Previous Post #337: Untold Tales of CrazySugarFreakBoy! and His Amazing Super-Friends Go to Part One: The Sun Did Not Come Up Go to Part Two: The Blister Pits Flared Go to Part Three: You'll Get the Death Penalty For This What has gone before: The Carnifex has fallen, but his defeat has cost the Lair Legion dear. The final battle left Rabid Wolf dead, the Librarian brain-dead, and Hatman without his powers. Now the Legion must move on, with returned heroes, new problems, mop-up from the Carnifex’s plots, and a line-up change to decide.     What could possibly go wrong? The Hooded Hood's Homepage of Doom features previous chapters of our story Who's Who in the Parodyverse lists details of the cast Where's Where in the Parodyverse covers locations and situations ***     It was dawn in Candia. The sun did not come up.     The goddess of the North was dead.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“It should be light by now,” whispered Masha Massalski, Party Animal.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yeah, and the birds should be singing and the grass should be growing,” answered Cockney occultist Con Johnstantine. “Who do you complain about that to when the Party office is closed?”     Hatman looked over the bleak hills and the mudflats beyond. “I thought maybe she’d come back here,” Jay Boaz said quietly. “Somehow.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Zdenka Zarazoza was Zvesti Zdrugo, our Rabid Wolf,” said Masha. “She was Candia. The comrades handling us couldn’t see it, but the rest of us…” She choked a little. “She was my friend.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“A friend to everybody she met who had a good heart,” Hatman said, holding the weeping superheroine’s hands. He didn’t know Party Animal well but he knew she’d been Zdenka’s dearest associate. The girl shivered in the chill of the non-morning.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“She died bravely saving the whole Parodyverse,” Jay went on. “She died for love, Masha Marikova. That’s an epitaph I’d be proud to have one day. The Legion are thinking of making her a posthumous honorary member, like they did with Premiere.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“But she died,” Johnstantine snorted. He stubbed his cigarette out beneath his heel. “So what are we going to do about this mess then?”     Party Animal peered out over the gloomy landscape. Even the distant greenery was turning brown and grey. “Zdenka was gift to us. We did not treat her well. We did not… cherish? We did not cherish her. Now Candia is dead.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“The Hooded Hood seems to have made Candia just to have Rabid Wolf available to polish off the Carnifex,” Johnstantine admitted. “I guess he doesn’t need it now. It’s sinking back to oblivion.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“But a hundred and ten million people live here,” Hatman objected. “Zdenka wouldn’t want them to die. She wouldn’t want this land to perish. We have to do something.” Jay Boaz turned round to the fourth member of their party. “Please, Whit?”     The Sorceress stood looking over the darkened land, her skirts billowing in the artic breeze, her long blonde hair trailing to the south. “This land is wounded,” she admitted. “Dying. She would not want that.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“She would not,” agreed Masha, sobbing. “But what…?”     Johnstantine laid a hand on Party Animal’s shoulder to calm and quieten her.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Jay,” Whitney told her old lover, “I’m going to need a sacrifice.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I’ll die to save Candia,” Hatman agreed. “You know I will, Whit. I’m useless to the LL now that I’ve lost my power anyway. Sure, they’re talking about keeping me on as support crew, but…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You will never be useless, Jay. But I don’t need your life for this. I need your heart.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“My heart?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Much as I hate to say it, you and Rabid Wolf were very close. If there’s anything left of her now, it’s what she gave to you.” She laid a hand on Hatman’s chest. “I need it for Candia.”     Hatman bit his lip. He looked over at Masha Massalski and at the dying land. “Do it.”     Sorceress nodded and kissed Jay on the cheek. “You’re a good man, Jay Boaz.” She glanced at Johnstantine. “You’re sure it’s her?”     The irritating Englishman nodded. “Who else? Best friend, loved Zdenka, full of life, heart as big as all outdoors. Who better?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Right then,” said Sorceress. “Masha, kiss Jay.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What? Not that I’m minding kissing big hunky decadent Canadians but there’s a time and a place.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Kiss him.”     Party Animal wrapped her arms around Hatman and proved that she was the best there is at what she did.     Sorceress touched their heads as they kissed. “Now,” she said, releasing her own powers.     The cloying mourning grief and guilt lifted from Hatman’s soul. For a moment, just a moment, the kiss on his lips became familiar and intimate, Zdenka’s kiss, as distinctive as a signature; a goodbye kiss. Then the piercing pain in his heart became a numb dull ache; an old scar kept with pride for solemn remembrance.     Masha looked around. The land was still dark. “Nothing’s happened,” she said.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“That’s ‘cause you haven’t told it to, love,” Johnstantine smirked. “Give it a go.”     Party Animal extended a tentative hand to the east. “In my dear friend Zdenka’s name, rise,” she told the sun.     Dawn burst across the horizon, painting the sky in pink and orange. The greyness burned away and the land bloomed fertile green.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Zdenka wouldn’t leave Candia to die,” Sorceress declared. “The rest is up to you,” she told the new goddess of the north. ***     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What in the name of Uncle Sam’s crotch critters are you doin’ to my helicarrier?” demanded SPUD Director Dan Drury as he strode onto the command deck of the great flying defence platform. He stepped over the high-voltage cables strewn across the gantry and stalked to where Al B. Harper was just disassembling a three million dollar sensor array package with a teaspoon.     A nervous security guard snapped to attention. “Sir, he had the authentication documents registered on the computer, sir!”     Drury slapped away the proffered comm-pad. “’Cause he did. Hallie, where the goldfish-gargling hell are you hiding out in all’a this? Come on out and tell me whut you bozos are up to before I have you all shot at dawn!”     An egg-shaped Holographic Display Emitter manoeuvred out of a narrow conduit duct and projected a life-sized image of the Lair legion’s resident artificial intelligence. “Ah, Colonel. Yes. Well, you’ll be pleased to know that I’ve located a security chink in your software firewall for you. It allows an intruder to cut false orders allowing…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yeah, I got that. So before I go cut open the paper-only file I got on taking down nosey computer sentiences whut break into my helicarrier systems you want to explain what this is about?”     Al B. rolled out from the tangle of wiring he’s just created. “Colonel Drury. Good. I need your authorisation codes to get past this next bank of defences. I don’t really have the fifteen minutes available to break through them in the normal way.”     The head honcho of SPUD cocked his laser pistol. “The short version memo?” he prompted.     Another head appeared from the hole in the technology wall that Al had dismantled. “Um, maybe we should explain to the angry man with the eyepatch and big gun why we’re taking his ship apart?” suggested Vinnie de Soth. “I make it a habit to try not to get shot before breakfast. Or at all, really.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Good call, kid,” Drury approved. “So tell me whut’s goin’ on before I decide you’re all clear an’ present pains in my butt and have you… what the hell am I standing in?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Good morning, Colonel Drury,” bubbled the Manga Shoggoth, welling up through the grid flooring and glopping over the super-spy’s boots. “Well, morning by your rather ridiculous limited mortal time-frame assuming you insist on those silly rules of space and causality.