An airplane flew high over the jungles of Vietnam, disgorging its cargo of paratroopers. One by one chutes opened and the troopers started to slowly drift to the ground. In addition to the parachutes, below each trooper was a sling holding a platform with a full picnic lunch spread out on it. Checkered cloth and everything, the whole picnic works. After all, parachuting is hungry work, and the troopers deserved a good meal waiting for them when they hit the ground. The camera zooms in on one such picnic lunch. The centerpiece of it is a gigantic submarine sandwich, big enough to feed an entire platoon on its own. Suddenly the bread splits open as a fist shoots out. Jack climbs out of the loaf and brushes crumbs and pastrami off has he steadies himself on the platform. "Good, I've managed to infiltrate their lunch, when we land I can hide in the jungle," he thought to himself. But he hadn't been the only one to think of the sandwiches as the ideal hiding place! All around him, Triad goons burst from the sandwiches on other platforms and started shooting at him! Sometimes they accidentally hit paratroopers, which caused the chutes to tangle up and the whole assembly to drop like a rock. Jack ducked and dodged, using his variable-length staff to knock some of the Serially-Numbered Triad Goons from their perches. Things seemed to be going pretty well. Then his paratrooper was shot and he felt the sickening lurch as he went into near free-fall. The ground rushed up at him as the checkered picnic cloth tangled his arms and legs. The trees were coming up awfully fast.... Then Jack woke up as he fell out of bed and hit the floor, tangled in his bedclothes. "Ooohhhh..." he moaned as he clutched his banged head. "That's the last time I eat an entire submarine sandwich before bed." ============================================================================= CRAZYPL LOTCRA AZYPLOT .|, COHERENT COMICS PRESENTS CRAZYP OTCR ZYPLOT ---X-------------------------------- CRAZYPLOTCRA OTCR LOTCRAZYPLOT '|` CRAZYPLOT LOTCR AZYPLOT CRAZYPLOT LOTCR LO ZYPLOT 36 CRAZY PLOTS CRAZYPLOTCRA OTCR LO ZYPLOT #2 - Plot 1: Protection Racket CRAZYP OTCR LO ZYPLOT by the Dvandroid CRAZYPL LOTCRA AZYPLOT CRAZYPLOTCRAZYPLOTCRAZYPLOTCRAZYPLOT (copyright 1996 by Dave Van Domelen) ============================================================================= There was a knock at the door, and everyone froze. One of the men at the table nodded to a hulking figure with a "5" on his lapel. "5" got up and opened the door to the warehouse that they were meeting in. "Hello, cleaning service," said the old man at the door. Although he wasn't really an old man. In fact, to any reader its obvious that this is Jack in some makeup and a grey wig and overalls. "Sir, it's the janitor," the Serially-Numbered Triad Goon said to his apparent boss, speaking in Cantonese. Now, in a serious world, Pei Dou (the boss) would have had Jack sent away. Or maybe even shot, since his disguise was pretty cruddy. Good thing for Jack this isn't a serious world, eh? "Bring him in, but keep him away from The Stuff, Number 5," Dou replied in Cantonese. "Shiping would have your head if any of his precious merchandise was damaged." 5 nodded, and told Jack in English, "Come in, and be quick about your job. But stay away from the boxes over there, they're fragile." Jack nodded and grinned toothlessly, black caps covering most of his teeth. "Sure thing, sonny!" he said, his thick grey stage beard covering his lips so it wasn's obvious they were moving in Cantonese. He moved over to the corner and started to mop the floor. After shooting the cleaning man one last suspicious look, Pei Dou turned back to his men. "Okay, my brother thinks we need to set a really big example so people don't think they can go to Li Ning for protection from us. He's been leaning pretty hard on his old customers and promising they don't have to pay the Pei Triad. So we need to convince them that they DO." "Gee, boss," Chao Chi replied, "kinda hard to make a big example of anyone right now." "Yeah," his cousin Fan Zi added. "With that Windsor Plague and all the exploding cities, the people are jaded. It's an un-cool situation." Dou slammed his fist on the table. "The entire East Coast and Canada can fall into the sea for all I care! This is L.A., not Windsor. We should be able to find something big enough. What about that movie set?" Jack's ears perked up as he stopped mopping. "I think they actually paid us," Chi replied. "Yeah, but they gave us lip over