Blue Light Productions presents
Limp-Asparagus Lad #43
A Legion of Net.Heroes title
"Somewhere Friendly" part one
Written and copyright 2001 Saxon Brenton
Guest art by J*rry Ordw*y
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Cover shows Limp-Asparagus Lad standing on a beach, looking up at a
night sky reminiscent of Van Gogh's 'Starry Night'. In recognition of
the 'Maximum Insecurity' banner emblazoned diagonally across the top
right-hand corner of the cover, Limp-Asparagus Lad has draped over
one of his arms a neatly folded fuzzy blue blanket with teddy bears
embroidered on it.
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There was an explosion.
Then came the blackness, followed instantly by a bitter, biting
cold. A cold so extreme that it made him want to scream.
What seemed like only a second later he could see again - kind
of - and Limp-Asparagus Lad immediately lashed out at Dinnerplate
before the net.villain could carry out another of his tricks. The
snuffleupagus-nosed mutant was too dangerous to be allowed even an
instant's respite.
It was just as his blow was connecting that L-ALad realised that
his target wasn't Dinnerplate - but by then it was too late to pull his
punch. Then, to his considerable surprise and relief, his fist simply
went straight through the other person.
Limp-Asparagus Lad blinked and tried to focus past the multi-
coloured splodges (which were still working hard at cluttering up his
vision) and onto the figure before him. Then the consequences of his
adrenalin surge caught up with him, and he collapsed.
Staring upwards from where he lay, he could see a canopy of trees
overhead dappling the light. This, clearly, was not the hideout of the
mutant angst-eating net.villain.
He recalled the fight with Dinnerplate that occurred last issue.
He recalled Retcon Lad cutting loose against Dinnerplate with some
sort of energy overload. And then the explosion, and now he was in
this place.
It was about this time that he also realised that he had collapsed
onto a pile of cushions and pillows that had been strewn about on a
grassy lawn.
A voice asked, "How are you feeling?"
"Very sore," L-ALad replied succinctly, turning his attention to
the querist.
The question had come from the young man of about twelve years old
standing patiently on the mossy grass across from him. He was fair
skinned, with light brown hair and green eyes, and he had a truly
vicious scar that went from one side of his face to the other running
across his eyes.
The boy nodded sympathetically and said, "I imagine so. Here," he
said, holding up a thermos, "when you feel steady enough, I brought
some passionfruit juice for you."
"I doubt if I am so unsteady that I cannot..." began L-ALad as he
tried to stand, and then realised that this was still a bit beyond him
at the moment. "On reflection, I believe I will just lie here for a
little while," he decided.
The other nodded again. "That's probably a good idea under the
circumstances. Just in case you're interested, you feel a lot worse
than the bruises you took from Dinnerplate would normally warrant.
Dinnerplate's shadowstuff is actually a type of life draining nega-
energy from the Antimatter Universe of Thhhppp."
(The name, of course, was made by poking his tongue out and
making a short wet raspberry. Gotta have people poking their tongues
out in a Legion comic.)
"When Dinnerplate 'blew up'," the boy continued, "he was thrown
back into Thhhppp, and you were dragged along with him for a little
way before I reeled you in. Immersion in that nega-energy drained a lot
of your strength, and also disrupted your drama dampening field."
Limp-Asparagus Lad looked more closely at the boy, and commented,
"You seem to know a lot about me."
The other shrugged. "I'm a precog and a bit of a clairvoyant.
Among other things. I foresaw that you'd need rescuing. And also, I'm
one of your Writer's pre-internet creative writing characters, and I
broke the fourth wall more than a decade ago. Anyway, I'm known as Luke.
Pleased to meet you."
"Likewise," said the LNHer. A thought occurred to him. "I assume
you don't have a sister called Emily, though."
"No."