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Okay, I’m reactivatin’ SR 1066,” threatened Drury.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We’re looking for Al’s firehouse,” Vinnie blurted. “That’s all.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And you think it’s behind the wall of my helicarrier?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We think it got transported via some elder god dimension-bending, probably to the centre of the known universe,” Hallie explained. “Al thinks he can probably track it and hook it back but the equipment he’d normally use for that is in the EEE firehouse.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“It was this whole thing with the Carnifex and the Necromancer General,” Vinnie explained. “It’s still kind of worrying me, actually. I mean, why would the Carnifex use someone so basically incompetent at Bogdan for something like that, when he could have recruited… well pretty much any of my relatives?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“So you just decided ta come and take apart a ninety billion dollar NATO facility and hoped I wouldn’t notice?” Drury growled.     Hallie nodded sheepishly. “It’s a little time-sensitive, getting Miss F and the rest back before they’re eaten. And you seemed very busy, having to re-evaluate every file you’ve got on the Carnifex for the last year. And Al did help build this helicarrier for you, and he’ll put it all together again after.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Better,” called Al from under the main navitronics console. “With a coffee machine.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You may wish to evacuate non-essential personnel though,” the Shoggoth advised. “The slingshot effect can be somewhat disturbing.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“The what?” blinked Drury.     Vinnie swallowed under the intense glare. “Well, in theory the best way to get the firehouse back, assuming that somebody there has been smart enough to keep them alive till now…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“They will have,” said Al.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“…is to hope that they’ve set up a timespace anchor and made use of this minor dimensional lifeline I managed to send to them…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“They will have,” said Al.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“…so we can basically go there and grab them and tow them back.”     There was silence on the helicarrier bridge.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I’ll be able to envelop and dismantle any elder parasites that invade your vessel, before I leave,” the Shoggoth offered helpfully. “Most of them anyway. The big ones.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“So there’ll be no need to have anybody shot, right?” suggested Vinnie hopefully. “Or IRS audited?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You’ve got Framlicker, Aston an’ your kids in your firehouse lab zapped to some elder-baddie hot zone and you want to take my carrier over there to do a pick up,” Drury summarised. “Yeah, what the hell, let’s go. Beats doin’ the Carnifex paperwork. Wa-hoo.” ***     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And you’re okay?” CrazySugarFreakBoy! checked with Alice April Apple for the twentieth time.     Dreamcatcher Foxglove’s wife looked over to his mother. “Is there any way we can get ‘We’re fine’ tattooed on his hand or something?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“He’s just suffering from his Gwen Stacy complex, honey,” Meggan Foxxx assured her. “Dream, those Carnifex goons never got near us. Hatman an’ the rest’s the heroes just dropped down on ‘em like a ton a’ bricks and took ‘em down. The babies never even got woken up.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We lost some brave SPUD troopers, though,” April admitted. “I’m writing to every one of their families. Sending a drawing of their lost loved one as well.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yeah, I’ll be enclosing a letter too,” CSFB! agreed, suddenly sober for a moment. “And Amber better be making sure they get the full benefits package. I mean it.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“It’s been a helluva few hours, hon,” Meggan said, hugging her boy. “I’m real sorry ta hear about the Librarian and Zdenka. And Jay, I guess.”     Whatever response CSFB! might have made was interrupted by Yuki, Dancer, and Nats walking in. CSFB! liked to have his meetings in the Lair Kitchen where others could wander in and out.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We’ve finished the scan on where the Esqualine Tower was,” Yuki reported. “The shops that it displaced a year ago that we never even noticed were gone, they’re back. It’s as if it was never there.”     Nats snorted. “Yeah, when the Shoggoth eats a building, he eats it good.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“He does,” agreed Dancer. “So I guess we can close the book on that bit of the case, o glorious leader.”     April looked curiously at her husband. “Leader?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Hatty handed in his resignation before he headed off the Candia,” Dream added sadly. Then he perked up. “But, that leaves me as leader of the Lair Legion. At last.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Oh good,” said Yuki.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“He’ll grow into it,” Dancer assured her. “It’s Dream. Of course he will.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“He couldn’t do worse than G-Eyed did that time,” Nats pointed out.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“But leader…” frowned April.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Don’t worry,” Dream promised her. “We’ll totally be seeing more of each other once you suit up and join the team, April.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Bit soon to be doing a new line-up, isn’t it?” the former Groovy Gecko-Girl asked evasively. “Shouldn’t you at least make arrangements about poor Lee and Zdenka?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Zdenka just kind of dissolved soon after she died,” Yuki Shiro reported. “A.L.F.RED came and picked up Lee’s body an hour ago. D.D. said there were emergency protocols to initiate but she wouldn’t say what they were.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We’ll hold memorial services, of course,” Nats promised. “Graham was talking to the governor about Arlington.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“But we need to move the team on,” CSFB! insisted. “You know what I’m talking about, Dancer. Ever since you came to the Legion you’ve been wanting us to be more proactive, tackling world hunger, human rights abuses and suchlike.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I have,” agreed Sarah Shepherdson, perking up. “I mean, I love shoes, but not shoes made in some sub-continent sweatshop by ten-year-olds in indentured labour. Let’s stop that.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Isn’t that what conventional international relations are for?” Yuki cautioned. “I mean, we’re not the police, we’re not Amnesty International, we’re not Robin Hood and his Merrie Men…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Not yet,” grinned CSFB! “The day’s young. But first up we need to replenish the roster.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We could do with a few more heavy hitters,” admitted Yuki Shiro. “And maybe a mission specialist or two. I have dossiers…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“All of them,” CrazySugarFreakBoy! declared. “Let’s have ‘em all.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“All?” asked Nats. “Doesn’t that get us back to the mess where we looking at an uncoordinated hundred member league proposal?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Not one big team,” CSFB! said. “Franchises. We’ll start be deputising the Global Gangbusters. They’ll be the Lair Legion: Strikeforce. Giant Robot Six can be Lair Legion: Asia. Project Pendragon can be Lair Legion: UK. spiff can work up a Lair Legion: Badripoor with Elsqueevio and Bev and Falconne and whoever else is out there. Whitney can head up Lair Legion: Ghostbusters. Glitch’ll run Lair Legion: Heavy Metal. If Miiri wants to she can have Lair Legion: Lemuria.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Let me get the CPR equipment for when you tell Amber about this,” offered April. “Seriously, Dream…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Seriously, April. Why not have ‘em all?