DVANDOM _____ ______ _____ _______ LOOSE ENDS Part 1 of ?? [ ]__ [ ] [] [ ]__)) [ ] ` [ ]__ #85 - "North by Northwest" [ ] [ ] [] [ ] \\ [ ] [ ] copyright 1997 Dave Van Domelen [_] [_]__[] [_] \\ [_]___/ [_]____ -------]==+ <*> +==[------- [cover shows members of Dvandom Force lassoing a clunky giant robot piloted by Dr. Zwarghoff, while Myst lurks in the background. It all looks very Golden-Age-y.] A scooter zipped zippily down the streets of C@L, its rider hunched down from the weight of a fully-stuffed knapsack on his back. In itself, not an unusual sight. Scooterists would be the first to notice something wrong, though. The scooter didn't roar with the miniature thunder of a two-stroke engine, didn't emit the characteristic smell of two-stroke engine oil. In fact, it purred silently, as if electrically powered. Okay, so maybe it wouldn't take a scooterist to notice this point, but they'd be the first ones in any group to do so, okay? And they *would* be the only ones to notice that the scooter wasn't of any standard manufacture. Not a Honda, nor Vespa, nor Malaguti, nor any other known scooter type, domestic or foreign. In fact, it seemed to borrow elements from all of them, as if it were thrown together from parts of many scooters, pieces put wherever they'd fit, and extensive use of bondo and repainting covering the faults. Such scooterists would make a mental note to look for the scooter again at the next rally, ask the owner how he'd made it and what determined his choice of materials. But one in a hundred would notice something else entirely. They'd catch those brief moments where the driver was only pretending to be in control of his scooter. Moments where the trained eye could plainly see that the scooter was driving itself. Then, maybe, the observer would remember events of a few years ago, and wonder if this wasn't one of the robots who tried to invade the Looniearth once. And he'd be on the right track. "Faster, Frank. We need to get to the arena before registration closes!" "But, Steve, we're already going the speed limit...and the impound lot is boring," the scooter replied, carefully only transmitting its words into the radio earpiece his rider wore. "I have a drill that will be even more boring if we miss this tournament, Frank," the driver warned. "Yes, sir..." the scooter started, then cut himself off with a quiet, "Poopie!" "What? What is it?" "Net.heroes, your Blueness," came the tremulous reply. "I think I can bring myself to speed, now." "Hush, you mechanical moron," the rider chided. "You have a totally different form now, there's no reason they would recognize you so long as we don't do anything suspicious. Keep driving." The rider took a cautious look in the rear-view mirror and confirmed his lackey's fears. Two net.heroes, one of whom he recognized as being a member of that dratted Dvandom Force team, were behind them on what appeared to be rented Vespas. They seemed to be consulting a sensor device of some sort, and moving purposefully towards him. "Curses, they must have a neutrino detector with them, it's homing in on your neutrino sieve as a local dark spot," the rider hissed. "There's no way we can make it to the tournament now. Switch to batteries, Frank, we need to give them the slip." "Um, you took out my batteries because they wouldn't fit in this form, Steve." The rider clenched his teeth, counted to five and resisted the urge to pound his head against the dash. "And they're both wearing helmets, so I doubt your brainwashing power would work. Fine, we do this the hard way." Suddenly, the scooter jerked backwards as brakes were applied, and the two net.heroes shot towards it. The driver reached out and grabbed the neutrino detector. "Zwarghoff!" Sidewinder cried out as the device was taken from Kid Pocky's hand. "Er, you must have the wrong person, I'm not him, uh uh," Zwarghoff said as he dashed the detector against the street, shattering it into a thousand [1,225 to be precise - Ed] pieces on the blacktop. "Bye!" he smirked as he gunned his scooter to unscooterly speeds and shot into traffic. "Deactivate your scooter and take to the air," Kid Pocky shouted over the now-honking traffic. "I'll follow as best I can!" Sidewinder really didn't like taking orders from Kid Pocky. Not only was he, on the surface, a newbie and Sidewinder one of the most senior members of the team, but in reality Kid Pocky had recently revealed to the team that he was the