it," Serially-Numbered Triad Goon Number 5 noted. "Hmmm, you may have something there, Number 5. Still, didn't they have a stuntman there who had really good Kung Fu?" Dou asked. Jack huffed up his chest as he resumed mopping. "Nah, he was a poser," Number 3 snarled. Jack barely kept himself from throwing the mop at 3. "Besides, we can always arrange an accident... something Kung Fu isn't going to save you from. Like...replace the pyrotechnics with real plastic explosives for a really big bang?" "Ayyy...that's a big messy, isn't it?" Zi asked. "We're Triad, not IRA." "Yessss..." Dou ruminated, "but it *would* make a big splash. And if we can find a way to pin it on Li Ning's people, make it look like he's getting revenge for the movie people paying us, even better." Just then, Jack's wig caught on a hook hanging from the ceiling and stayed behind as he kept mopping along the floor. "Hey, that's no janitor!" Number 3 shouted. "Must be one of Li's men! Kill him!" Dou ordered. Everyone pulled out pistols and started shooting in Jack's general direction. He threw the mop up into the air, striking the lights and shorting out the whole electrical system for the warehouse. The room was plunged into darkness. "Stop shooting! You might hit Shiping's stuff!" Dou ordered. "Get outside and keep him from getting away!" Light streamed into the warehouse as the doors were opened and triads dashed outside to search for Jack. "Zi, get those lights back on!" Dou added. Fan Zi sauntered over to the electrical box and gave it a whack. The lights came back on. "Ayyyy...do I got it, or do I got it?" he asked. "You'll get it from me if that spy gets away. Now get out there!" Zi nodded and dashed out to join the search. Dou sighed and sat down heavily in his chair, leaning back and massaging his temples. Then he opened his eyes and looked at the ceiling. "Er, hi?" Jack said from his perch in the roof framework. "Gah!" Dou screamed as he grabbed for his gun. Dou's hand reached his gun about the same time Jack's foot did. There was an unpleasant crunching sound as three of Dou's fingers broke. "Sorry to be a pain, I'll just be going," Jack grinned as he kicked the gun away and ran out the door. Dou pulled his backup derringer out and fired at Jack's retreating figure, but between the pain and having to fire off-handed he really didn't have a chance of hitting. What Dou said next was in Cantonese, and for the benefit of our more sensitive readers, I won't translate it into English. Suffice to say, it peeled the varnish off the table. * * * * A little later in the day, at a similar warehouse elsewhere in LA's Chinatown...okay, it's the same exact warehouse, even has the same table and bulletholes and everything. And all the actors are the same, only sitting at different places at the table and wearing slightly different outfits. We're on a tight budget here, and can't afford two warehouses for minor scenes. Although I suppose we SHOULD have patched the bullet holes and revarnished the table first. Oops. Ahem. Anyway, on with the action.... "Gentlemen, we need to make an example of someone," said Li Ning, who looked suspiciously like Chao Chi with chalk in his hair to make him look older. "And..." he was interrupted by a knock at the door. "Get that, Lo Gan." Gan, who looked like Number 5 in a different suit and weird sideburns, stood from the table and walked to the door, flipping his balisong knife open and closed reflexively with "SNICK" sounds. "Yeah, who is it?" he asked, opening the door a crack. "Flower delivery!" came the reply. Gan opened the door wider to see a young man with a colander on his head holding a bundle of flowers. "FTP flower delivery," the man (who anyone not actually IN the story can see is Jack) added. Gan peered at the colander, which had a small "FTP" sticker on the side, and another small label that read "Looniversal Plot Devices Inc." Okay, we're outsourcing. It's cheaper. This scene wasn't even in the budget, we gotta make do, okay? "It's okay, Gan, I ordered them...this place needs some sprucing up. Just because we're gangsters and hoodlums is no reason to meet in drab warehouses all the time, right?" Jack nodded (having, um, beaten up the real delivery guy, who we sincerely hope won't sue the producers of this series) and brought in the bundle. He started arranging them around the room in a very artful fashion while Li Ning turned back to his meeting. "As I was saying, we need to make an example to our customers of what happens when they don't feel they