Spacebullies Two: The Search For More Parody

Planet Awkwardlisp had many locations from which dimensional tunnels could be generated; but when the heroes on Awkwardlisp heard that Kuparr Daku the Dreamtime Chieftain was coming from Ostralia, they made sure that the Aborigine shaman could meet with the party assigned to open friendly contact for Earth-Whichever with Urth.

Whiskey Dallas was the confirmed leader of this delegation. As a singer, she had always gained good rapport with audiences; and it was verified that the English language existed on Urth. Accompanying Whiskey would be Tin Rin Rin the dog hero, with his boy Jeff Stierman. It was a quality of dog heroes that good people meeting one would always understand that the dog hero's human friends were also good people. Irina Beriya and Tapidri Drifla lent obvious diversity to the diplomatic team. The combat-ready second team had Zoorama for magic, with her new husband Kirk Slippage for a mix of science and machismo. The Chinese kung-fu couple, who had arrived just in time to be in the second group, would supply more diversity and more combat power if needed.

Whiskey's team was supposed to land in front of Justified League Headquarters on Urth, while Zoorama's team stayed on standby. But Kuparr changed this when he announced that he had received a new vision on his tunnel-flight from Earth-Whichever. A vision, and a comparatively ordinary communication. The more ordinary communication had been from Green Flashlight John Stewmeat. John had to leave Earth-Whichever to seek help for some crisis on his own Earth ("Jersey Earth" to readers of this serial), and the help needed to include at least one powerful woman. Sushi Strum, the Woman Torch, volunteered to accompany Green Flashlight Stewmeat, whereupon She-Hunk instantly relieved Unfindable Man from any division of loyalties by saying, "Come on, Jimmy, let's go with her."

Kuparr's explicitly supernatural revelation requested a change of itinerary for the teams going to Urth. Zoorama's emergency-alert group should now become the open-diplomacy group, knocking politely on the Justified League's door. And for an out-of-left-field surprise, the revelation added that Whiskey's group should go to an out-of-the-way spot in the Cambodia of Urth. By way of explanation, Kuparr was only able to say that the errand to Cambodia should also prove non-violent, and that Tin Rin Rin's ability to understand all speech regardless of language would be extremely valuable. Nitara "Golden Rakshasa" Bagram asked at the last minute to come along with Whiskey Dallas, because Cambodia's culture had comfortable similarities to her own.

John Stewmeat was brought up to Awkwardlisp, so as not to strain himself with a galactic flight when he was barely recovered. She-Hunk, Unfindable Man and Woman Torch then went with John by wormhole to Planet Wawa; and the other two groups went to their newly designated objectives on Urth.

The Janitors of the Universe were good at surveillance. They knew that John's incoming wormhole was friendly, so did not block it.
 
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Whiskey, Jeff, Tin Rin Rin, Tapidri, Irina and Golden Rakshasa were delivered to a wide street in the Cambodian city of Battambang. The civilians around them had all at least heard of dimensional tunnels, due to Twerpseid's former attempt to conquer Urth. But before anyone had time to panic and stampede, Whiskey made use of a plotline-convenient spell Zoorama had cast upon her before takeoff. Under this magic, Whiskey loudly performed a song set to a tune familiar in the Cambodia of Urth. Naturally, the words were in Cambodian, which Whiskey pronounced perfectly despite never having learned the language.

The substance of the lyrics was: "Don't be afraid of us! We come in peace. We are enemies, not friends, of the invaders who attacked your world before! We wish to see for ourselves how your world is doing since defeating that invasion. If anyone is hearing my song who can speak English, Russian or Hindi, please help us with interpretation!"

The spiritual power of her singing persuaded her hearers to believe what the song said. A family of tourists from the India of Urth were fortuitously present in town, and before long they were helping the visiting heroes to converse with the police officers who gathered to find out what had happened. A boy of this family asked Nitara whether she had heard about the new superhero, Nonwhite Lightning, who had helped Atomic Scalp against villainous assailants. Of course, none of the new arrivals had heard about Atomic Scalp's rescuer. Nor, for that matter, did they know anything about Atomic Scalp himself, beyond what they were told about him being a villain turned good.

The next quarter-hour was spent with Whiskey's party telling the locals more about Earth-Whichever. All of the newcomers followed a piece of advice which Irina had given before they transited here: NOT to volunteer the fact that Earth-Whichever's victory over Twerpseid had gone so far as to counter-conquer Twerpseid's own home planet and nullify Twerpseid's powers. ("That would sound like ridiculous bragging.")

Not unreasonably, many of the locals wanted to know if there was a Cambodia on Earth-Whichever. The delegates were pleased to be able to affirm that yes, they had a Cambodia too, and like Urth's Cambodia, it had escaped the Marxist genocide which befell the Cambodia on Original Earth. The locals, for their part, shared with the delegates their knowledge that Greg and Ruby Sutter were expected at the train station soon.

Upon a lull in the overlapping conversations which Nitara was juggling, Tin Rin Rin uttered one sharp, emphatic bark. Jeff told Nitara for everyone's benefit: 'Tinty says that the train was boarded enroute by OTHER alien visitors. Like us, those aliens do not intend any harm; but UN-like us, they seem to be confused about their own reasons for coming to Urth."

A Cambodian woman who had stayed quiet up to this point, now asked through the interpreter: "Is your dog really an Arhat in disguise?"-- Arhats, in Eastern religions, being sort of like guardian angels. To which Jeff replied: "No, he's just a dog hero. But dog heroes are never wrong."