"Just checking." He looked around, examining his whereabouts more
closely. They seemed to be in parkland of some sort; there was grass and
a light covering of trees, but none of the undergrowth that would have
sprang up in untended wilderness. Limp-Asparagus Lad also noticed that
there was a piece of table leg from Dinnerplate's headquarters. The
weather was warm and he could hear the susurration of breaking waves
from somewhere in the middle distance. Overhead, brightly coloured
parrots and other birds sang or squawked over fruit and nectar bearing
flowers.
There was a rustling in the leaves overhead. L-ALad glanced up,
and met the gaze of something small and winged and reptilian. The tiny
dragon regarded him for a second, before flying away to attend to its
own business.
"Where are we?" the Man of Dull asked.
"Somewhere Friendly. It's a pocket dimension that Freakout
created for the Space Cadets a while ago."
"That statement raises more questions than it answers," Limp-
Asparagus Lad observed. It was not a question.
Luke shrugged. "Have to keep the readers interested somehow." He
sat back, propping himself up with his hands out on the ground behind
him. "For instance, even though another one of my powers is tele-
porting, I'm not going to offer to take us back to the house straight
away," and here he waved a hand off in one direction, "Or even back to
the Looniearth. You can rest up here for ten minutes or so, and then
we can walk back. It's only a few hundred metres along the beach, and
it'll give us time to swap stories and bring the readers up to date
with some of the backhistory."
"Yours, I take it?"
"And yours. A story for a story, Piers Anthony style."
Limp-Asparagus Lad examined the idea and could only see one thing
wrong with it. True, this place was very restful and pleasant, and it
might be nice just to slow down for a bit. On the other hand: "I will
need to return to Fourth Wall Lass and Retcon Lad. I have no idea how
they fared after the fight with Dinnerplate."
"Tired and sore, but otherwise fine," answered Luke. His eyes
took on a slightly distant look. "They've called the cops and an
ambulance, although the ambos are mainly for Zachary."
"Who?"
"Abbadon. His real name is Zacharias Durandal."
"I see."
"Anyway, on the timetable I've got in front of me I can have you
back there in half an hour or so."
"Very well. So then, who are these 'Space Cadets' you mentioned?"
"A group of about, well, twelve or so of us if you count every-
body. We met during the Secret Crisis Of Infinite Wars of 1987 - big
superhero crossover Event type thing."
"That is the second time that you have made mention to something
happening more than a decade ago," Limp-Asparagus Lad objected. "You
do not look old enough to have taken part in an event like that."
Luke smirked. "Even allowing for the time distortion of superhero
class universes?" He shrugged again. "Yeah, well, really it's because
I kind of stopped aging after I died. I've looked twelve for the past
decade or so. I'm actually closer to twentysix, I suppose."
Limp-Asparagus Lad blinked in something terribly close to
bemusement. "I haven't arrived in some sort of surreal Monty Python
based storyline, have I?" he asked.
Luke shook his head, unfazed. "No more so than you normally have
to put up with in the Looniverse, what with it being composed of equal
parts superhero cliches, British Humour, and They Might Be Giants
lyrics.
"Anyway, getting back to the Secret Crisis. It was a huge piece
of fanfic that our Writer started back in 1987. Solely for private
pleasure. It went onwards into 1993 before he lost interest. That loss
of interest was mainly because he had found a Life - with the LNH and
few other social activities, including, bizarrely, regular social
meetings with the local Star Trek club." Luke raised an ironic
eyebrow, then continued: "Mind you, the latter interest dried up since
then, partly because of burnout and partly because of his irritation
with the activities of The Evil Empire."
"I'm not sure I understand that last reference."
"It's a pointed comment on the nature of Star Trek fandom in
Australia. It probably doesn't mean much unless you know a bit about
the specifics of the conflict in that country between local fan clubs
run for fun versus officially licensed fan clubs run for profit."
"If you say so," agreed Limp-Asparagus Lad, then brought the
topic back from its meanderings: "Getting back to your story..."