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I thought you didn’t want to change the roster because you were still holding places for the folks we lost to the Narrative Wave at the end of the Parody War?” April argued. “For Finny and DK and Banjooo and Tricky and all the rest?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yeah, and G-Eyed’s back already,” CSFB! replied. “So now we know it’s only a matter of time. But it’s not like we’re filling Finny’s place, or Enty’s or whoever, because there’ll be places for everyone!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You’re letting Goldeneyed back on the team?” Nats frowned.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Why would we want Bry?” asked Dancer. “I mean, it’s Bry!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Because it’s Bry?” suggested Bill Reed. “Speaking of Katz, so far I’ve completely failed to convince him to go back into the cellar and stand in that dimensional doorway again.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“That doorway no longer exists,” pointed out Yuki.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Do we need to tell him that?” objected Nats. “We’re not letting him back in. Please tell me we’re not letting him back in.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We let you back in,” Dancer teased.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What if I quit if he joined?” Nats threatened.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Then he could have your room?” Dancer suggested brightly. “Marie likes to haunt his old one. Well, the bathroom. And we did have an accidental dimensional door to the Wookiegetlucky Swamp in there a while back.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Amber aside, do you really think you’ll get approval for that big an expansion?” Yuki asked CrazySugarFreakBoy! “The security implications are massive. And what about public perception?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“That’s what I need to talk to you about, baby,” Meggan told CSFB!. “I’ve been doing that PR stuff you guys have me on retainer for. Looking at the polling data, that kind of crap. Working out where you all stand now.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Where do we stand?” demanded Nats. “Apart from well away from the disaster zone that is G-Eyed.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You’re popular,” Meggan promised. “Real popular. I mean, we haven’t got the full data from last night’s Carnifex thing, but it’s a no-brainer. Every human on the planet had your fight telepathically beamed into their skull. With no commercial breaks. Everyone saw you guys doing the hero thing an’ paying the price. You weren’t this popular after the Transworlds Challenge. You’re won-the-Parody-War popular.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I guess this might be the time to think about reviving Dancer: the Musical,” considered Dancer. “Only with better choreography in the Baron Zemo number.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“So nobody’s going to mind if we do Lair Legion: International,” CSFB! predicted. “It’s a no-brainer. What could go wrong?” ***     In the crowded markets behind the Paradopolis Variety theatre, two superheroes wandered between the trestles and spinner racks. One wore a tattered and scorched all-black bodysuit and headstocking. The other had a domino mask and a simple blue t-shirt with cutoff sleeves revealing the periodic table of elements tattooed on his biceps. Together they pressed through the throng and were pretty much ignored.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You see, what I find amazing about Paradopolis,” said Alcheman, “is that you can walk through the streets here masked and costumed and people just try to sell you things.”     Goldeneyed nodded and allowed himself another hot dog. Paradopolis hot dogs were noxious. He’d really missed them.     The chemical champion went on. “Anywhere else we’d be mobbed for autographs, arrested, chased by press crews, something. Here we’re just part of the local landscape.”     G-eyed gave up manoeuvring his mask to consume the bun and simply teleported the dog into his mouth. It needed more mustard so he teleported that from the vendor’s cart. “I thought we’d be conspicuous when we decided on keeping our uniforms on,” Bry Katz admitted. “Especially after that broadcast dealie last night. I just forgot what the Big Banana’s like.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Takes more than a global telepathic transmission of a superhero death match to faze Paradopolitans,” Alcheman shrugged.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yep. It’s good to be back.” G-Eyed looked out across the seething fleamarket. This wasn’t the expensive shopping streets off Parody Plaza, along Busiek or Stern Streets. This was a jumble of people with carts and wagons selling cheap second-hand goods for cash or barter; and it was absolutely the heart of the city. Or maybe it’s kidneys.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You still haven’t said where you went,” prompted Alcheman. “After you vanished so dramatically wrestling a narrative bomb at the end of the Parody War, over a year ago.”     Bry shrugged. “Is that why you agreed to go shopping with me? To keep detecting, masked marvel?”     Michael Wooster shook his head. “Nah. Truth is I’ve been away for a while myself, and while I was gone…” he paused, “I can’t tell you about that. I was just wondering how somebody comes back to superheroing after a…” He paused and scratched his head. “Listen, I can’t really explain my reasons for being curious. I need to keep my identity secret, Goldeneyed.”     G-Eyed nodded. “I can understand that. At least you don’t have to conceal your skin colour.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Old problem. I’m one of the last LL’ers who has a concealed ID. Me and Dancer, I think. Assuming Dancer isn’t Dancer 24/7, which I think she might be. Nats used to keep his real name quiet, but I don’t think anyone really cares enough about him to bother. But I like my privacy. And a few times when people have found out who I was then people near to me have suffered.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Okay, then you’ll know I’m not just being an ass when I say that I don’t want to be too specific about my personal circumstances. But while I was away, and not by my choice, my s… relatives decided that my wardrobe was - how did they put it - ‘lacking in anything not fit to burn or give to third world peasants’. So they disposed of it for me.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Nice.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Oh, they bought me new things,” Michael shuddered. “Things with shoulderpads and vents and designer man-bags. Now I’m shopping for things I can wear without dying of embarrassment.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Gotcha.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“It’s bad when my superhero costume’s the least embarrassing thing I have to wear. And the most conservative.”     G-Eyed grinned. “It’s worse when your superhero costume is the only thing you have to wear – and that’s me. While I was gone my stuff got put in storage in some basement of the Lair Mansion, only then they had an invasion of dinosaur Nazis or tentacle-headed psionic jellyfish or something. When Flapjack pulled my gear out for me it was a sack of charred ashes.”     Alcheman picked up a comfortable paisley cardigan and considered it. The invisible Wooster sisters in his head mocked him until he returned it to the pile. “Do you get some kind of contents insurance with the LL?” he wondered. “Or are you secretly a millionaire playboy or something?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Sadly I’m the something,” G-Eyed admitted. “There’s some kind of Legion stipend that covers basic living expenses and I can stay at the Lair Mansion rent free if I rejoin. But I don’t know if I should.” He paused to examine a distinctive leather jacket that would help him distinguish his new costume from the old one usurped by Blackhearted.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Why wouldn’t you rejoin the LL?” Alcheman asked. “I mean, I had a superhero team before I was commi… away. They all lived at my house and drove me insane. Well, not clinically insane, because there’s really nothing at all wrong with my mental health, not in the least little bit, no matter what… The point is, I’m sure the Lair Legion is different. Professional. Sober and organised.