 
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Before the train actually reached Battambang, Ruby Sutter regained cellphone connectivity. The first person she got hold of was Rhett McBride, the Clean Hornet. "Mister Hornet? This is Ruby! What do you know about a planet called New Laziness?"

"Nothing, I confess. I'm a local kind of guy, as compared to whole galaxies." It sounded as if he turned away from his phone. "Squire, did you ever hear of a planet called New Laziness?" The recognizeable hoarse voice of Squire Vindictive was just audible, replying: "When I was a prisoner of the Boardroom of Owls, two or three of the researchers referred to something by that name, but they never specified that it was a planet."

Clean Hornet addressed Ruby once more: "Squire and I await what YOU may tell US about New Laziness."

"That planet is a super-futuristic world, nominally the rival and enemy of Planet Awkwardlisp. It's ruled by an immortal and allegedly benevolent king named Highfyver, who reputedly has as much power as Twerpseid. But I'm sure you noticed, when Twerpseid invaded us, that NO ONE from New Laziness showed up to aid our defense. This appears to be the norm. Highfyver's notion of 'cosmic balance' is to let evildoers do whatever they want all the time, while scolding anyone who fights against evil.

"Several men from New Laziness-- they're pretty much human-- were sent recently to our planet, to investigate the 'disruption of balance' which was produced by our NOT lying down and surrendering to Twerpseid. Two of them are sitting with Greg and me right now; they understand what I'm saying to you, but they have no objection to my making this call. I believe that they're hoping to find out more about present conditions by listening to me. They showed last night that they have no clue about investigating, raiding, anything. When Greg tried singing a country-western song for them, they enjoyed that. I'm confident that they'll behave well in Battambang."

"All right, Ruby. Now I have news for you too. Some other people appeared in front of the Justified Hall, and one of them has blue skin. They said nothing about New Laziness, but they did say that they were from an alternate Urth, which had also fended off an invasion from Awkwardlisp."

''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''

When the engine horn of the approaching train was heard in the far distance, Golden Rakshasa urgently beckoned to the Hindi speakers. "I need you to tell everyone around us that I want to show what I can do. Just in case anything happens which requires it. This is not anything to threaten any of you; I just want you all NOT to get scared if I am compelled to do it in earnest."

It felt like hours, waiting for the tourist family to pass the explanation, and for those they warned to pass it further. It took SO long, that Copperfox had time to be annoyed with his treacherous laptop for playing idiotic tricks with coloring and re-sizing the typed letters in this post of its own accord. Finally, Nitara struck a pose on the boarding platform, gestured gracefully, spoke some random words in Dravidian, Sikh and English...... and assumed her were-tiger form for about fifteen seconds, nodding and waving a forepaw in greeting. Her interpreters had done their part well; none of the onlookers panicked, though several of them flinched a bit.

Your historian reminds you that Nitara and her companions had not heard Ruby Sutter's conversation with Clean Hornet; and points out that dog heroes are not such a venerable institution in any version of India as they are in all versions of America. Tin Rin Rin's charisma which proved the goodness of his party held true, but the accuracy of his intuition was not automatically known to all humans. Just in case Tin Rin Rin WASN'T infallible concerning the extraterrestrials riding the inbound passenger train, Nitara wanted to be ready against any danger. Then she turned human again, her clothing magically rematerializing on her as she did so.

But Tin Rin Rin's instinct WAS infallible, and the emissaries of New Laziness WERE harmless amateurs.
 
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THE PLANET NEW LAZINESS was home to at least a FEW persons who were useful for something. Two of these were Big Barndora, the first Awkwardlispian War Witch to repudiate Granny Rudeness and join the side of good; and her husband, Wispy Mythical, who wasn't much help in a head-on fight, but was ENORMOUSLY gifted for sneaky matters.

Wispy, who was the same size as a modest-sized adult human male, had just finished traveling three miles along a ventilation duct whose cross section was four inches by seven inches. He did not have a shrinking power like Ant-Man, could not become unsolid like Vision, and could not be compressed like Mister Fantastic. But his muscular wife had given up trying to find out how he did it. All he would ever say was, "It's my secret."

Instead, Barndora asked Wispy, "Did you find out who the self-propelled visitors are?" She said this, meaning persons who (like Highfyver) could survive and fly in airless space without a ship.

"There are four of them, all humanoid and female; they look like the women Impunity Man told us he saw on Planet Tuusakkarin." Impunity Man, one of the handful of genuinely never-aging people on New Laziness, could teleport himself individually faster than the lords of New Laziness or Awkwardlisp could produce wormholes. Before Wispy had reached adulthood, Impunity Man had explored a spherical galaxy four galaxies away from the Milky Way, where he had vanquished an evil being who was working at becoming as mighty as Twerpseid. Without the heroic immortal's intervention, that spherical galaxy would have completely fallen under tyranny in less than five hundred years.

Barndora frowned thoughtfully. "Isn't that the world where some people migrated long ago, because they wanted to reject the influence of the Green Flashlight Corps?"

"That's right. People of multiple humanoid species. They invented, or acquired, something LIKE the Flashlight prosthesis, but very different in purpose. Less concern with material effects, more with manipulating people's feelings. Unlike the Green Flashlights, they recruit only humanoids, and interact exclusively with humanoids. I don't know much more than that, and Impie isn't around to tell us more. But THEY'VE been on our planet before; some of our King's officers were speaking cordially with them in the palace gardens."

"All right, did you hear anything relevant while you were spying?"