"Okay then, lessee. The Secret Crisis was huge, sprawling and
unwieldy, and was basically an excuse for fanboyish team-ups. It was
one of those 'Crisis On Infinite Earths' style crossovers were every-
thing was destroyed but somehow the status quo was contrived to be
preserved, and almost everyone forgot about it afterwards.
"During that little escapade a group of us were thrown together
and became friends. We were all in a position to remember afterwards.
Freakout created this place for us to meet, sort of like a clubhouse,
since we had all been gathered from across different parallel Earths
and some from different times as well. So this place has high inter-
dimensional connectivity - at least, it has for those people who have
been authorised to use it. And of course, inter-dimensional teleport
is one of the powers I picked up during the Secret Crisis. So, getting
you back home isn't really a problem."
"Thank you. That would be appreciated."
"You're welcome. There is, however, a 'but'. There's someone who
needs your help over in rec.arts.movies.b-movies. It would be simplest
just to go in and drag him out, in which case I could do it myself.
However, narrative convention demands that someone go and have an
Adventure saving him. And of course, your net.comic, your
responsibility."
Limp-Asparagus Lad would have sighed. Drama could be so
irritating sometimes. But, being who he is, he simply replied. "Very
well then. To continue your story, what was your part in it all?"
"In something like that? Everyone gets bit parts, of course. Oh,
okay, sometimes something more substantial than that. For me it
started one morning after I started having dreams that later came
true. A bit of a co-incidence that my powers activated just at the
time that the storyline was beginning."
"It sounds like a plot contrivance."
"Yeah, probably. Later when I met up with one of my friends,
Chris Green, it turned out that other-dimensional counterparts to
himself were turning up for some reason... more plot contrivance, I
expect. In the end there were so many of them that we started to
jokingly refer to them as the 'Legion of Chrises' and the 'Crisis of
Chrises'. But it was that first morning that we started to realise
that Something Was Up. Things kind of got out of hand after that, what
with all the crossovers and team-ups and whatnot.
"During that time I got to meet a whole bunch of other people who
were fanboys and fangirls for comics and SF and stuff, and through it
all we kind of hung out together and... you know... had adventures."
His eyes took on the thoughtful look of recalling a pleasant memory.
"That was the first time I ever visited a super team's satellite head-
quarters. You never really forget your first look at the Earth from
space. And we even helped save the hash of a few of the major league
superhero groups. Fortunately we had Dickenson as our defacto leader;
he was a medical intern at a clinic in New York dealing with super-
human diseases, and he was used to keeping his head in an emergency.
Anyway, he had a good sense of when to pull up short any of the
silliness that looked like it was going to get out of hand. It was
during those adventures that it became kind of obvious that I had
Crystal Montclair syndrome - I just kept getting all these new powers,
more than I knew what to do with. I also got wounded a couple of
times," and here Luke pointed to the aforementioned scar that ran
across his face. "This is the legacy of an attack by a lizard man-type
critter. And in the end, it was the death of me. Literally."
Limp-Asparagus Lad considered this, then said, "You are a ghost,
then?"
Luke rocked his head back and forth as he considered this. "I'm
a... I think 'memory' would be the best description. Usually to be
undead, there has to be something left to animate - mind, body, or
soul, or whatever. But I got snuffed when we were trying to put a
halt to the rampage of a mad god of entropy, and there literally
wasn't *anything* left of me. I exist now only because of circum-
stances that allowed memories of the other Space Cadets to kind of
congeal together into a self-aware pattern." He sighed. "Of course,
the guys'd only known me a few weeks, so their memories weren't
exactly *complete*. I had to go back afterwards and use my psi to fill
in all the gaps of the bits that they didn't know about. Even so, when
you put everything together I'm still not the 'real' Adrian 'Luke'
Pastach, just a very close copy. And of course, after the reboot that
inevitably happens after these Secret Crisis type Events, all the
damage gets undone and in one sense I retroactively ceased to be dead,
so there's an original version of me that doesn't remember any of this
living back with my parents in Australia... "
"Ah-HA!" cried Writers Block Woman, popping up for a completely
gratuitous cameo. "Are *you* Cultural Cringe Boy!?"