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You have actually met them, right?” G-Eyed checked. “I mean, I know I’ve been away but CSFB!’s still there? And the Shoggoth? And Yuki Shiro?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“They’re the varsity. The world’s greatest heroes. Even the Carnifex was impressed with their resumé,”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yeah. One morning at the breakfast table in the Lair Kitchen would get you a better picture,” Bry warned the elemental adventurer. “But that’s not what’s making me wonder about going back to them. It’s that… well, I’ve been gone for a long time. My friends have all moved on. There was this girl I knew, that I was really starting to like, but she’s left town, disappeared. There was an old girlfriend and we had a kid – long story involving aphrodisiac rays and sentient bug-colony scientists - and they’ve both vanished. Separately. My old sidekick Frog-Boy’s a multi-billionaire celebrity in rehab and he won’t return my calls. Even the guys who trained me, the Order of the Observing Eye, evil manipulative bastards that they were, they’ve gone. It’s like my whole life is erased like that stuff in my locker. If I take this mask off, what’s left?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Well I had a job, a fiancée,” confided Alcheman. “A wardrobe. In fact people had my whole life planned out for me. Now… well, what do you do the day after the Hooded Hood drags you from where you’d got yourself stuck and recruits you to stop the Carnifex? Apart from buying pants. Do you go back to how it was or do something else?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We should team up and solve crimes,” joked G-Eyed. “Except we just did that.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I guess we’re back to the buying pants plan, then,” sighed Alcheman.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I guess so,” agreed G-Eyed, turning back to the stalls. ***     The far wall of the iron hall ground open with a screaming of gears and a hissing of pistons. The vista beyond was of tormented red skies over a bleak metal city. In the distance the blister pits flared and shot their black bubbling energies up to the heavens.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Apocalyspe!” introduced Dark Thugos, spreading his arm out to show the world of which he was absolute master.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yes, it’s horrible,” said Lara Night.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Dark Thugos,” Anna recognised the man who’d just transported them to his home planet. “Omega class cosmic threat.” She moved to shield the debilitated Lara. “Stay back, Thugos! I mean it.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Anna, you can’t stop him,” Lara said wearily. “On our best day we’d struggle.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And it’s not just him,” Chiaki Bushido noted, glancing at the guards and servants assembled on the platform below. She quickly assessed the tactical combat possibilities; there weren’t any.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Horrible?” Dark Thugos objected to Lara. “There is beauty here, in the crystal of teardrops and the patterns of sprayed blood.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Beauty doesn’t make it less horrible,” replied the strange visitor from another multiverse. “Or less wrong.”     The master of the annihilation eyebeams regarded her. “I thought you less narrow-minded than that, emissary of Shema. Apocalyspe is a physical manifestation of an eternal principle: the survival of the fittest, the triumph of the strong over the weak. We mould the future of the Parodyverse in these endless forges and pitiless battlefields. We become the new gods of creation.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I see that. It’s still horrible.”     Thugos folded his hands behind his back. “I hope to convince you differently. It was very remiss of you not to come and see me before now. I understand you have already been threatened by the Chronicler of Stories and cosseted by the new Destroyer of Tales, such as she is. You’ve met a Herald of Galactivac and an avatar of the Manga Shoggoth and the Sorcerer Supreme. And of course you have known the personification of chaos quite intimately. I feel neglected.”     Anna the android moved beside Lara and shut down some of her external sensors to blank out the screaming from the Uglies in the worktrenches below. “This world…” she whispered. “The energies. The misery…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What is this place?” Liu Xi Xian demanded. “The sheer elemental power, all harnessed so fiercely like a braided chain. Where have you brought us?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“It is his planet,” Chiaki Bushido replied, scowling as she tried to block out the maelstrom of psychic images that threatened to claw her down to madness. “This place reflects his soul.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“It is a harsh world because it is a harsh universe,” noted the new conqueror of the Shee-Yar Imperium. “Here we temper. Here we prove. Even death is not the end of our struggles.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“So it was you who brought the dead back across Shee-Yar Prime?” Liu Xi Xian accused. “All those people shambling mindlessly, chasing us…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“It was not,” Thugos owned. “Although since they were available I was glad to claim them.”     Anna accessed her files. “When the Lair Legion first met Thugos he was Tyrant of the Sol Empire in another reality. He commanded a planet of scientifically-animated corpses and used them as an army of conquest.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Is that what you intend now?” Lara challenged the Master of Apocalyspe. “Is that why you’ve taken Shee-Yar Prime?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Not that world alone, but the whole of the Imperium,” Dark Thugos clarified. “Every dead thing on every world in the empire now serves me.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“That is very bad,” breathed Liu Xi. She reached out to see if she could unbalance the raging elements that seethed through the world beneath her. She found them shackled inexorably to Thugos’ will.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Do you plan to use your new subjects as an army?” the Psychic Samurai demanded. Thugos could not be read.     The Master of Apocalyspe, new Tyrant of the Shee-Yar Imperium looked into the sky at his new acquisitions. “They will make a fine gift for a lady,” he declared.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What kind of girl wants ninety zillion corpses instead of a corsage?” demanded Lara.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And why does Dark Thugos want us?” Liu Xi worried.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I wish to get to know Ms Night better,” Thugos answered. “The rest of you may go – after you have performed one small service for me.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Uh-oh,” Liu Xi breathed.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What service?” demanded Anna. She clutched the severed arm she hadn’t yet had time to repair. “We’re not exactly at our most efficient right now.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You may rest and re-equip,” Thugos agreed. “You may take Apocalyspian components to replace those damaged in your struggle.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Be careful, Anna” Chiaki warned the android. “Everything here is a little bit twisted. Any upgrade here comes with a hidden price.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I mean the android may have Apocalyspian components to replace the damaged components from this world already used in her construction,” Dark Thugos clarified.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What?” demanded Anna, but the tyrant had already moved on.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You may rest for a day and a night while I converse with Lara. We have ethical issues to debate. Then the rest of you will be returned to Shee-Yar Prime to solve the mystery of who animated the dead for the Carnifex and how such a thing could be done across a thousand worlds.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Miss Peel…” began Liu Xi.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Didn’t have the ability to do that,” interrupted Chiaki. “Lord Thugos is right. There’s something else.” She didn’t add that she felt it better that she and the others found it before Thugos’ minions could. “We’ll recover then set out and do it - if we’re all allowed home afterwards.” She glanced at Lara. “All of us.”     