"Yes. One of the visiting women, who did most of the talking from their side, gave the weirdest name for herself that I ever heard. Her name, by her own telling, consisted of seven musical notes, rising and then descending in pitch, followed by coughing. She had rendezvoused with the other three women in the visiting group, all four having come from separate worlds where they had been working for 'social change,' as they called it. Of the four, only Musical-Notes-Plus-Coughing has been on an Earth-variant lately, but the others had all been working with human-like beings. You know, like Bajorans or Klingons in Star Trek shows. If Musical-Notes-Plus-Coughing speaks the truth, all of them, wherever they work, are promoting love and kindness, while never harming anyone.

"Then His Majesty Highfyver HIMSELF joined them-- accompanied by the now-powerless prisoner Twerpseid. At that point, they all switched to speaking a language I don't know; but by their tone, it seemed to me as if nobody present particularly DISLIKED Twerpseid."

Pausing to transmit an online royalty payment to Harrison Ford, Barndora muttered, "I've got a bad feeling about this."

WE'LL RETURN TO THE JUSTICE-LEAGUE-PLUS-FOURTH-WORLD STUFF LATER. WE NEED TO REJOIN THE ANIMATED-STAR-WARS-DERIVED AND BABYLON FIVE-DERIVED CHARACTERS FOR A WHILE.
 
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In the obscure but prosperous Bakesum System, a patrol wing of twenty-four A-Frame fighter-bombers from the Republic of Lots of Worlds had fortunately been visiting just when Thuglife Skrawn's fleet struck. The people here had been bypassed by previous wars, and thought they were safe. The invaders seemed uninterested in landing on the inhabited planet Cakebun and occupying it, but set out to destroy every Cakebunder spaceship, orbital platform, asteroid outpost, shuttle, drone or satellite in the star system.

The Brogue Wing deployed to repel the invaders as soon as those were acquired and identified. There were three eight-ship squadrons in the defending force. One was commanded by a man named Wrench Redpilly, who was an acquaintance of Poormee Armadillo's family on Planet Kantpoo and had also spent time on the arid world Nagobah; another, by a woman named Shwinn Soso, who had been instrumental in preventing Emperor Porkanbeen from completing and using his Extinction Star; and the lead squadron, by Master Quinine Sauce, a survivor of Order Pick-Up-Sticks, the only living high-ranking non-Toofah-Roffian up-side Fuss user who has not been mentioned before now in this story.

By encrypted ship-to-ship radio, Quinine told his fellow squadron commanders: "If we aim to destroy their capital warships, we'll be lucky if we kill even one of those monsters before the rest blow up all of their targets. What we'll do instead is cripple their TRACKING ability: knock out their sensor arrays, so they can't AIM their offensive weapons. Use your own defensive chaff clouds for the same purpose. We'll tell the Cakebunders to focus what armaments they have in orbit on intercepting any missiles the enemy launches at local infrastructure. May the Fuss be with us!"

The ensuing battle was worthy of top-grade CGI animation, including lots of spacecraft making 180-degree turns inside a turn radius which was physically impossible at their velocity; too bad it's only happening in prose on a screen. The attack on the Bakesum System was Admiral Skrawn's fake-out, intended to draw the Republic's attention away from the world which the predatory Barnsmell would be sent to overrun. In fact, he had WAITED to make this attack until there WERE forces from the Republic present to defend the populated planet. He expected and wanted Brogue Wing to use subspace radio to alert other good-guy forces, and bring them here, so no one would stop the troop transports carrying the Barnsmell to the Deathtrap Major system.

In the short-term view of the the Bakesum operation, the Grand Admiral was expecting precisely what Master Quinine expected him to expect in such a scenario: that any defenders would try to destroy one or more of the attacking warships. As it was, instead of maybe blowing up one space-destroyer entirely, the A-Frame ships degraded the tracking ability of nearly all the enemy ships. Nine of the defending fighters were wiped out, and six others damaged; but in return, they gained time for all Cakebunder personnel in space to evacuate planetside.

By the time any large Republic warships arrived to defend Bakesum, Skrawn had his ships in good order to retreat. He had anticipated slugging it out with such a rescue force, but now found himself at a disadvantage, precisely because of Quinine Sauce's tactic of weakening his tactical sensor capacity. So he withdrew, confident that he still had succeeded at preventing Planet Nondefensico in the Deathtrap Major system from receiving aid.

Skrawn, of course, was not reckoning with Master Drool, the Bubblewrap Coalition, and Jacob Mossyhutch's ridiculously over-powered gravity gun.

> > > > > > > > > > > > >
 
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The colony of Defenselessville, on Planet Nodefensico, had been settled by people who believed that if they didn't start a fight, nobody would ever attack them. They had gotten away with this for more than a century of story-time, because their location was well away from prevalent conquest routes; and because their planet had enough resources to support them acceptably, given a sustainable lifestyle, but not enough resources to make it economically important to any interstellar conquerors.

They had never seen or even heard of the Creepycrawlids in the "Starship Grunts" reality, nor the Postalfiends in the "Ringjonn Earth" reality, so they never worried about any ravenous aliens wanting simply to EAT THEM as food. But out of that Ringjonn sub-universe, a menace was coming which was not much less horrible than people-eating swarms. Aliens were coming who would "only" devour SOME of them, then enslave the rest. These were the Barnsmell, who had long enslaved the inventive Pindowny and manipulated humans in their sub-universe.

At a time soon after Bubblwewrap Five had organized its rescue mission for people who didn't know they were in peril, the oblivious imperiled people were enjoying a fine autumn day, playing games like volleyball and croquet. When the light of their sun Deathtrap Major was blotted out in places, they were slow on the uptake.