"No, I bloody well am not! Now go away. You're supposed to be
chasing Carmen at this point in continuity. [In _Writers Block Woman
(and Mouse) #33-35 - Footnote Girl] You'll get your resolution to this
running gag when you reach the _Birth Of A Villain_ cascade."
"Hmmf," she sniffed, and vanished as quickly, mysteriously and
ludicrously (but fashionably) as she had appeared.
Luke looked put out. "This is what I get for only keeping my
precognition tuned on 'major threats and significant stuff'," he said
to himself. He sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. "So much
for the pathos of an angst-filled origin. Never mind though." He
turned back to L-ALad and asked, "How are you feeling now?"
"Better. Let me see if I can stand." This he did.
"The beach is this way," said Luke. "But we can walk along the
path rather than trudge through the sand, which'd probably be a bit
more effort than you'd want to go to at the moment."
Limp-Asparagus Lad followed him a short distance to the beach.
There was a small seawall along the upper limit of the tide line,
separating the yellow-white sands from the grassed forest beyond.
There was a path running along the top of the seawall, leading off
towards either end of the beach. A short distance along that path,
there was even what looked like a wooden picnic table.
All of this L-ALad noticed only in passing. What attracted most
of his attention was the sky.
It was hardly what could be called blue, although there were blue
bits here and there. Mostly it was taken up with the two dozen or so
multi-coloured suns. They were scattered irregularly across the sky;
pastel splodges that seemed to be pulsing gently.
"They must each emit far less light and heat than Looniearth's
sun," L-ALad noted clinically, "Otherwise their collective output
would have reduced this world to a seared cinder."
"Well, yes," admitted Luke. "Come on, let's stop at the table.
You can rest there."
"One question occurs to me," said L-ALad as they reached the
wooden seat. "If Dinnerplate's life draining abilities are so potent,
why am I able to move at all after so short a recuperation?"
"Oh, that's just the nature of this world," explained Luke off-
handedly. "When Freakout created it, he got a bit creative with the
laws of physics. Things recover from wounds faster than they would on
Earth, but decay less rapidly. There are other metaphysical properties
about it that I think he copied from some Diane Duane novels."
"In that case we probably should not go into an extended meta-
physical discussion on how it works," said Limp-Asparagus Lad.
"Well, yes. In any case, right now it's time for a completely
unrelated and no longer even topical bit of comic-book parody," said
Luke, pointing a thumb off-panel.
Maximum Insecurity
The artificial planet of Webster's World was originally built
to preserve universal knowledge. Over time it had assumed other
functions - sometimes temporarily, sometimes not. Eventually it became
apparent that the semantic energies for the Infinity Dictionary that
was housed there were useful for promoting dialogue and understanding
of all types, and that prompted Webster's World to become the ad-hoc
centre of a bureaucracy.
That bureaucracy was more diplomatic in nature than anything
else. The galaxy known to the humans of the Looniearth as the Milky
Way - and to some others as Mutterer's Spiral - did not have anything
approaching a single unified government. However, in Webster's World
it did have a conference and arbitration body where planetary govern-
ments and species could meet to talk and arrange trade if they chose.
And some did not interact with others much at all, mused the
first ambassadorial assistant to Webster's World of the Giant Radio-
active Space Hamsters From A Planet Far Beyond Mars. Her name was
Re'quee and at this point in time she was following the Etaoin
Shrdlu's ambassadorial Observer. And was accompanied by her younger
brother.
The Etaoin Shrdlu were an old species who had given up their
physical bodies to become Beings Of Pure Thought. They took very
little part in galactic affairs, and this was reflected in the fact
that the title of their representative was 'Observer'. As far as was
known the ambassador was the only member of its species who was
currently physically manifest - and certainly the only Etaoin Shrdlu
who was immediately available for consultation by others. Even so,
this was still a vast improvement over other pre_cursor races who had
Moved On, or compared to reclusive races such as the Time Barons who
held themselves apart until such moments as they considered it
appropriate to meddle with the affairs of others.
