Birth Of A Villain #36
a chaotic add-on cascade type Legion of Net.Heroes title
"The Conclusion (?)"
Written by Martin Phipps with no one there to stop him!
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Cover has wReamicus Maximus and Father Brown shaking hands
with Bill Clinton in the background.
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As usually happens in the Looniverse, events are ultimately decided by
committee, namely a committee of writers from the real world. In this
particular case, however, the vast majority of writers appeared to have lost
interest in the various Melissa clones. This then ultimately resulted in
one ultimate fate for all the Melissa clones, one which struck the fancy of
the only writer who was apparently interested in seeing the story to its
ultimate conclusion: the Melissa clones all became amorous Filipinas who
went around Manila saying "I love you" to all the men they met and causing
them to momentarily erase from their minds all memory of their wives and
families. The Melissas were finally brought to justice, however, when the
mayor of Manila ordered another crackdown against that sort of thing!
Meanwhile...
Doctor Stomper found himself in a small canoe on a lake. He sat there
silently and motionlessly. Then he heard a voice.
"Wake up, my boy!"
Doctor Stomper noticed oars on either side of the boat. He placed his
hands on the oars.
"That's it, boy! You can do it!"
Doctor Stomper brought the canoe to shore. He looked up at the man who
had called to him. He wasn't very tall so the reeds along the shore
obscured all but the part of him that was above the waist. He was an old
man, but still healthy, which was all the more surprising because he was
dead. "Grandpa?"
"Yes, boy, it's me!"
"Am I dead?"
"No, you're dreaming."
"Oh."
"But you might as well be dead already, son, if you're not going to wake
up."
"Grandpa, I'm tired. I feel as though there's something in me making
copies of itself and sending out e-mail to all my friends."
"Yeah, that's the Legionaire's Disease," the vision told him. "But
Gorilla Grad thinks he's got a cure for you and the others, but you have to
fight it, my boy! They can't bring you back if you don't fight."
"I don't know," Doctor Stomper said. "I'm not a major player in the LNH.
I never was. I never even appeared in Cry.sig. Hell, the person I was
based on, he hasn't even been on the net since May of 1992!"
"And if he were here now he'd say that it was completely out of character
for you to be whining like this!"
"Thing is, do they really need me anymore!"
The vision shook his head. "My God, son, did you even read the last issue
of this series? Don't you realise how dry the pseudoscience for this
reality is becoming without your entertaining explanations? Do they need
you? My God, son, they need you more than they've ever needed you before!
Now you get out of that boat and come step onto shore!"
Doctor Stomper nodded. "I'm coming, Pops!" He struggled to get out of
the boat.
"That's it, my boy, you're doing great!"
"I can barely feel my legs."
"Come on, you can do it!"
"Grandpa?"
"Come on, Doctor, come back to us!"
Doctor Stomper opened his eyes. Around him stood Gorilla Grad, Tsar
Chasm, Weirdness Magnet, Pedestrian Girl, Fourth Wall Demolisher Lad,
Expendable Man, Fourth Wall Lass, Twaeila Brock, Mouse, Insomnia Boy, Easily
Siscovered Man Lite, Coward Lad, Google-13, DeadHead Man and Chinese Guy; in
other words, the entire cast of the past thirty-five issues, with the
exception of Writers Block Woman who was sitting elsewhere in the room with
Mr. Tiddles on her lap.
"You did it!" several cast members told Gorilla Grad.
Gorilla Grad nodded. "We need to give this to all of them," he said,
refering to the special mixture of Dr. Paprika and Jolt Cola. "But be
careful! Make sure the solution is only 25% Jolt Cola! Anything more than
that could be dangerous!"
"Congratulations!" Tsar Chasm said. "Of course, you realise that I will
have to leave now. The Legion considers me a villain and if any of them
were to wake up and find me by their bedside there might be an unfortunate
understanding."
"Of course," Gorilla Grad said. He offered his hand. "If we see you
again, I hope it can be as friends."
"I wouldn't count on that," Tsar Chasm said, refusing the handshake.
Gorilla Grad went back to tending to Doctor Stomper.
Over the next few days, the Legionaires were slowly came out of their
comas. As it turned out that Legionaires disease was not life threatening
and, given time, the Legionaires would have all have woken up on their own
accord. In fact, none of them had been out for more than a week when all
was said and done. Yes, that's right, the past thirty-five issues all took
place in a matter of a few days, which meant that it was still 1999 (much to
the confusion of Weirdness Magnet who seemed to think it was 2001 already).