They were lucky that the good guys had a clue.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

"I count seven troop ships," Corin Webber told everyone on his team, speaking from inside his Shadything vessel. Drool was no longer guiding the rescue task force, because he had many other things to attend to; but some of his "Flapjack" technicians were assisting the engineering departments on board the Aggiemarbelon and the Queen Yessa. "Estimated carry capacity, two thousand soldiers each, with presumed light-infantry armaments. The ships mount short-range defensive weapons, and have well-armored hulls but no stand-off energy shields. Escort is limited to three frigate-class combatant ships; they clearly didn't expect to meet any spaceborne resistance."

Captain Constance Tilbury transmitted back from her improved Earthlyforce ship: "Then let's inform them of just what a blunder they've made."

"Leave some scraps for our ground-pounders!" exclaimed Captain Woodrow Ackerman from the bridge of his now-armed transport ship.

"Before we wipe the floor with those creeps," Corin admonished, "let me use my plotline-convenient everything-translator to offer the Barnsmell a chance to beg for mercy." His actual message to the invaders was less crude, but he did warn them that they would be slaughtered if they didn't give up. A female Barnsmell officer named Dahabsa answered with really naughty language, and her ship revealed that it did carry one heavy particle-beam weapon mounted forward. The blasts from this cannon failed to damage the Shadything ship, but succeeded in announcing that the Barnsmell weren't in a negotiating mood; and while the firing ship was holding the good guys' attention, some of the other aggressor ships began launching their transatmospheric landing craft.

Dahabsa's probable remaining lifespan was to be measured by the time it would take for Corin's beams to burn through her troop ship's hull. Now a last-minute addition to the rescue task force came into play. J'Unkycar, the Goldarn ambassador to Bubblewrap Five, had rounded up four fighter craft from his own world's navy and lent them to Captain Tilbury. These four fighters together engaged the nearest enemy frigate in combat, while the Mintcandybarri fighters took on the other frigates. One each of the two fighter types was destroyed and others damaged before the frigates perished.

It was plain that not all of the hostile transatmospheric shuttles could be stopped before they landed close to the chief population center; so Captain Ackerman peeled off to make his own descent. On the way down, he expended two of his hull-mounted missiles to destroy one landing craft whose trajectory was such that the fall of its wreckage ought not to strike any spot on dry land. Then all attention was on delivering his load of Anflaktikshok martial artists and other fighters to the surface.
 
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Lieutenant-Commander Josh Cordwood, executive officer of Bubblewrap Five, had insisted on being part of this counterattack, because he hardly ever got to go anywhere or do anything. So two of the three top officers of the space station were going personally into ground combat: no worse than Kirk and Spock in Original Star Trek both leaving the ship with a landing team. As soon as Woodrow landed the transport near the endangered colonial capital, Josh disembarked in the lead, followed by Snack Salad, Noherra Synthmusica, and several station police including Raquel Delgado.

Behind them came Jacob Mossyhutch, carrying his enigmatic gravity gun. Immediately, accompanied by Raquel, he ran off at an oblique angle. He couldn't use his fantasy weapon if any part of Defenselessville was in his line of fire. All the others bore plasma rifles, whose deadly force would be expended before coming near the town.

Most of the Barnsmell invaders (more than three thousand of them already on the ground at this location) were weaponless by choice; they WANTED to rip humans apart with their claws and fangs. One in thirty of them had a bullet-gun, and these returned fire when they saw plasma charges fatally burning dozens of their fellow savages. Josh Cordwood, and all of the ground squad who DIDN'T have names given in this narrative, suffered non-fatal flesh wounds in their left shoulders. Range advantage with their plasma guns helped them, and fifteen or twenty Barnsmell were slain or hurt for every human wounded.

Then Jacob, with Raquel covering him, reached a spot from which he would not kill any friendlies.

A stream of hypersonic pellets flowed from the gravity gun's muzzle. Not one pellet stopped in the body of a slain Barnsmell; EVERY pellet went through at least eight aliens, and kept flying at a tangent which would leave atmosphere. All of the friendly spacecraft knew the plan, and were clear of the stream of relativistic pellets. One of the huge enemy landing ships took over fifty of the gravity gun's rounds, and suffered enough damage that the surviving crew members had to abandon ship.

Impressive though this was, it didn't end the battle. Jacob was inhibited from doing much more shooting, lest he hit friendlies after all. So now the Anflaktikshok warriors, with melee weapons, charged into the midst of the disordered and dismayed Barnsmell. And hundreds of swift pellets were flying off in space, destined to -- go places.
 
WE INTERRUPT THIS PLOT ARC to insert another story-related music video.

Most of you are too young to remember an old NBC-TV series about a rural cop in a big city, so I offer its title theme. The star had formerly been in the cast of "Gunsmoke." His later character is the inspiration for "Denise McFogg" whom I recently invented.

 
>>> ON TERRA: The Inquiry, with his vague finding-out-things talent, and Katuva 'Sky Lioness" Walton with her birds gathering intel for her, had figured out who was behind the international tampering with animal-care supplies. It was an evil mutant genius called The Sly Evolutionary, who had a super-long lifespan, and who was trying over a period of years to develop super-animals that would help him conquer this Earth-variant. The Sly Evolutionary had been run to ground at a fortified hideout in the Pyrenees mountain range, but was not about to bow down and yield. A combined Spanish and Moroccan combat formation, with Major Tarik Almohad leading the Moroccans, had assaulted the stronghold. Green Dart was with the ground troops, using his new dart-rifle to take some live prisoners. Spanish fighter jets had strafed the evil mutant's base, assisted by The Brickhawks; but two Brickhawks, Pamela Lovejoy and Todd Morris, had been killed when their helicopter was shot down by a missile.

Yes, they went to The Good Place.