"Observer," she asked, trying to hide any traces of irritation
at its cryptic behaviour, "What is this about? If it's something
important, shouldn't we bring it to the attention of Hewllee? She
*is* the ambassador; I'm only her assistant."
"The lady ambassador is already at the Council meeting,"
the Observer assured her. Its voice was breathy and slightly
ethereal - probably a reflection of the fact that its vaguely
humanoid form was not fully solid. It glided like an apparition
through the halls, then added, "It is needful that you and your
brother see what transpires there today."
"Me?" squeaked Branb'ss. He was young and a male, and although
Re'quee loved him dearly it was only Re'quee's respect for the
Observer that had convinced her to bring Branb'ss along.
The Observer nodded politely but distantly to the youngster.
"Even so."
The three of them came to an viewing gallery where they could see
the proceedings. Branb'ss put his paws up on the railing and scanned
the chambers. "It's so full," he said.
"The Galactic Council is meeting to debate a very important
issue," replied Re'quee.
"It is? What?"
"Collectable trading cards."
His eyes went wide. "Gosh."
"The fad for collectable trading cards began on the Looniearth,"
said the Observer. He turned his attention from the council floor,
where proceedings were about to begin, then inclined his head to look
at Branb'ss. "Teasers took note of the phenomenon and exported it to
galactic civilisation. You know who the Teasers are, don't you?"
Branb'ss nodded. "They're the rich kids who have nothing better
to do with their time than to cruise the galaxy, looking for planets
that haven't made interstellar contact, then land in some remote place
in front of some poor soul who nobody's ever going to believe, and
strut up and down in front of her making 'beep beep' noises."
"Correct," agreed the Etaoin Shrdlu. "It's all rather childish,
really."
"The collectible trading cards have been causing havoc," added
Re'quee. "They're addictive, and dangerous. The fad has only recently
been brought under control. The Galactic Council is going to try to
decide whether to simply quarantine the Looniearth, or punish it by
collecting all the confiscated cards together in the form of a comet
and sending to the Looniearth."
"But... the impact of that many cards... It would destroy the
planet!" Branb'ss protested.
"Yes," agreed Re'quee. She looked around the chamber to see if
Morton Phillips, the Looniearth's ambassador, was here. She knew that he
had been working hard to get a 'no' vote against both propositions. "The
position of our planet is to oppose such a drastic measure," she added.
"Others will oppose the motions, for one reason or another,"
predicted the Observer gravely.
Around the council chamber the representatives of so many of the
Looniverse's spacefaring nations fell quiet. There were the Dvorkians.
The Bud'jee. The Marzians, the J'so, and the Denominators.
There were people from the pink-skyed Planet Claire, who were
humanoids with their faces on their chests, just like the medieval
notion of the headless blemyae. They were masters of biotechnology and
were noted for their anti-agathic products.
There were representatives of the various biroid races, whose
blood was based on ink, and who had been spoken of highly by whoever
was the Looniverse's version of Zaphod Beeblebrox.
There were the small grey humanoids from Zeta Ridiculi, who
habitually visited other planets, surreptitiously kidnapped people,
gave them intimate and embarrassing medical examinations, and then
inserted 80-foot radar dishes up their butts. (Nobody knew why they
did this. Even the Zeta Ridiculans didn't know why they did this. The
current best guess was that it was some sort of species-wide obsessive-
compulsive disorder).
And there were representatives from an alien race made up entirely
of venetian blinds and curtains. They were from the Planet of the Drapes.
One by one the various diplomats made their prepared speeches to
present their case.