Thugos turned to admire the view of the screaming city from his citadel balcony. “Prepare.” ***     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Was the place always this tidy?” Fleabot asked as he looked around the Lighthouse.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“My Nanny visited us,” explained Sam Featherstone as Vizh looked worriedly at the perfectly-stacked piles of magazines and books. “She likes things just so.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“She’s terrifying,” Tandi 9000 admitted. The sexbot-turned-babysitter shuddered. “I thought she was scary when she hit the Carnifex’s thugs with her umbrella and sent them to Denver, but then she started rubbing her finger along surfaces checking for dust!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“The Mouse Guard and the birds are quite exhausted from all the cleaning,” Magweed admitted, “but the place does look nice.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We found eleven remote controls down the back of the sofa, dad,” Griffin reported to Visionary. “Also some mould that Hallie-mom sent off to Dr Moo to analyse. And what looked to be the haunch-bones of a fair-sized bear. We think Lisa’s cat might have hidden them.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“But you’re okay?” Vizh checked. “I was very worried.”     Magweed and Griffin hugged him. “We’re fine,” Magweed told him. “We were worried about you. Poor Mr Bookman! Poor Zdenka.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“But you got the Carnifex!” Griffin grinned. “He should have known better, the mean ol’ villain!”     Sam put down the report on Vespiir’s visions about the future that wouldn’t happen now. “Very interesting stuff,” she admitted. “Very interesting.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Well a lot’s happened in the last few hours,” Vizh told the children, “including quite a bit of housekeeping, it seems…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“My housemaid programming wasn’t really up to Nanny’s expectations,” Tandi admitted. “I never learned to use a vacuum cleaner to vacuum things. Also my scrubber subroutines seem to be lacking.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“But she’s gone now, right?” Vizh checked. “I mean I don’t need to go wash behind my ears really quickly before…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Mr Visionary!” called Nanny Greenwood.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Nanny,” twitched Vizh. “Hi.”     But Vizh was to be spared by the arrival of Kerry Shepherdson and Danny Lyle. “Hey, Feebionary, fire up the Pinto of Fail because I finally got parole from the lighthouse of dweebitude!” Kerry called. “CSFB! signed our release papers and we can go to…urk! Hello Nanny.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Hey, Nanny,” gulped Danny Lyle. “I wasn’t doing anything bad with Kerry. Honest.”     Nanny glared at the two young people with gimlet eyes. “I should think not, Daniel,” she told him. “I expect you would treat a young lady with very proper respect.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yeah,” Kerry told him, poking her tongue out at him behind Nanny’s back.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And you, Kerry,” said Nanny, without turning round, “I expect you to behave like a young lady fit to receive such respect.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Um, yes Nanny.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Wow,” whispered Griffin to Sam. “She is good!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Now let me see this proclamation you were speaking of,” Nanny went on. “Ah, I see your further education paperwork has finally been processed and you intend to continue your academic endeavours at college. Congratulations.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Wait,” Vizh blinked. “Kerry’s moving out? To Paradopolis U?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“All the Juniors got in,” Danny reported. “I think Al B. pulled some strings. And the Bautista Foundation just agreed to rebuild that science block Ultizon demolished the other day. And hey presto, next day Kare, FA and Gaz all get their admission papers.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“But…” Vizh frowned. “Where will you live? What will you do? Did we discuss majors? Did we discuss campus evacuation plans?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We didn’t cover allowance increases yet,” Kerry noted hopefully. “Or me having a car. Or maybe a tank?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What’s Gaz going to study?” Fleabot wondered. “Puking or smiting?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Does he have to choose?” wondered Griffin.     Vizh remained flustered. Magweed held his hand.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Well this is all very positive,” Nanny Greenwood announced. “Now I shall accompany Kerry up to her room and assist her with her packing. We can tidy up as we work. Come Kerry.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Acckkkkk!” cringed the probability arsonist. She shot Danny a help me look. Danny shot her a you’re on your own this time wince. Nanny dragged Kerry upstairs.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I’ll really miss her when she’s gone,” Vizh admitted.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We’ll still see Kerry all the time,” Griffin comforted his father.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“No, I mean Nanny,” the possibly-fake man explained. “Stay here. I need to go find a video camera.” ***     Special Agent Frank Gardener dropped a thick case file onto the metal desk. “Svetlana Rezilyant,” he began. “You’ve got quite a history.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I don’t get complaints from my dates,” answered the pale-blonde with a little smirk.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Born in Commieslavia to a Russian father, brought up in Blackpool Beach, GMY” Gardener summarised. “Graduate of polymer chemistry, Michigan U., where you first met Baroness von Zemo and had the lab accident that gave you your stretching powers.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“She was Beth Dewdrop back then.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“When von Zemo inherited her title and a castleful of supervillain kit you came and joined her as her enforcer and general flunky. Later you turned on her and went freelance. Wasn’t she paying you enough? Or was she keeping your sadistic murderous tendencies on too short a chain?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You got a copy of my Penthouse spread in there?” the girl in the power-dampening cuffs asked her interrogators. “Want me to autograph it?”     Special Agent Lester Dawes got in her face. “Only thing we want you to autograph, ‘Silicone Sally’, is the confession that you planned to kill hundreds of American schoolchildren with your dirty bomb!”     Sally raised one painted eyebrow. “My what?”     Gardener perched a hip on the corner of the table. “You know how few people get Presidential pardons like you did, Sally? Do you have any idea what happens to them if they go back to their old ways after?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Old ways?” snorted Dawes. “Before she was only an assassin and hired thug for Beth von Zemo and accessory to the Baroness’ world takeover bid. Now she’s branching out to mass murder terrorism.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” protested the pliable playmate. “I don’t know what you’re smoking, either.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We’re smoking your ass, ‘Silicone Sally’,” Gardener promised. “In the electric chair. You’ll get the death penalty for this.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Do I get some kind of representation at all?” Sally demanded. “Only, you know, usually there’s a trial?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“If you were still in the US, maybe,” Gardener answered. “If you hadn’t smuggled fissionable materials into our country and planned to detonate them in a Washington kindergarten. If you hadn’t tortured and murdered three good agents who were investigating your trail. Right now you’re damned lucky we’re still working out how to waterboard you, honey!”