reincarnation of Acton Lord. Two big strikes against anyone, really. But he had to admit that Pocky seemed to be on the side of the angels now, and he *did* have the same leadership skills which had made Sig.Lad the original leader of the Secret Dvanders. So he hit the button on his Vespa which doesn't exist on a normal Vespa, and it collapsed into a small box, which he snatched up and hooked to his belt before taking to the sky. One of the few things remaining at Andale Atoll when they cleaned it out, the small GIF Box was a useful little tool. Once in the air, it wasn't hard for Sidewinder to spot Zwarghoff. After all, while C@L had a large number of scooters, it had only two scooters capable of reaching that kind of speed...three a moment ago. He contemplated using his Web of Diversion, but there was too much chance he'd cause a serious traffic accident with such a broad-spread attack. Chancing a look back, he saw Kid Pocky was falling behind, despite being able to match ATV...or would that be Scooter...Frank's sheer speed. According to reports, Zwarghoff had been in C@L several months, long enough to pick up a few tricks of navigation. But he didn't have an eye in the sky. "Pocky, take a right in a second...yeah, it's one-way, just use the sidewalk or something. Yeah, there! I'm angling to drive him that way, I figure he'd got radar or something keeping an eye on me. Time to buzz him, just in case," he said before snapping off his comm.thingy and diving towards his scooter-driving quarry. Predictably, Zwarghoff took a sharp turn away from Sidewinder, and down the one-way street that Pocky was picking his way up. A moment later, the two scooters passed like jousting knights, and the lance of Pocky that Kid Pocky had created knocked a startled Dr. Zwarghoff from his seat and onto his back. The pack he wore burst, and cards exploded out of it like a blizzard of brown and white. Pocky screeched to a stop sideways, in a move reminiscent of the famous scene in Akira, except that he was riding a scooter, not a cool futuristic motorcycle. And he didn't have a funky pill emblem on his back. But he was Japanese, at least. Anyway, he deactivated his GIF Box and fired a quick volley of hyper- velocity Pocky at ATV Frank as the small RoboMAC tried to transform into humanoid form. Explosions wracked Frank's body and his left leg came off in a shower of sparks. "Owwww, what ya hafta go and do THAT for?" he whined from the ground. Sidewinder landed and helped the turned-turtle Zwarghoff to his feet. "Okay, Dr. Z, you've been a fugitive just long enough. Time to go back to your jail cell." Zwarghoff sputtered and batted at Sidewinder's arm. "Get your hands off me, you imbecile! I'm ot under your jurisdiction, I'm not even from this altiverse!" "I have a boo-boo," Frank whimpered. "Shut up, Frank," everyone chorused. "Let me guess," Kid Pocky said, idly holding a Magic card between his index and middle fingers. "You swapped places with our Zwarghoff when it was time to send everyone home, yes?" "Give me that, I need it for my deck," Zwarghoff snatched the card from Pocky's fingertips. "And your surmise is essentially correct, whoever you are. I have committed no crimes in this altiverse, you can't hold me on anything. Now kindly release me, I have a Magic tournament to attend...the winner gets five metric tons of Spam, which I intend to use in a device to leave this puerile reality." "Dimension travel with Spam?" Sidewinder shook his head. "What'll they think of next? But you're wrong, Doc...there's plenty of evidence up in Wisconsi.net that you engaged in illegal experimentation on human subjects." "Preposterous! I've never even *been* to Wisconsin!" Zwarghoff sputtered. "We know that, and you know that, but we all know you're a wanted criminal in *some* dimension. The planted evidence we found points clearly at actions taken after the swap, so you can't weasel out that way. You're serving your time one way or another," Kid Pocky seemed to be smiling under his helmet. "I'll just be going," ATV Frank said, having put his leg back on. "Oh no you don't, Frank," Sidewinder was suddenly next to him, a hand on his shoulder. "You've still got that little incident of mind-controlled kids to answer for, remember?" "Look," Zwarghoff broke in. "Can't we come to some sort of agreement? Whoever framed me has some reason to want me out of the way, so obviously he fears what I might do if free." "Or maybe you