"Qwellas of the Zethryth, am I," began a reptilian. "Studied the
economic impact of the trading card addiction, have we. Affecting
customers, and therefore revenue base, it does. Therefore, its source
to be dealt with, it must." It was a comment that could be considered
typical of the Zethrythians. Not only were they xenophobic, but they
were a mercantile species as well: if the Looniearthlings were
considered a threat to their trade, then that threat would have to be
removed by whatever means.
"Hewllee of the Giant Radioactive Space Hamsters From A Planet
Far Beyond Mars," announced the bear-sized hamster who was Re'quee's
immediate superior here on Webster's World. Hewllee made a single
quick preening motion of her whiskers, then continued. "Some have
questioned whether it might be that our opposition to the proposals
stems from some favouritism towards Loonihumanity. I would remind the
council that as a self-liberated slave race from humanoid masters,
my people have no particular love of any bipedal species. We are,
however, keenly interested in justice. I will remind the council
(again) that the Looniearthlings had no way of releasing the scourge
of collectable trading cards on intergalactic civilisation. That was
the doing of the Teasers, and I would call for punitive measures to
fall on those most directly responsible."
"Gentlebeings," began the Denominator ambassador - a humanoid
with *very* big teeth - bowing formally to the assemblage. "One finds
oneself recalling that that even quite small numbers of Looniearth-
lings have been able to resist incursions by the Cascaders." [Such as
in 'Descent' in _Legion of Net Heroes_ #s 63-67 - Footnote Girl]
"And that's the entire point!" cried the Dorfian representative,
whose limited patience had given way now that the soporifics that he
had taken earlier had finally worn off. "The Looniearth has a number
of cadres of net.ahuman beings, some of who are in the Phenomenally
Cosmically Powerful rank. Collectively they are a threat to our
security, and the Dorfians call for their immediate elimination!"
A new figure stepped forward and announced, "The net.gods of
Topphorti do not agree."
A ripple of fear passed across the crowd as people suddenly
recognised the craggy faced individual in the white disco suit. The
figure surveyed the auditorium before announcing, "I am Flipseid, Lord
of the Oldpaperclips and ruler of Topphorti. Know, oh mortals, that
the secret of the Net.i-Life Equation lies somewhere on the planet
Looniearth, and that by my machinations I *will* have it. Cordon off
that world if you so choose, but any attempt to destroy it will meet
with my displeasure. I trust you know enough of my reputation that I
do not need to elaborate."
A low, fear-filled murmuring arose, but no one challenged his
threat. Up on the balcony, Re'quee's attention was diverted from the
Council floor to her brother, who was leaning forward and hissing
softly to himself in anger with ears flat against his skull. She was
mildly surprised by this - although young and frisky and plucky enough
to not to be the typical male cringing violet, she had thought he had
better sense. This distraction caused her to miss the arrival of the
next speaker.
"Your threats are not necessary, Flipseid," said a shapely human
woman who approached the speaking dais. "The Council will not act
against my world, because I forbid it."
Flipseid gave her impassive glance. "I am not used to being
considered an also ran. Who are you, woman?"
"I am Splashpage of the Looniearth. Fifth level adeptus of the
Fourth Wall." Then she turned her back on Flipseid and addressed the
crowd. "So, you people think that you can play the heavy against the
Looniearth? You fools have no concept of the forces you are dealing
with. The Looniearth is the reason this universe exists. Everything
else is peripheral. In this reality, as in Real Life, it is we humans
who create aliens," and then she swung around and pointed a finger at
Flipseid, "and *gods*!" She paused. "Alone in the cosmic dark, *we*
created all you ultra-terrestrials; as companions and adversaries, as
mentors and bogeymen. You provide an alternative. An escape. A threat,
and a dream, and power, and refuge, and pain. But you are all still
*human* creations."
Flipseid gripped her arm, and said with soft-spoken menace that
echoed throughout the chamber, "If such foolishness were true, then we
would be the only thing that provides loonihumanity with purpose and
meaning, and hence would be the only things that matter. But it is not
true, and because we have the power, we are still the only thing that
matters. Either way, the Looniearth looses."