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You think this is good cop bad cop, Sally?” Dawes chipped in. “Hell no, this is pissed cop and pissed cop. Those men had families, kids. And what kind of scum plans to murder pre-schoolers and spread radioactive materials over half a city?”     Sally began to get scared. “I haven’t got any idea what you’re talking about,” she promised.     Gardener slammed the table again. “We have an airtight case against you! We have witnesses. We have testimony from your ex-boyfriend.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Which ex-boyfriend?” Sally began. “There’s quite a range of…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We found the nuclear waste in your flat!” shouted the special agent.     Sally went pale. “You… you found it there?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Oh yeah,” Dawes snarled. “And the photos and plans scouting your target. And the Sybian money transfer. When did Emperor Scorpion recruit you, Sally?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Wait, I never…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We found the agents; wallets in your bedside table, you murdering bastard!” Gardener accused. “Did you enjoy torturing them with your stretchable body, tearing them apart slowly for hours? Yeah, we got the coroner’s report. We know what you did. Only somebody able to stretch like that could get inside those men the way you ripped them up.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“But I didn’t… I wouldn’t…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You did. We know,” Dawes snapped. “You’re going to die for this, Ms Resilyant. And good r…”     He didn’t complete his sentence. He tumbled to the floor. Gardener fell with him.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What?” Sally puzzled as her cuffs unlocked themselves. The invisible knockout gas hadn’t affected her unique biology.     A ghostly figure shimmed into view. “You’d better hurry,” said the Tech Spectre. “They’re going to find the men down outside your cell pretty soon. Run.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Who?” Silicone Sally frowned. “Wait a minute… I’ve seen your file…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yes. I never did a centrefold for Penthouse,” the Tech Spectre replied. “Look, you can stay and chat or run for your life. Right now you’re an escaped terrorist murderer and the OPS guards out there have kill orders. Either get going or stay and die right here. I get paid either way.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“If I run they’ll think I’m guilty.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“If you don’t they’ll shoot first and worry about it later.”     Alarm klaxons began to ring. Sally slithered under the door and began her getaway. “I didn’t do it,” were her last words to her rescuer.     The Tech Spectre waited long enough to be sure she was on her way before he faded out. “Oh, and Beth von Zemo says ‘hi’,” he chuckled as Sally fled for her life. ***     Vespiir had been in the Lair Mansion once before, briefly, after her arrival on Earth and before being granted the sanctuary of Lemuria. She hadn’t been in this particular room, which was reminiscent of the instruction chambers of the lemans except for the lack of whipping posts; but she’d seen it in her dreams.     She bowed deeply as people came into the room. She wasn’t sure about rank or protocol here but everybody was superior to an evok-hai, a branded outcast with no place.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Hey, no need for that,” Ham-Boy told her. “We’re here as friends.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I dost not hold with being bowed to,” Harlagaz Donarson agreed. “Tis not the Ausgardian way. If you woulds’t worship then merely smite some enemy and dedicate yon victory. Or send burgers.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I am sorry, masters,” Vespiir replied. She made to bow again then remembered and stopped in an ungraceful jerk. She stood unhappily, uncertain of the correct posture to assume.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yeah, they’re not masters,” Fashion Accessory assured the Caphan. “They’re just boys.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Hey!” objected Ham-Boy.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“It’s right there in your superhero name,” Samantha Bonnington pointed out. “You could have been Hamflinger. You could have been Hambattler. You could have been the Protein Paladin. You could even have been the Meatpacker. You chose to be Ham-Boy. It’s self-inflicted.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Tis true thy superhero name doth sucketh most verily,” admitted Harlagaz.     Vespiir ventured a look up at the hulking bronze-thewed Ausgardian and the lean ham-cowled adventurer then forced herself back to a properly docile position with her eyes cast to the floor.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Guys, you need to step outside for a while, okay,” FA told them. “You’re unsettling her. It’s time for some girl talk.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Then we shalt go forth and await thee in yon Lair Kitchen for the nonce,” Harlagaz announced. “Tis best we secure supplies of mead and cheetos ere mine father arrives for the fray.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“There’s a fray?” Ham-Boy worried.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Mine father art arriving, is he not?”     Fashion Accessory waited until the boys had left the Juniors classroom then turned back to Vespiir. “There, now we can relax.”     Vespiir nodded and bowed again. “Yes, mistress.”     FA sighed. “Okay, first off, I’m not a mistress. Hatman’s completely clueless so I never really got the chance, and now he’s off… Er, I mean, I’m not in charge. Of anything. I’m just me. Samantha. Er, Samantha of the House of Bonnington, or possibly the Houses of Bonnington and Cunningham if my parents divorce is through yet.” She looked over at the silver-mesh Caphan bikini that Vespiir wore, did a twirl, and was suddenly clad the same. “See? We’re alike.”     Vespiir’s eyes widened. “You have a marvellous gift!” she appreciated.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yeah. It kind of got dropped on me by the Hooded Hood, a little fragment of Austernal power to transmute fabrics. You want to try what it’s like wearing Earth clothing?”     Suddenly the Caphan was clad in a Roberto Cavalli original, a patchwork sweater and leopard-spotted mini-kilt with high boots and a silk scarf. FA thought the girl would he delighted but Vespiir screamed and clutched her hands to her forehead.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What is it?” Samantha asked anxiously. “What’s wrong? It was just for fun. I thought… why are you covering your face?”     Vespiir shuddered. “I am sorry, mistr… Lady Samantha.” She braced herself and forced her hands to her sides to reveal the livid ugly still-bloody scar on her forehead, the cruel mark of a slave found so unworthy as to be tossed beyond the protection of the law. FA’s clothes change had dissolved the bandage-scarf that had covered it. The evok-hai blushed and blinked back tears at her humiliation.     FA paled. “That’s what they did to you?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Some of it,” Vespiir replied. “I am sorry.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You didn’t do this so you don’t have to apologise,” Samantha replied fiercely. “Look, I know how it is to get used and hurt by bastards when you don’t know enough to protect yourself. It’s not your fault.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I see the future sometimes,” Vespiir confessed. It was that which had earned her the punishment. Only Caphan men received the prophetic gifts of Raathi.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We know you do. That’s why we’re all still breathing this morning. Most of us. And why the Carnifex isn’t. Vespiir, you saved the world. Saved all of us. We like that you can see the future.”     Vespiir bit her lip, then stopped. She’d been trained better than this. “You are a high lady of great value,” she wondered to FA. “They know of your gifts and value you all the more for it.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yeah. I’m hot and I’m super-powered. Yay me. And yay you, Vespiir, because you are as well.”     The Caphan seeress shook her head.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Want me to call the boys back in and ask them? You’re a total Caphan babe with a body I have to invest three hours a day on a stepmaster to compete with. You’ve got a really cool power that’s helped us more than we can say. As for that… thing they did to your forehead… Let me see it.”     