were a convenient patsy," Sidewinder interrupted. Zwarghoff swallowed nervously, then continued, "Perhaps. But even with all my files on RoboMAC technology destroyed by a virus embedded in them, I know a great deal about that advanced science. An...alliance...might be of mutual benefit." Kid Pocky looked at Sidewinder, who shrugged. "Let's take him home with us, we'll need to figure out how to spin the dimensional thing anyway. I'm sure Squidman'll want to hear Zwarghoff out," Sidewinder supposed. "Fine, let's go before the police get here. Oh, and don't forget, Stan asked us to pick up some nanobrews while we were here...." * * * * They were coming, I thought as I folded the telescope and banished it to the unspace it came from. I imprisoned one of their own, and the net.heroes wanted payback. Never mind that I did so under the auspices of the very law they claimed to uphold. Never mind that I was a duly deputized member of the Onyx City Police Department at the time. Such niceties never matter to net.heroes. I could have remained within the main precinct where those scofflaws were unlikely to follow, but if they did, innocents would be hurt. And, in light of what happened later, it was just as well I didn't force my new friends in the department to choose sides...I'm afraid they might have chosen mine, unwisely. But I had cast my lot, and...fled, I suppose that is the right word...to the hills outside town, to a safehouse I knew about thanks to a few late-night visits to secret files in the precinct house...the keys I can summon will open many doors. I knew where my powers came from, and that I might need a bolt-hole in case things went sour. And, regrettably, they went very sour. So I waited in the hills, watching the city and hoping I'd be ready for a fight in case they managed to figure out where I might be. They had. The buffoon I had captured had help from an out-of-town net.hero named Macroman, who had recently been so ineffective against Acton Lord. Fortunately, Macroman was holding back on his inhuman speed so that Barman could keep up, so I would have time for a quick recharge. Forming its shape in my mind, I summoned my generator from unspace. Tapping out a quick sequence on the ten-button control surface, I felt the power flow into my altered cells, and my vision got noticeably crisper. One of the prices of my power is that I can no longer see the world as it is, but rather as a computer simulation...and as my power runs out, the image becomes hazy and indistinct. It had its benefits, true, but it didn't feel...human. Not that I *was* human anymore. They were almost at the door.... * * * * We were almost at the door of the police safehouse. I wasn't sure if I was glad to have Macroman here helping, or ashamed that I needed it. And boy, did I need it. When Acton Lord came on TV and said he was behind this whole thing, it didn't take long before the City Council reversed itself and I was let go...and I wanted to give that Myst a piece of my mind. Better yet, capture *her* and prove she was part of the whole conspiracy. But I had no luck at ALL. Zip. Nada. She'd gone into hiding, leaving a note with the cops that she was afraid net.heroes would come after her, specifically me. THAT really helped me get information out of the cops, y'know. And she was obviously not a heavy drinker, because none of my bar contacts had any clue where she was. So I sat and spun, feeling about as useless as always, good only for a round of free drinks and some yuks. Then Macroman showed up with all the answers. Bang, proof that Myst was given her powers by some net.villain or other. Bang, he ripped into the police computer system and found where Myst'd broken in and hidden her tracks. Bang, he figures out where she's hiding. He did all this in the first ten minutes, right in front of my face. I was about ready to go home and drink myself into another dimension when he gives me this look, like he's been to that dimension a few times, and asks me if I want in on the collar. Damn straight I do. I owe that b----. And I owe myself. * * * * Doug felt a little guilty. About a lot of things around this mission. For starters, he knew Zwarghoff was innocent of turning people into hero-hunting cyborgs, and so did Squidman...but the fastest way to convince the Onyx City Police Department that their net.ahuman officer Myst was one of the bad guys was to use the frame-job that had been tossed onto Zwarghoff. As