Denise McFogg was there, with Dreadfuldevil, because they had favorably impressed Major Almohad when he heard of their own part in investigating the American part of the animal-tampering mystery. When a cave was found that seemed to be a secret entrance to the Evolutionary's headquarters, Denise revealed that she was an experienced spelunker (cave explorer); so she was allowed to accompany Dreadfuldevil as the first ones in. Twelve soldiers would follow them at a fifty-meter interval.

Inside the evil stronghold, they were attacked by some grossly ugly mutated beasts. Props to Dreadfuldevil for fending off three of these, despite his carrying no deadly weapons. But Denise, and the first two Moroccans to overtake her, were more pragmatic, and shot the monsters dead. The incursion team continued inward-- but soon had cause to regret having been so hasty. Long, long mutated snakes dropped from the ceiling, to entangle and immobilize the intruders. Except for Denise and Dreadfuldevil; she had long experience dealing with snakes, while he of course had his extra-keen hearing to alert him.

Denise got a fresh magazine loaded into her handgun, while Dreadfuldevil hefted a kung-fu style steel whip. They fought their way farther in, past more icky animals and some human guards-- to find themselves in a movie-climax type of standoff.....

"Hold it right there!" boomed The Sly Evolutionary. "I am about to change into my ultimate self-development! As soon as I drink this flask of plotline-crucial potion, I will become all kinds of super-unbeatable, unless someone shoots it out of my hand before I drink!" So Denise shot the flask out of his hand.

The villain laughed. "Fooled you! That was just a bottle of Crocodilade, and you fired your last bullet! NOW to drink the real stuff!"

With his whip Dreadfuldevil shattered the second flask, only to be told that it was ANOTHER decoy. So Denise and Dreadfuldevil rushed to close quarters as the Evolutionary drank the real stuff at last. They still almost overpowered him while he was changing; but their shared reluctance to kill a (more or less) human being worked against them, giving him time to reach full power. They were both about to be strangled to death----

When eight ceramic pellets, which had crossed a quarter of the galaxy in a minute and a half, turned several corners on the way, and swerved again to avoid hitting any good guys, penetrated many meters of mountain rock and killed the super-villain just like that. So Denise McFogg and Dreadfuldevil went back to help their companions get loose from the mutant snakes.

Only many days later would spells cast by the wizard Conn Johnstantine uncover the facts about Sergeant-Major Jacob Mossyhutch.
 
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>>> ON SEEDUBB: In the middle of a broad prairie in northern China, Lex Loozor and Red Headbone were setting up a new device. Brand new, in fact. Even in the most favorable conditions, it would take time before the Communist industrial base could get powered-armor suits into mass production. Lex and Headbone were confident of their design work, but wanted to be able to show the Party something impressive NOW.

The present experiment was along very different lines than trying to make soldiers powerful enough that eight or ten of them together could fight even a high-grade superhero and have a chance of winning. It was closer to being an invisibility process, but not quite that either. The two evil geniuses had told their handler, Secretary Hui Kai-Ma, that the new project was calculated to disorient opposing soldiers on the battlefield, making them vulnerable to a sudden strike. The "Night Bringer," much more useful in the daytime than at night, would DIVERT sunlight away from the enemy, momentarily putting the enemy inside a small but crucial zone of total darkness. Like being in an eclipse.

The test began at one minute before noon, local time. The Night Bringer did create a hemisphere of deep night in the target location. But at the stroke of noon, four of the ceramic pellets from Jacob Mossyhutch's gravity gun came streaking in at a shallow angle, and reduced the new invention to metal shavings and particles of glass.

Secretary Hui at least could assure Beijing that the Night Bringer had not FAILED, it had merely been destroyed by some unidentified adversary. So the two evil masterminds did not fall out of the Party's favor. But neither did they ADVANCE as far in this favor as they had hoped.

To his own surprise, but to his eventual rapture, Lex found himself accepting Marcie Graze's offer to make him feel better. Within the same ten-hour period, the female Face Twister Doubleslick made the same offer to Red Headbone, promising to make her face look whatever way Headbone preferred. She, too, found her offer gladly accepted.
 
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>>> ON MEDIUMGARD: In the Tibet of this Earth-variant, the Marxist-sympathizing Buddhist Monk Drigum Namdre received a vision from someplace, telling him that if he tried extending his bilocation far enough, he could reach another world altogether, and find allies for his ideal of collectivism. The vision advised him that he could achieve the necessary distance in a manner comparable to skipping a stone across water. Since the mythical planetoid Hallpasscard was in the same solar system as Mediumgard, the monk could direct his astral self to Hallpasscard's interdimensional bridge, and borrow its power.

Not even trying to ascertain WHO had mystically messaged him, Drigum did as he had been urged. It worked better than he had hoped; within what seemed only a few minutes after he had reached Hallpasscard, his alternate self was in ANOTHER Tibet. No duplicate of himself lived there, so he didn't have to be concerned with a doppelganger quandary. He was able to determine that this Earth-variant had few if any locally-based superheroes, but that some VISITING super-powered persons were in the process of transforming this Earth in ways that he might find compatible with his own views.

This was, of course, Jersey Earth. Drigum Namdre was about to establish communication with the Heart Sapphire Sisters-- when eleven of Jacob Mossyhutch's relativistic pellets hit and killed his extra body. He still was alive on Mediumgard-Earth, but had lost his ability to be physically present in two places at once. Resigning himself to the loss, he bent his attention upon deceiving inhabitants of his own Earth-variant, like the two retiring missionaries he had bamboozled.
 
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As has been shown, most of Jacob's pellets went where they would cause a good result. But in one case, it was a most unfortunate result.