Meanwhile, with the LNH back in action, the Legion of Costumed Individuals
(Pedestrian Girl, Fourth Wall Demolisher Lad and Expendable Man) made their
way back to their home dimension and Twaeila Brock similarly returned to
alt.barney.dinosaur.die.die.die.
With things having settled down, Tiddles, who still had control over
Writers Block Woman, considered the situation he found himself in. He
realised that is would look a bit strange to have Writers Block Woman flying
into action with a cat in her arms... and God forbid she should drop him!
Nor had he quite figured out how to manipulate Writers Block Woman such that
nobody would suspect that he was actually in control; after all, it was one
thing to fool Insomnia Lad, DeadHead Man and Chinese Guy but what about the
rest of the Legion? Or mouse, for that matter?
After checking Writers Block Woman's entry in the LNH roster, however, and
following the link to her daughter, Mouse, Tiddles was able to determine
that Writers Block Woman was, in fact, the ex-wife of Jonathan Connery, the
Director of the Conspiracy Corporation, the second largest corporation in
the world. Tiddles soon realised that, short of getting Writers Block Woman
and her husband back together again, there was no way he could use Writers
Block Woman to gain control of the Conspiracy Corporation. Mouse, however,
was another story.
>From what Tiddles had been able to determine, it seemed Writers Block Woman
and Jonathon Connery shared custody of Mouse. Thus, all Tiddles had to do
was take control of Mouse, leaving Writers Block Woman with a big gaping
hole in her memory but otherwise no more the wiser, and then just bide his
time until Mouse's next trip to Net.Zealand. Tiddles purred with delight.
Being in control of the world's second biggest corporation was certainly a
lot better than being in control of some small time crime syndicate!
Tiddles had Writers Block Woman bring him into Mouse's room. He then
instructed her to leave him there, go back to her room and go to sleep.
Mouse found her mother's behaviour a bit strange.
"Mom? Why did you bring a cat in here? Mom?"
=( She can't hear you. )=
"Who said that?"
Tiddles jumped up on Mouse's bed. =( I did. )=
"Whoa!" Mouse said. "I guess I shouldn't have watched Doctor Doolittle
before going to bed!"
=( You're not dreaming. )=
"Oh and I suppose you are a talking cat."
=( You hear my voice as a result of my powerful mind projecting its
thoughts into your brain. I am Tiddles. I am your master. )=
"You must be joking."
=( I am not! I am a superior intellect! You will do as I say! )=
"You must have me confused with somebody else. I think for myself! I
don't take orders from anyone, let alone a cat!"
=( I am no ordinary cat. I am Tiddles. )=
"And I'm Mouse." She shook his paw. He felt humiliated. "Nice to meet
you, except that mice don't like cats... and now I can understand why."
=( Enough of this! You will take me to Net.Zealand where I can use your
father to take over the Conspiracy Corporation. )=
"I don't think so. I'm quite happy here with Mom and all my friends in
the LNH. Now, why couldn't you just be an ordinary housecat?"
=( Ha! Someday cats will rule the world! You'll see! )=
"Fine. Until then why don't you just go to the kitchen and get a nice
bowl of milk. Hmm?"
With a hiss, Tiddles ran out of the room, out of LNH HQ and out into the
night, perhaps never to be seen again.
Of course, you might be wondering what happened with wRreamicus Maximus
and his church of Dvandom in his on again, off again battle with Father
Brown and the Church of the Fourth Wall who were at one point allying
themselves with the Nodacommandos. Well, unfortunity, due to the separation
of church and state and the freedom of religion, both guaranteed by the
constitution of the Loonited States of Ame.rec.a, there was nothing the LS
government could do about either group. Instead, the government offered to
negotiate a settlement.
After months of intense negotiations, the two church leaders were brought to
Camp David where a beaming President Clinton, always thinking about his
legacy, got the two of them to sign an agreement to cease hostilities and to
not try to bring any writer, neither Dave Van Domelan nor David Henry,
through the fourth wall to the Looniverse. The two church leaders then
agreed to shake hands. They met again in early 2000 when they shared that
year's Nobel Peace Prize.
It remains to be seem, however, if the two churches, with their
diametrically opposed beliefs and points of view, would continue to coexist
peacefully. That's life: you can't expect that everything will have a neat
and tidy conclusion.
THE END (?)
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