb. “I wanted to try and get some communication back to the White House.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Because Hallie hasn’t been trying in all the weeks she’s been here,” Flapjack scorned. “Besides who could they send out to rescue us? Condoleeza Rice?” He paused to consider that with a happy leer.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Those aren’t the comms panels,” observed Garrick.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“No. These are the telepathic insulation buffers that activate the blanket defences against psychic assault on the mansion,” noted Amber St Clare. She smashed them in with the bottom of a fire extinguisher.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What?” gasped Flapjack. He made to rush forward but found he couldn’t move.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What?” demanded Herbert Garrick, equally frozen by telepathic compulsion.     Amber’s eyes were wide and terrified as her body activated the main monitor screen to show the squid-heads gliding through the mansion’s main door to take them all. ***     Dancer dived from the jacuzzi and grabbed a towel as the bathroom door over-ride was activated. “Flapjack, I told you what would happen the next time you…” she began before her voice was frozen along with all her other conscious movement.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You’ll wish it had been a dozen Flapjacks before I’m finished with you,” the intruder noted, stepping into the steamy chamber. “Instead, it is I, the new Master Brain of the Spawn of Umshath.”     And Edward Cromlyn made a little mocking bow. *** Next Time: Okay, I’ll admit this isn’t the best place to leave the story to allow for tie-ins, although there's some possibilities of people want to expand what happens between the scenes of this story. I’ll try and complete the next part that gets us past the big cliffhanger as soon as I can; all feedback is gratefully received. We’ll see if we can’t move this arc towards conclusion in The Hobgoblin of Little Minds. Special thanks to Rhiannon, who reminded me that Cromlyn was also in the Mansion when it vanished, and that his powers were being suppressed by an ingested piece of Shoggoth. Everything that happens next is her fault. *** Out-Takes Dept: One of the features of a round robin plot is that characters don't always go where you think they will. Hence when I started writing this chapter I expected Champagne, Dancer, and Amber to all be joined up with Hatty, CSFB!, Sally, and Mumphrey at the ruins. When their writers instead took them elsewhere the following out-take from our first scene became redundant:     One lone troll spotted a group of non-combatants cowering away from the battle; obvious hostage choices.     But a dark-haired human female stood between him and his prey with her hands on her hips.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And just what do you think you’re doing?” she asked. The troll didn’t speak her language but the tones were sufficient. He ground to a halt and raised his club to strike her down.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Shame on you!” the female chided him. “Didn’t your mother bring you up better than that? Now you go back to your boss and tell him all of this isn’t a good idea. If he doesn’t shape up then we’ll be sending Mumphrey down to humph at him. Off you go now. Shoo!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Dancer, you can’t speak to a troll like that,” one of the non-combatants told the dark-haired one.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Well, I don’t have his Facebook ID, Amber” she answered. “Besides, while he’s looking at me Dream’s coming up behind him and…”     That was the last that troll heard of the conversation. *** The Hooded Hood's Homepage of Doom Who's Who in the Parodyverse Previous Chapters: #1: “And just when did Danny find time to take over the Parodyverse?” by Dancer #2: "Sometime you have to turn flammable again!" by Visionary #3: That’s the Way the Story Goes by the Hooded Hood #4: See No Evil by the Hooded Hood #5: Whodunnit by the Hooded Hood, Visionary, Killer Shrike, and Jason #6: Suspicious Behaviour by the Hooded Hood, Jason, Hatman, and CrazySugarFreakBoy! #7: Accusation and Denial by the Hooded Hood, JJJ, Jason and L! #8: The Final Solution by the Hooded Hood and Dancer #9: The Land That Common Sense Forgot by the Hooded Hood #9.1: Adventures in Parodyverse by Jason #9.2: Chad and Ronnie by L! #9.3: “In addition to cappuccino and personal hygiene these tribespeople have not yet invented underwear.” by Dancer #9.4: Lone Lost Boy & Heroines Hanging Together by CrazySugarFreakBoy! #9.5: From Dross into Gold by Killer Shrike #9.6: Old Friends and New Allies by Visionary #9.7: Taking a Swim by L! #9.8: A Post-Swim Chat by L! #9.9: Champagne and the Land That Common Sense Forgot by Champagne #10: The Age of Villains by the Hooded Hood #10.1: Adventures in Parodyverse by Jason #10.2: The Baroness #55 by JJJ #10.3: Adventures in Parodyverse by Jason #10.4: Ewe Gotta Have Hart 1 by Killer Shrike #10.5: Ewe Gotta Have Hart 2 by Killer Shrike #11: An Age Undreamed Of by the Hooded Hood #12: The New Lair Legions (And Other Heroes) by the Hooded Hood #12.1: I Hate You by Visionary #12.2: Champagne and the Tower of Laments by Champagne #12.3: Adventures in Parodyverse by Jason #12.4: The Hearing by Visionary #12.5: Adventures in Parodyverse by Jason #13: Exploring the Forbidden Valley, or Samantha Featherstone and the Crystal Goddess by the Hooded Hood #14: Real Heroes by the Hooded Hood #14.1: “I’d like to be clear that I’m a no-skewer zone, and have been since college.” by Dancer #14.2: Catherine & the Danger Zone by L! #14.3: “Do you know how much shaving I had to do to put this thing on?” by Visionary #14.4: “Well we can’t just wait here till we find a use for Visionary. We’ll starve to death.” by Dancer *** Original concepts, characters, and situations copyright © 2008 reserved by Ian Watson. Other Parodyverse characters copyright © 2008 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.