>>> In his hidden lair, the good wizard Hector von Bootblack was working on plans to capture and imprison another demon lord the way he had captured Kuth-Hula-Hoop.... when a single gravity-gun round crossed the dimensional perimeter and SHATTERED the controls of the currently-operating containment installation. Given advance warning, Hector would have been able to re-confine Kuth-Hula-Hoop, or at least avoid being killed by the fiend. As it was, only one and a half seconds elapsed from the noise of the shattered console to the cold shock of demonic tentacles grabbing him.

But your author ISN'T one of the all-too-numerous modern authors who want evil to be omnipotent. AsaLion appeared just in time, grabbing Kuth-Hula-Hoop in turn and pinning it to the floor.

"Monster, I will not permit you to slay, much less possess, My servant Hector von Bootblack. I will permit you to depart this place, to resume tempting people within the limits I set. But I will not stop Hector from trapping other evil immortals. And I place a binding on you, that you will not be able to warn your fellow demons of what Hector may do to them."


Other gravity-gun pellets reached other distant locations, as we may observe later.
 
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Of all the simultaneous plotlines I've been juggling here for more than a year now, the one based on Stephen King's "Dark Tower" novels is the one to which I've given my greatest degree of independent creativity. My "Ronald of Goliad" really doesn't have much in common with Mister King's Roland of Gilead, beyond carrying guns and being a driven, valiant paladin. But I still chose to make my gunslinger hero definitely a takeoff on the "Dark Tower" gunslinger-knight, as an act of resistance to Mister King's gloomy view of the universe. Most of what is in the "Ronald of Goliad" plot arc is of my own making, such as the effects of an abnormally low-flying moon on Planet Punksteema.

So, before I resume narrating events on Punksteema, I'm going to compose a review ONLY of elements in this arc: the Punksteemian characters, with the nations they are part of, and missions they may be pursuing.

~ ~ ~ ~ RONALD OF GOLIAD, THE LAST TOWERMAN, is an Obi-Wan Kenobi type: the last survivor of his glorious order of heroes, trying to resurrect the all-male Order of Towermen from obscurity, and also to encourage a revival of its female counterparts, the Smoke Maidens. Ronald was born in Wellvernia, Punksteema's south continent, but he is now operating in Arcondoyla, the north continent. He has two very special gifts: he can slay weapon-resistant monsters WITHOUT needing magic spells or special weapons, and he can always make people believe what he says provided that it IS true. As of the point where I last left Ronald, he had enlisted not just one, but FOUR padawan-equivalents.

The closest thing Ronald has to the sorceror antagonist in Mister King's novels is an evil immortal called Jaheg-Jorod. This villain has the powers of teleportation and of animating corpses, and also knows a lot about technology. Jaheg-Jorod, like other villains in my serial, wants to make people everywhere give up hope of goodness ever triumphing.
 
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SOME COUNTRIES RONALD HAS PASSED THROUGH ON THE NORTHERN CONTINENT:

Bamulica is a European-type nation, with a technology level around our mid-nineteenth century. Politically, it is a confederation of competing thanedoms, with no king. Malgriff Thanedom has the healthiest society of the Bamulican sub-realms. Ronald made many friends there, and acquired his noble mule Marhalt there.

Hukshem is home to people similar to Southeast Asians in our world, and they enjoy vigorous commerce with other countries, including neighboring Kikoro. A Loi-Hukshem family named Pril took interest in Ronald's quest. A son of the family became Ronald's first new apprentice, and a daughter revealed a desire to become a Smoke Maiden.

Nizozu is a low-technology (but magic-using) tribal society, whose economy is based on fishing. The people are good-natured, and Ronald found that they had adopted and raised a European-type boy from the south continent whos parents had perished in a shipwreck. With the approval of his foster family, this boy became Ronald's second padawan-equivalent.

Tablanor is the most technically advanced of these countries. It has no airships, but does have telephones and railroads. Tablanor is where Jaheg-Jorod's zombies first appeared. The exact Biblical Christian faith is practiced here, despite Punksteema NOT being a direct version of Earth. I made it so, because many fantasy authors violate logic in the same way.

Felruda, neighboring Tablanor on the north, was once at war against its neighbor, but peace was made before Ronald came that way. Felruda is an outpost of urbanized civilization, with mountains to its west and a cold prairie to its north.
 
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HERE ARE SOME CHARACTERS ON PUNKSTEEMA WHOM RONALD HAS NOT YET ENCOUNTERED IN PERSON......

ZORALEE JERALO is the exact prevailing type of leading lady in steampunk fiction: tough, brave, smart, beautiful and self-reliant, working as a private detective. Her brother BILLYBOY was transformed into a giant rat by an evil sorceror, but retains his human mind and spirit. A singer named JUDY LIGHTHEART, who loves Billyboy, is involved with seeking a cure for the unfortunate fellow. A good sorceror named FELIPE CATALANO, who vainly loves the lady detective, is unable to cure Billyboy, but is also in on the quest for a cure. Felipe is aided in the quest by his loyal macho cousin YSIDRO LOPEZ. All of these characters dwell in a nation called Gromstark, which is east of any place Ronald has been to during the story.

JIZBROL TAZAFF, whose family name comes first as in a real-world Asian name, is a scientist from the land of Quelidar. He is an airship designer, and hopes one day to build a ship which can reach Punksteema's moon. Tazlaff is among the extra characters who end up joining Felipe and Ysidro in a westward journey. Also on the expedition are a woman named SAZKA FAF-BOLI, who has a specialty of grinding optical lenses, and her daughter HEEJEE FAF-TUJAN, who is an expert rifle shot.