Vespiir shivered and pulled back her hair.     Samantha brushed a knuckle over the burned flesh. “Yeah, that’s nasty, but we can work with it. You see, Vesp, I’m not smartest kid in the class, and I’m never going to be the best superhero, but there’s one thing I’m really good at. I know clothes and accessories. I know how to look good. I know how to make other people look good.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I am evok-hai” Vespiir argued.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Hey, you know what? I was on Caph. I’ll tell you what I learned there. I learned that the most famous, most glorious, most fabulous women in your culture are Ohanna, Miiri, and Kaara. They sing songs about the Nine Exiles, right? Also some shudderingly inappropriate ones about Vizh that I’m in therapy with Kare about. But you know what all those girls had in common? Every one of them got exiled. Every one of them suffered. Each of them had to tough it through to become what they are.” Samantha laid a finger on the tip of Vespiir’s nose. “You know any other Caphan ex-slaves who’ve been tossed into the big wide universe with the chance to become someone really special? Cause I do.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I am not…” began Vespiir.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You don’t want to be them. You want to be you. Vespiir of whatever the hell you decide to be of. But till then I’ll tell you the other thing I know. Ask me what that is.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What is it that you know, Lady Samantha?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I know that girls without flaws are considered beautiful,” FA confided in her. “But I know that girls with flaws who know how to take those flaws and make them… part of their style, those girls can beat out the perfect ones any day. You want proof? Here I am.”     Samantha moved her hand over Vespiir’s forehead and there was a Chanel print headband there. Then a LoPresti tinted scarf. Then a Gucci turban. Then a Disney princess tiara.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Honestly, Vesp,” promised Fashion Accessory, “with that figure the last thing the boys’ll be looking at is a mark on your forehead. Now hold still while I find you something to wear that says ‘Look upon my perfection Earthmen and despair!’”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You are very kind, Lady Samantha,” admitted the Caphan.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I’m quite the bitch when you get to know me. All my friends say so. But when you feel you can tell me that too, that’ll mean we’re friends.”     Samantha returned Vespiir to her traditional outfit; except now it was of gold mesh with the jewelled ornaments of a great lady, fringed with the saffron cords of a member of a high lord’s house.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I am not allowed to wear this,” Vespiir warned, fumbling to unclasp the metal bikini.     FA stopped her. “Actually you are. It’s the right of members of the House of Viisionary, believe it or not. And you’re being transferred to his house. Well, not his house. Not even his lighthouse for more than a few days. But his House house, if you want it. If that’s okay with you?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Lord Viisionary desires me?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Ew, no. Nobody needs grades that badly, even me. No. But you’ve got that psychic power that you can’t control. Ebony says it gives you nightmares and you can’t shut it off. You can’t focus it. So CSFB! and Vizh and Hallie had a little conference about you and… we’d like you to join the Junior Lair Legion training programme. It’s not quite as lame as it sounds. Not quite.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“You wish me to… join your tent?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“We wish you to join our tent. Except hopefully Danny’s got something better for us when we move to… Hey, that’s another day. And you probably know about it better than I do anyhow. But yeah, HB and Gaz and I wanted to ask you, wanted to know if you wanna maybe come to Paradopolis U. with us and study, I dunno, Women’s Studies or something? And learn to use that curse of yours to save the world some more.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I… I would like that,” Vespiir admitted in a very small voice.     FA smiled and winked. “In that case let’s get the boys back in here then follow the smoke to find Kare and Danny. Then we can say Welcome to the Juniors, Vesp. Welcome home!” ***     Ã¢â‚¬Å“There’s quite a crowd out there,” worried Visionary, peering out of the window beside the adamantine front doors of the Lair Mansion. “About every TV station on the planet’s camped there, plus more journalists than I thought existed, then half the population of Paradopolis with placards and banners.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Like I told you, you’re popular,” answered Meggan Foxxx, the Lair Legion’s PR officer and mother of its new leader. “Everybody wants to hear what you’re planning next.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“And you don’t think we could handle this better in Mumphrey’s press room? Or maybe by e-mail? Only the lawn conferences we’ve help before haven’t all gone so good.”     Nats appeared levitating heavy crates of press packets. “Yeah, I think the main tip is not to start singing Henry the Eighth in the middle of it, Vizh. Important presentation tip.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“That and make sure you’ve remembered underwear,” admitted Dancer. “Damn that Johnstantine.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“This many people near the Mansion is a security nightmare,” Yuki Shiro fretted. “Marie’s having a hard time keeping Sgt MacAllistair down in sick bay. One micro-nuke concealed in that crowd and…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yon scanner beasties wouldst have told us,” Donar assured his old team-mates, “and then we couldst have smitten the felon. Besides, I am certain I couldst swallow a micro-nuke and still hath room for cheesecake.”     Icy wasn’t bothered about security concerns. Now he’d reformed after his encounter with the Carnifex he simply enjoyed himself waving out of the window at the children in the crowd. “It’s nice that all these people came to say hello to us.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“It’s nice that they’re not carrying pitchforks and burning torches,” Flapjack added.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yet,” muttered Visionary.     Amber St Clare, Legion liaison officer wasn’t happy either. “I’d still like the chance to review what CrazySugarFreakBoy! is going to say out there,” she admitted. “I haven’t got the clearances and permissions I usually…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Just trust my boy, Amber,” Meggan advised. “He knows what he’s doing.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“That’s the scary thing,” Amber replied in a whisper.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“I wish we could wait till the others are back,” Dancer admitted. “Any word from Hallie or Al B about finding EEE?”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“No so far,” Vizh reported. “And no trace on Liu Xi and the others either. We can’t even really look for them till we’ve got EEE back.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Vinnie’s looking,” Dancer assured him. “I know he went off to talk to Urthula.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What about Silicone Sally?” Nats checked. “Any word on where she got bundled off to? I’m having a hard time believing she was planning what they said she was.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Hallie should be able to trace her when she gets back,” Vizh suggested. “I hope she gets back soon.” There were a few things he had to talk to the AI about; like Kerry moving out; like what Hallie had said to him in the Carnifex battle.     Ã¢â‚¬Å“But thuddy seems to have vanished again,” Nats sighed. “I bet now G-Eyed’s going to want to take his place.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“What is it with you and G-Eyed,” demanded Yuki. “You’ve served together on the team before.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Yeah. Before G-Eyed became the Hooded Hood’s best buddy and invited him to move in to the Mansion. Before G-Eyed became acting team leader and decided we should be a freaking army – no offence to Dream’s plans, Meggan, but it just didn’t work out. Before G-Eyed became a horse’s ass and nearly wrecked the Legion.