Splashpage smiled at him. "Wrong."
It is always hard to make out the expression on the dark and
grooved face of Flipseid, but on this occasion even those furthest
away from the dais saw his anger change with a flicker of fear.
And then all that was left of Flipseid was a piece of A5 paper
on which were printed his Official Handbook Of The Looniverse
biographical details.
Splashpage turned back to the Council. "I assert metaphysical
superiority. I am not going to treat you as Flipseid did. I am not
going to stand here making threats like the climax to Heinlein's
_Have Spacesuit Will Travel__. I will not tell you to do things my
way or else, and leave you to do as you are told. You will all be
dealt with. Right now."
Some of the brighter Council members realised what this meant,
and began to run. It didn't do them any good. The next instant, the
Council chamber was filled with sheet of paper printed with Official
Handbook entries.
Re'quee wasn't sure whether the three of them had been spared
because they were hidden from view up on the balcony, or because the
Etaoin Shrdlu was somehow protecting them. Whatever the case, her
heart almost jumped to her throat when Branb'ss transformed in a flash
of light from a bear-sized hamster into a bear-sized hamster wearing a
garishly coloured spandex costume with a stylised picture of a quiche
emblazoned across his chest, and leapt from the balcony into space
over forty metres above the floor below.
"Surrender, Splashpage," proclaimed Barnb'ss as he flew around
the room in a graceful arc and landed on the floor on the opposite
side of the chamber. "You cannot hope to succeed with your evil plan,
for I am... CAPTAIN RAT CREATURE!"
Splashpage pointed at Captain Rat Creature in an effort to take
him out as well, but he used his super-cricetidean dexterity to dodge
out of the way.
Re'quee was frantic. She rushed to edge of the balcony to watch.
"Be calm," said the Etaoin Shrdlu. "The transformations of even
a fifth level adeptus are only temporary."
"You mean he'll loose?!" squeaked Re'quee as her voice rose an
octave in fear.
The Observer regarded her calmly but with sympathy. "Splashpage has
been on a quest to increase her abilities, and her power is waxing. He
has no more chance against her than any of her other victims."
Down on the Council floor he was putting up a darn good fight,
however. He blasted her with energy beams from his eyes, then ducked
behind some wreckage so that he was no longer in her line of sight.
The end result was never really in doubt though. After no more
than a minute Splashpage finally managed to down Captain Rat Creature,
leaving Splashpage alone on the chamber floor, laughing - triumphantly
and mockingly.
Limp-Asparagus Lad asked, "Why do I suddenly have a blue blanket
with teddy bears quilted onto it?"
"It's a souvenir Maximum Insecurity blanket," said Luke. "It's a
marketing ploy, just like foil covers and bound-in trading cards. See?
I've got a green one." He held it up. It had bunny rabbits on it.
Limp-Asparagus Lad looked at his blanket. "I would have preferred
a grey one, personally." (Regardless of what Neil Gaiman thought,
L-ALad was of the opinion that it was grey rather than black which was
the colour that went with everything.)
"I'm afraid that Blue Light Productions isn't giving out any grey
Insecurity blankets in this promotion," Luke explained as he began
folding his up. Anyway, I think it's your turn to give a piece of back
history."
"What would you like to know? About how my biological parents were
kidnapped by aliens? About the increasing social isolation I felt
after my powers of dull manifested themselves during my early teen
years in IO.wa? About how I was originally one of the gif.clones of
Sig.Lad that were created by Acton Lord, only to have an independent
origin retconned in later?"
"Actually, in the endnotes for issue 41 it said that we'd get to
find out how you met your girlfriend and lost your libido."
Limp-Asparagus Lad nodded. "Since it seems that we need a cliff-
hanger ending, let me just say that we met during a battle against the
Brotherhood of Net.Villain for the very fate of her soul."
"There's no need to go quite that far."