ARMANDO CASADOR, a citizen of the nation of Reslagor, heads up the ABSOLUTELY OBLIGATORY evil business corporation, the Two Rivers Evil Business Corporation. He is married to LADY SELMA, a self-exiled noblewoman from Bamulica's Thanedom of Malgriff. Armando has effectively sold his soul to the wicked immortal Jaheg-Jorod, who as I have said has use for science as well as magic. Armando is developing the hardware for a modern navy which could control the planet's Equatorial Ocean, and has run trials of his weapons out at sea.

FOUR MYSTERIOUS WOMEN of the southern continent are camped out on Disappointment Plateau, just waiting for me to decide who they are and what role they are to play in Ronald's adventures. \\\\\\\
 
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Severely seasick from the gross tidal effects caused by a passage of Punksteema's moon a short while before, Felipe and all of his companions were glad to get back on solid ground as promptly as possible, once their ship dropped anchor in a Vodranorian harbor. The ever-durable Ysidro remarkably contrived to carry all of their baggage ashore by himself, while Felipe, Tazaff, Sazka and Heejee dragged themselves down the gangplank.

By multiple relays of a telegram, Felipe had sent word ahead to this very seaport, advertising his available services as a finder-out of needed information. Consequently, thirteen prosperous Vodranorians, responding separately to the offer, soon showed themselves. Every one of them either spoke Felipe's Gromstarker language, or spoke a commerce-language Felipe knew, or had an interpreter along who could speak with Felipe. The knowledge wizard reminded each prospective customer that they would owe him nothing unless he produced helpful data for them. But one of his new customers instantly earned FREE service from Felipe-- when she revealed that she could speak the Quelidard language. Forty-one-year-old Yinada Tugrif was not a particularly attractive woman; but by being able to interpret fully between Jizbrol Tazaff and Felipe, she instantly became in Felipe's eyes more lovely than any other woman except Zoralee Jeralo.

"Miss Tugrif, is there any serious time-urgency about your needs?--- Good. I promise you the greatest fact-finding satisfaction I can manage, if you'll just get writing materials and write a translation of some technical information that Mister Jizbrol will share, while I interview my other new clients. For many days, I have only been able to communicate with Mister Jizbrol in a limited way, but by now he does know which facts I most need, and he'll pass those facts to you."

Tazaff was more than glad to converse freely with someone who understood his words. Felipe, with some assistance from Ysidro and a gradually-recovering Sazka (while an also-recovering Heejee hovered protectively near the party's baggage), began sorting out what each of the other new clients wanted the wizard to find out for them. For the benefit of as many as could understand him, Ysidro subtly dropped hints that if anyone tried to cheat Ysidro's cousin in a bargain, Felipe both could and would uncover any secrets the cheaters needed to keep hidden, and reveal those to the whole world.

As a side concern, when Sazka had the opportunity, she sent off a few telegrams to local businessmen who might be interested to employ her at lens-grinding for gunsights, reading glasses or telescopes.

As another side concern, Ysidro started a new relay-telegram going back to the east, intended to let Zoralee and Billyboy (if they could be reached) know that Felipe's party had made it as far as Vodranor.
 
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One effect on Punksteema of having an unnaturally-close moon was that this moon's gravity pulled the Equatorial Ocean into a never-ceasing eastward current. Before the advent of steamships, an oceangoing vessel COULD NOT sail toward the west except by staying close to a continental coastline, or by steering on endless time-consuming tacks across the world-current.

Around the time when Felipe Catalano found lodgings for his party in Vodranor, one of the few steamships based in the Wellvernian continent was departing the country of N'Dazpor, whose dark-skinned people were akin to Ronald of Goliad. On board the merchant steamer Speculation was the owner, a sixtyish widow named Jutmeddu Bishtal. She had done business with Armando Casador of Reslagor, when Armando's own steamship the Clutching Fist had last been in southern waters. She knew nothing about the weapon testing Armando had conducted at that time, but in a general way she was interested in acquiring advanced manufactured goods from Arcondoylan countries.

Also on board her ship, and also unaware of Mister Casador's wickedness, was a quasi-Asian man, a Loi-Tidumo, representing the interests of his nation which was generally friendly with Jutmeddu's nation. Fidzab Kulut was normally stuck at home, being the harbor master of Tidumo's principal seaport; but as a man who was impartial where mutually- competing Loi-Tidumo business firms were concerned, he had been widely endorsed as an emissary to expand commercial ties in Arcondoyla generally.

No, the four mystery women whom I recently mentioned were not with Jutmeddu. They'll come in later.
 
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Back on the northern continent, the draft-animal drover Skagruth Johnston still was with the Jeralo siblings Zoralee and Billyboy. The animalized-but-still-human-in-spirit Billyboy always behaved sensibly around Skagruth's camelopards. Between this, the fact that Skagruth tended often to place himself between the enchanted doomrat and the draft animals, and the fact that the camelopards knew they would be FAR from defenseless if a doomrat attacked them, there were no adverse incidents in the little caravan. In fact, several working-class families who knew Skagruth, and who accepted his word that the doomrat was tame ("He's lived all his life with Miss Jeralo's family"), traveled with them for portions of the way.

Right now, Zoralee's contingent, and one large family that still was with them, were in a small nation called Valtork, at a northern latitude level with Felruda which still was off to the west. The working-class family still accompanying the camelopards bore the surname Spasho; all of them spoke Valtorkan, and were going to resettle near some Valtorkan friends. As neither Zoralee nor Skagruth knew ANY of the Valtorkan language, Zoralee paid Mister Spasho a silver piece to stay with them longer and interpret where needed, until Zoralee and company exited Valtork.