can trust us to protect them from the heartbreak of Triad attacks. Too many have been caving in and paying Pei Man for protection, and we have to do something to show them how dangerous this can be. Any suggestions?" "Well, there's that movie crew doing the Jimmy Rip film," suggested a goon who looked like Pei Dou but doesn't actually have a name because this part of the script was a rush job. "Yeah, I could do some splicing," added Gan, flipping his knives open and closed. "I'm the best there is at what I do, and what I do ain't legal in most states," he mumbled to himself for the benefit of any readers who may not have gotten the joke yet. "Couldn't you just say it with flowers?" Jack asked from over in the corner. Everyone STARED at him. "Um, never mind." "Everybody's a comedian," Ning sighed. "Gan, I want you to go to the set and watch the setup for their next stunt. Cut whatever needs to be cut to make it a real killer of a stunt." He chuckled evilly to himself, as befit a Triad Big Brother. This time, Jack managed to sneak out before anyone saw through his disguise...mainly because we don't have any blanks left to shoot a gunplay scene right now. Gotta order some more. Man, am I embarrassed to be narrating this scene. And, to think, I'm doing it for scale because the regular narrator wouldn't take the pay cut to do an extra scene. "It'll be a stepping stone for your career," they said. Yeah, right. Well, the scene is over, and I'm gonna go make sure I get paid before they fold up the walls and skip town. Losers. * * * * You can just tell that that guy doesn't have what it takes to make it as a narrator. Anyway. * * * * Lo Gan crept quietly through the riggings of the movie set. For this shot, Jimmy's character was going to be chased down the road by a van full of Triads, who would hit a jack and flip over after he fired some blanks at the van. Well, his stunt double would, anyway. They'd do some closeups of the same thing later to edit in. He was pretty sure he'd found the right spot. If he cut this wire, the pneumatic jacks wouldn't launch the van correctly, it'd spin out of control and slam into something that wasn't supposed to be slammed into, like maybe the camera crew. Wouldn't that be a pity. "You know, if you wanted a position as Best Boy, you only had to apply at the desk," came a voice from behind him. It sounded like that goofy flower guy! Gan whirled around to see a guy in yellow and green fighting togs, with a red strip of silk tied around his head as a mask. Now that he looked at the guy, he was pretty sure it wasn't the flower guy after all. "Whoever you are, you'll make a nice addition to the mess I'm making," Gan hissed as he flipped his blades open. SNICK! "Me? I'm Crazy Guy!" he shouted, tossing a wire up into his hands with his toe and then whipping the wire around in a looping motion to catch Gan's left hand in it. With a quick jerk, he pulled Gan towards him. But Gan was the best he was at what he did, and apparently that involved ducking pretty well. Gan twisted aside and under Jack's kick, freeing his hand by slicing the wire in two with his free hand's blade. Knives whirling and SNICKing, Gan turned his dodge into a savage attack that forced Jack to jump back to avoid being skewered. Unfortunately, Jack landed on the pneumatic jack. Even more unfortunately, the wire Gan had cut was live, and fell on the contact plate for the wire that signalled the jack to fire. And thus, the jack jacked Jack about ten meters into the air, just as the van full of fake Triads coming down the street turned out to be full of real Triads come to shoot up the place. And he made a real pretty target.... DID PEI DOU GIVE UP THE EXPLOSIVES PLOT WHEN HE UNCOVERED JACK SPYING, OR IS THIS A *THIRD* TRIAD COME TO MUSCLE IN? WILL JACK SURVIVE BEING USED AS A MACHINE GUN PINATA? HOW STUPID A QUESTION WAS THAT? OF COURSE HE WILL, HE'S IMMORTAL! WILL WE GET TO SEE HIM ACTUALLY BEAT SOMEONE UP NEXT TIME? AND HOW LONG CAN THE AUTHOR STRETCH ONE MEASELY PLOT? ALL THIS, AND POSSIBLY A BETTER BUDGET, ON THE NEXT...SUPERGUY! ========================================================================== Author's Notes: The opening dream sequence is pretty much exactly taken from a dream I had the other week, except I added in the McKay sequence at the very end for this version. And, for any aspiring Authors out there who worry that they don't know what they're doing, this episode should be ample proof that you don't need to have ANY clue to write a Superguy episode. }->