To Be Continued:
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Character Credits:
[Anal-Retentive Archive Kid wanders onto screen with a sheath of
papers and begins to read: ]
Limp-Asparagus Lad owned by Saxon Brenton. Created by Mystic
Mongoose Robert Armstrong) and wReam (Ray Bingham (chaos and entropy
incarnate)).
Adrian 'Luke' Pastach, and the Space Cadets created by Saxon
Brenton.
Writers Block Woman created by Jaelle (Jessica Ihimaera-Smiler)
and cameod without permission.
Flipseid created by Dvandom (Dave Van Domelen). First 'appearance'
(by an imposter) in _The Kinda Big Darkness Saga_. First 'real'
appearance (in an alt.ernate reality story) in _Stranger Tales_ #5.
The Giant Radioactive Space Hamsters From A Planet Far Beyond
Mars first appeared in _Death Of Cheesecake-Eater Lad_ #5. Splashpage
first appeared in _Limp-Asparagus Lad_ #12. Created by Saxon Brenton.
All characters copyright 2001 to their owners or creators.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Add Notes:
The history of the Space Cadets is pretty much exactly as Luke
described it. Most of them have and gotten lives for themselves, so
the chances of the full group turning up (or even just the ones I
created and have copyright on) are small. Further *references* may be
possible if individual characters come visiting - but this is unlikely
at the rate I've been writing recently :-( Even so, details of the
Secret Crisis probably wouldn't become any clearer anyway, partly
because of the aforementioned copyright problems but mostly 'cause I
was making it up as I went along with usually spur-of-the-moment c00l
fanboyish ideas, and really don't have more than a vague idea of what
happened anyway. Comparing it to a tighter plot structure (for example,
the comic book standby of 'heroes meet, heroes fight, heroes team up to
beat villain') the 1,200 pages I wrote before I lost interest would have
made up perhaps less than 5% of 'heroes meet'. And then there's the
issue of the writing being painfully embarrassing in retrospect. (Yes,
it's the return of the 'My Early Work Sucked' thread that made it to
runner-up in the 'Best Flame War' category of the 1997 RACCies.)
On other stuff...
The Net.imatter Universe of Tppphhh (or Antimatter Universe of
Tppphhh - the names are interchangeable) is a meltdown of DC comics'
Antimatter Universe of Qward, Marvel comics' Negative Zone, plus any
other negative universes like the Dark Kingdom/Negaverse from Sailor
Moon and the antimatter prison world of Omega from the Dr Who TV show.
Make of that what you will.
The Maximum Insecurity skit was apropos of nothing but was fun
anyway. It threw together a bunch of things. It's basically a parody
of Kurt Busiek's 'Maximum Security' crossover from Marvel comics in
2000, and starring the Giant Radioactive Space Hamsters From A Planet
Far Beyond Mars (who themselves are a combination of the Giant Space
Hamsters from the 'Spelljammer' setting of the Advanced Dungeons &
Dragons roleplaying game with the eponymous aliens of Weird Al
Yankovic's song 'Attack Of The Radioactive Hamsters From A Planet Near
Mars'). I would like to thank Graham McDonald for giving me the idea
that it would be collectible trading cards that the Galactic Council
would be worrying about, and Blair Rammage for pointing out the phrase
'Etaoin Shrdlu'.
The latter is the order of letters on the first two lines of a
compositor's keyboard for Guttenberg style linotype printing - much
as 'Qwerty' and 'Dvorak' are the order of letters on the various
keyboards of computers and typewriters. It therefore made sense that in
the Looniverse, the Etaoin Shrdlu would be another alien race, but much
older than the Qwertians or the Dvorkians. (Although I admit that
originally I was going to have 'The Net.ropolis Etaoin Shrdlus' be the
name of a gridiron team.)
In any case, some of the alien species are new, while have shown
up before; in particular, _Continuity Champ And The Drizzt's
Defenders_ #7-8 featured the Zethrythians, and #9 introduced the
Looniearth's ambassador (and showed how he got the job).
Back to the Index.