A big twist there at the end... that daughter of yours has a devious mind. You must be very proud.

Continuity note: Dancer is still in one line of the first, altered scene.

Lots of fun and excitement this chapter, as the bad guys get a little more organized in coming after our scattered heroes. Luckily, for the most part, the heroes were becoming less scattered just enough to keep up with the threats... minus those that became threats themselves, that is.

Fun "300" moment with Yo. I wonder why the villains would specifically want Magweed. Of course, they might have simply seen delivering the demand as a way to create discord, knowing Yo wouldn't agree to it in any event.

The Legion's efforts to defend the civilians were appropriately heroic, and led to some really fun action scenes. That group makes a nice line up, including shrike with a bazooka. Sally and CSFB could have made for quite a dynamic duo had he not already been spoken for twice over now. And Yuki's duel with the Apokoliptian Pirate was some more good action.

I enjoyed the defense of the Helicarrier, although even I picked up Al's insistence that he could have it under *his* control in no time. Following what he did to Anna, I had a sinking feeling about things.

Vizh was rather blasé about Hallie's memory loss or the whereabouts of his two children, I thought... but it doesn't seem that he had anything more controlling his thoughts than crullers. They are quite good, so perhaps its understandable. Poor Amber, being mentally enslaved again is not going to go over well with her, I'd think (especially after her line in this story showed she's far from over her past experiences.)

A chilling ending... Looking forward to more!

I thought it was odd that Al specified the engines would be under his specific control, and my fears were quickly realized. I hope Griffins are immune to telepathic control, or the helicarrier is in a lot of trouble. As are the team members in the Lair Mansion...perhaps the barbarians in the holding cells will save the day?

It's nice though to see the cast congregating together, though I have to admit I'm eagerly awaiting the reuniting of Yo with more of the cast. I hope the plan isn't to leave our favourite thought being behind in the stitched worlds at the end of all this.

And I especially enjoyed the 300 moment with Yo. For some reason Sarah won't let me kick someone into a hole at our wedding; "Does anyone object to this union?" Person in crowd stands up. "This is madness!" And then I'd promptly kick that person into a hole and proclaim "This. Is. My Wedding!"

I think it's romantic.

~Hat~

One objective for this storyline is to remind people just how dangerous Al B. and the Librarian can be.


We'll probably have to poll people about how and where some characters end up.


I think it should be part of every wedding ceremony.


So much better than that whole confetti thing.

Speaking of weddings, do I still need to acquire those decorations you wanted?

I am.


Ack! I'd better go revise that.


One theme I wanted to cover here was that of change. The appearance of the LL has itself become the driver of events in the thirty-two realms, with causes and effects cascading on from that.


More precisely, Cromlyn wants Magweed. She and Griffin are still young enough to be made useful to him.


I wanted to try and get some swashbuckling in here to keep the feel of the story.


Nice to know that people picked up when things were wrong.


You might notice that everybody in that group was really "reverting to type", almost being cliches of themselves. It's almost as if someone amongst them was amplifying certain typical quirks and traits to prevent them from being their most effective.


Now I need to work out a way to resolve the situation.

.

...Or should I assume some kind of posting snafu is to blame?

Good, because they definitely have the capacity to cause some serious damage if provoked. Though I guess that's bad for us since they have the capacity to cause some serious damage and they're currently evil...


I agree, it's time to bring back Mr. Epitome.


I'm not sure the church would appreciate me digging a hole in the sanctuary...maybe I could sell it as a rapid transit system to the basement...


No, but thank you very much. I'm scared of the shipping, and we've found an acceptable alternative.

~Hat~

Yes, I liked the introduction, which I thought did a lot to set up the heroic nature of the LL, and it serves as a nice counterpoint to show how much their addition means to this world while the other half of the story shows the affects of their subtraction from their homeworld.



Whereas the rest of us are too old and set in our ways?



Recent chapters (including tie-ins) have featured a good deal of swashbuckling to great affect. Always happy to have more from the sky pirates.



Well, my first twinge at all was when the Librarian used the mind control device on the natives who were about to attack Amber and Dancer... Mind control in general isn't often used by the good guys, even for benign purposes. Still, it wasn't until later that the alarms really started going off.



Interesting... and good to see my reaction, though a bit self-absorbed, wasn't unintentional. I'm not sure if I can do the tie-in I had thought for Vizh and Hallie's reunion under those circumstances, however, so I may just have to wait for another chapter or two.



I'd ask Rhiannon... she seems to have good ideas.