Especially for Mister Spasho, assure local Valtorkans that the doomrat was a tame one. Billyboy, of course, knew how to ACT tame, like a good-natured hound.

Valtork enjoyed telegraph service only at two border points, one to the west and one to the west. Readers should assume that Ysidro's telegram will reach Zoralee either at the west Valtorkan border crossing, or at a later point, whichever makes better chronological sense.
 
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~~~~~ IT'S USEFUL AT THIS POINT TO REPLAY SOME LINES FROM A FEW PAGES BACK, REGARDING CHARACTERS WHO AREN'T STRANGERS TO RONALD THE TOWERMAN (WHO LOOKS LIKE IDRIS ELBA WITH A COWBOY HAT, DON'T FORGET).

The small force venturing east from Bamulica had a loftier commander than the number of men would ordinarily call for. Colonel Roger Zaptrim, Chief of Hussars for Malgriff Thanedom, was acting as a diplomat, not only as a cavalry officer. In his absence, his younger brother David was the acting commander of all armed personnel back at home. Two other commissioned officers were with him: Captain John Telbroc who was Sir Ronald's friend, and (representing the Thanedom friendliest to Malgriff) Lieutenant Varlock Patterson of the Sagrum Rangers, leading four men and two women.

Unlike Malgriff Hussars who all had sabers and sometimes used rifles, the Sagrum Rangers carried lances along with pistols. Patterson and each rider of his squad all had revolvers; these had been given to the soldiers and police of Sagrum by Malgriff as a gift to an ally. As a backup, each Ranger also carried a pistol of the type which had been their standard issue before the gift of repeating weapons. These were single-shot guns, but not like muskets; they opened like a break-barrel shotgun, to receive a heavy-caliber pre-formed cartridge, which greatly improved loading speed over powder-and-ball weapons. In view of their mission, all seven Sagrums had silver-tipped bullets for their old-style pistols. Their lances likewise had silver-plated heads.

Besides the female Rangers, there were two other women in the expedition: Lady Dorothy Malgriff, representing her father the Thane, and single-named Brishlim, the sturdy policewoman who had met Ronald of Goliad when he helped to expose the crooked Justiciar Sparrek.

''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''

>>> Several days after passing with permission through Hukshem and Kikoro, and having visited the Tribal Union of Nizozu, the above-described group took passage (paying in gold) on two sail-driven merchant ships which were both going east. Both merchant captains had just purchased quantities of highly-popular Nizozuan fish oil, to resell elsewhere. Because they would be riding with the prevailing world-current, not against it, the ships could put far out from the coast and make excellent time.

They even had time to detour south to Pathamel, the Wellvernian country which was Otto Kergoff's birthplace. There, while trading was done, John Telbroc found some locals who remembered young Otto, and told them what little he knew of the lad's recent adventures.

For unit cohesion, the Sagrums rode together on one ship, and the Malfgriffs likewise on the other. But the smaller Sagrum contingent rode on the larger vessel, because only the big vessel could accommodate the horses, and this only if the human passengers were few in number. On their first night at sea (before the visit to Pathamel), Roger Zaptrim asked whether his ship's captain had heard anything about the undead walkers appearing in Tablanor. The skipper had heard only the vaguest rumors, because to date none of the ghouls-or-whatever had come as far as the seacoasts of Tablanor and Vodranor. Colonel Zaptrim revealed that his party possessed more complete information, obtained by magical means, and he shared it all. He stressed the fact that, in case of the sailors facing an undead attack at some harbor town, the monsters could be destroyed by flame. This information, of course, was passed along to the larger ship's crew as soon as possible.

The reader must assume that any ship movements necessary for the voyage to make logical sense, were done, and that the total time elapsed on the merchant ships will fit with passage of time for other characters.

\\\\\\\\\
 
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Never fear, I won't switch to a different plotline without catching up on Sir Ronald himself.

In the Heskadugra town of Digger's Doom, Ronald had learned that Father Metal-Eyes already knew supernaturally how Torin Pell (and the brave mule Marhalt) had died valiantly in the course of helping to rescue the cold-plains children from the undead walkers. And the clergyman had passed word to the Compass Railway of Tablanor which had been Torin's employer.

The railroad management had welcomed the Heskadugras' proposal to rename the Digger's Doom railway terminal "Torin Pell Station." Just in case anyone anywhere felt any doubt of the story, Ronald had used his gift of aways being believed when he told the truth, to verify for Tablanorians that no one in Heskadug had been at all culpable in Torin's demise. This done, Ronald had resolved to look further into the strong likelihood that additional zombies-or-whatever were being created on the far side of Punksteema's arctic zone. A saddle-stag being made available for him as a new steed, and finding this beast to be smart and responsive, the gunslinger had named him Polarboy.

D'Kovo's two ponies were boarded now in Digger's Doom, since they were not accustomed to such cold weather as Ronald's posse would be facing. Planet Punksteema did not have as great an axial tilt as any version of Earth had, so summer-winter differences at either pole were less dramatic; but even summer at either pole would be cooler than the average weather in Hukshem, and it was autumn now in the northern hemisphere.

When provisioning and equipping were done-- this to include the making of several additional silvered weapons for those who lacked Ronald's innate power against demonic beings-- the Towerman set out on quest once again. Besides his apprentices, he was accompanied by the Sogmilla huntsman Burzu Yunsh, and by the teenage plainsman Hedrai. (Fibgor was the one who got hurt.)

Here again, passage of time in my characters' actions should be assumed to be whatever works best to remain even with other characters' chronology in traveling from place to place.
 
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