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Hatty recommended Bry,” Dancer pointed out. “It’s not like we don’t all need second chances.”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“That’s why I think maybe we’d be better doing our press stuff in a more controlled environment,” Visionary ventured. “I mean, really, would it hurt to just put some flyers up round the city? Or maybe just let Dancer tell Big Thick Eddie? Being in front of cameras can be very nerve-wracking, especially for a new leader who’s not that confident yet and might…”     Ã¢â‚¬Å“Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!” shouted CrazySugarFreakBoy!, surfing down the balustrade of the main staircase and somersaulting down to the front doors. “Let’s go, superfriends! It’s showtime!” *** Notes of the Lair Legion Press Conference: The event took place on the Lair Lawn on a balmy afternoon under blue skies. Dreamcatcher Foxglove eschewed a microphone, preferring to stand casually beside the reporters’ seating with a soda in his hand from a cooler box by his feet. He joked with the press about the lack of teleprompters or written notes. When Meggan Foxxx had got everyone to their places he began to speak. CRAZYSUGARFREAKBOY!, leader of the Lair Legion: Heya, boys and girls and those who haven’t decided yet! This is your friendly neighbourhood CrazySugarFreakBoy! welcoming you to the all-new all-different Lair Legion press conference! I hope you brought spare socks because we’re gonna blow the ones you’re wearing to Jupiter! AMBER ST CLARE, Legion liaison staffer: The Lair Legion does not admit liability for any clothing damage or loss you may suffer as a result of this press conference. CSFB!: So first off I’ve gotta pay tribute to the brave folks who fell last night. There’ll be a moment of silence at the end of the conference for Rabid Wolf and the Librarian, then Dancer’ll be reading from White Fang and from some stuff by Dickens as a tribute. Seriously, we miss those guys and we won’t forget them. DONAR: Most verily. [Takes his helmet off. Clouds rumble in the distance] CSFB!: Next up, the good stuff! You’re all wondering about a new LL roster. Well the big news is, we’ll be adding pretty much everybody. I’ve sent messages to the Global Guardians, to Giant Hero Six, to GloPCrAp, to Team: Tolkein in New Zealand, to everybody. We’re gonna affiliate them all to the LL and have one really awesome mega-lineup that no baddie can resist! BERNICE TESSMACHER, reporter: Wait a moment. What about jurisdictional issues? What about national security considerations? CSFB!: What about them? This is superheroes we’re talking about. We fight the bad guys. The rest is just paperwork. JOSIE HART, reporter: Hold on. What about those metahumans operating under sponsorship from repressive governments? What about those teams that discriminate against women, or against other faiths? What about those who use lethal force as a first option? CSFB!: Yeah, those guys’ll have to get their heads out of their asses. But we can work it out. We’ll be setting up embassies worldwide, kind of like the Giffen JL era, and we’ll…” BILL O’RLLY, reporter: So you’re setting up a massive unmandated international super-powered militia with access to US security data and no oversight, protected by outdated international treaties that this nation never signed, intending to establish a metahumanocracy to lord it over everyday Americans? VISIONARY: Oh yeah, this is going well. Sing Henry the Eighth, Dream, while you can. CSFB!: Listen, O’Rlly, you m&*&£^”%£er, that’s not what we’re gonna do. Get your nose outta your paranoid isolationist survivalist fantasies and smell the real world! MEGGAN FOXXX: Hold it, Dreamy! I’ll field this one, okay? What my son means when he says that, Mistah O’Rlly, is that you can take your dumbass &%£$ questions and stick ‘em up your *%£& where the sun don’t shine, *£^$*&wad! NATS: Oh yeah. That’s the diplomatic touch we need right now. [Begins to sidle to cover behind the podium] CSFB!: You wanna know what the Legion’s really going to do? We’re gone save the world, that’s what. We’re gonna stop just reacting to the super-baddies and we’re gonna deal with all the stuff we should be doing. We’re not going Squadron Supreme or Kingdome Come. We’re just gonna fix all the stuff we can and make this a better place. BRIANNA ANDERSON, reporter: Whether we want it or not? What about international law differences? Will you enter sovereign nations without their agreement in order to… CSFB!: We’re not gonna get caught up in that jack-off bullshit! We’re gonna cut through the red tape that’s kept us from saving lives and tackling injustice and we’re gonna do it now. Today. You wanna know how? Ask me how. DREWSON BLAINE, reporter: CrazySugarFreakBoy!, you’re telling us that you’re going to be the man who decides when and how superheroes are going to violate international treaties. Could you comment on rumours that you and your wife are having sexual relations with a seventy-year old woman in some bizarre ménage a trois? Do you have a child out of wedlock with a supervillain’s daughter? Do you have a sister who’s a former member of the Purveyors of Peril? Have you had sexual relations with her? Do you think you’re the sort of person we should trust with the kind of power you’re claiming? CSFB!: Listen, my bedroom life is none of your business or anyone else’s. Even when it’s not in the bedroom. Anyhow, all the good stuff’s on April’s blog. So just shut the &%£ up and listen, will you. Ask me how we’re gonna make the world better today. DANCER, tentatively: How? CSFB!, grinning: I’m glad you asked. See, we’re gonna take them all down. BALD. HERPES. The Word. The Camorra Macchina. Factor X. The Ass-Raping Ninjas. Cult of the Apostate. Magenta St Evil. Joe Quesada. Spango. Barovia. North Korea. But today we’re starting the housekeeping really close to home, with the Pogroms of Purity, those &£$*£ *$%£s run by the Aryan Ideal, a neo-Nazi supremacist with the highest kill-rate of black suspects of any so-called superhero in America. Yeah, Karl Braun, you *££wipe, today the Legion’s coming to get you! NATS: We’re what? DONAR: Most excellent. Let the whomping begin for the nonce. VIZH: Wait. What? AMBER ST CLARE: Get me a tazer rifle. Now! CSFB!: Lair Legion! Line up! [General confusion, shouting, flashlights bursting, people leaving their seats to swarm around the team, cameras toppling etc.] ***     Aldrich Grey switched off the TV set and leaned back in his sofa chair. “Damn it,” he said. He pressed a button on a very different remote and spoke into it. “Activate the Lair Legion Protocols. Looks like it’s time.”     Then the Grey Eminence settled back to sleep. *** Okay, I admit it. This chapter has proliferated into two chapters. Sorry. We’ll get to the stuff I promised for #338 by #339. #340 tops. Meanwhile… Next Issue: The Lair Legion vs the Pogroms of Purity! Hatman gets an offer he can’t refuse! The Juniors on Campus! Silicone Sally vs Citizen Z! Lara Night and Dark Thugos! Helicarrier and firehouse! All this and… the Hooded Hood. Look for Untold Tales of the Lair Legion Protocols, coming soon. And special kudos to anyone who can identify where each of the reporters in this story originally appeared. Tie ins: One More Dilemma by Killer Shrike The Search by Al B. Harper In the Freezer by Visionary Change of Plans by Hatman Artwork by Visionary (with thanks; good, isn’t he?) and HH. *** And then: *** Original concepts, characters, and situations copyright © 2010 reserved by Ian Watson. Other Parodyverse characters copyright © 2010 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.

First I should say...uh-oh, CSFB! at a press conference can't be good by anyone's measure.

With Dark Thugos, it's hard to tell if he *wants* Liu Xi, Anna, and Chiaki to figure out the mystery, or if he simply wants them out of the way so they can't defend Lara, or if he wants them to get killed. Or maybe all three.

Then again, maybe as resistant to reading as Thugos is, Chiaki might be psychic enough to realize if she's in for a death sentence at least.

It also looks to me like Thugos used Ms Peel's defeat at Lara's hands as a test (either prepared or not) and wants that kind of power on his side. I wonder if that also implies that she'll be given little choice, as either her friends, or perhaps Earth, could be held hostage.

Or maybe I'm underestimating a more "modern" Dark Thugos, who simply wants Lara to negotiate with Earth and/or the Lair Legion for him.