a followup, there was a good chance Myst herself wasn't a net.villain, just another dupe...although the fact she'd fled to a safehouse and erased the data on that safehouse from the police computers did make her look at least slightly on the other side from the angels. And then there was Barman. His powers were about in the league of Cheesecake-Eater Lad, but Barman didn't have CC-EL's ninja training. Or much training at all. And Myst had real powers, albeit slightly odd. Barman was going to go down in the first five seconds of any real fight, Doug knew. But he also knew what it must have been like for the guy, wanting to make a difference and not being able to. Doug had spent years of his life impaled on the horns of that particular dilemma. So he asked Barman along, hoping he could take down Myst before the guy got hurt, or worse. Still seconds away from the door to the safehouse, Doug had more time to think than he really wanted. Maybe this mission wasn't as bad as he was making it out to be. But the whole idea of aggressively going after everyone and everything unaccounted for was souring Doug on everything. Okay, it was a good idea in principle...things left undone tended to come back to haunt you, just look at what happened when DeFacto's minions were allowed to run free [See the last 12 issues of Dvandom Force - Ed.]. But maybe Squidman was taking this too far...Myst had joined the *police*, after all...whatever views she might hold about net.heroes, she was basically one of the good guys, right? Then the gout of flame erupted out through the front window of the one-story rural house, faster than Doug had seen even explosions race. He desperately threw himself to one side, avoiding the flames but losing his footing on the gravel of the driveway. Now he was flying, but not under his own control...he'd left his flight harness back at the mansion, since Myst hadn't shown any flight powers, and his own speed was compromised when he used the outfit to fly. Bad decision. * * * * Oh, man.... I hadn't known Myst had fire powers...guess she never used them when she fought me because she didn't wanna cause any property damage. No, that wasn't why. She didn't use her fire powers because she didn't NEED to. She beat me so fast I barely had time to get the Cosmic Tap out of my jacket. And now Macroman had just slammed into a wall at about sixty, which had to hurt, even with his padded costume and the protective field I once read he had. He wasn't moving much, and Myst was stepping out of the house with a...match? Whoa! She blew on the match and a fhuge flame shot out at me! If I hadn't been already pointing the Tap at her and hadn't panic-fired it, I mighta been char-broiled. Yeah, yeah...beer has alcohol in it, even cosmic beer. But it has a lot more water than alcohol, and it doesn't really burn, so it snuffed the flames before the flames could snuff me. I dunno, I guess the rush just grabbed my brain in both hands and squeezed until I didn't have room left to be afraid. I mean, with Macroman down, I stood about as much chance of winning this fight as I did of getting an endorsement from AA. She beat me last time without even using all her powers, AND while trying to do it nice and legal. Now the gloves were off. It was a damn good thing I was sober enough to fight but not sober enough to realize exactly what deep crap I was in.... * * * * I had gained surprise on my hunters, which was good. Macroman was stunned, and the other was a fool. He *did* surprise me by blocking my first attack on him, and I paused to consider tactics. Macroman would recover from his tumble momentarily. Barman would always be a fool. I moved over to Macroman and started to bind him in clockwork, as I had bound Barman at the end of our last fight. I hoped that the aspect of time embedded in the clockwork gears would keep Macroman's timeindex powers in check, but at worst he would be delayed long enough after regaining his wits for me to turn my attention back to him. To my surprise, fortune favored the fool. A thin, golden stream shot out and snuffed my match, drenching my fingertips with ale in the process. By the rules which governed my powers, I couldn't just summon another match, I would have to wait a short time first. Frowning at my misfortune, I dismissed the sodden stick so that I could call up another all the sooner. "We've got the goods on you, Myst! You're going down!" Barman shouted. Was it bravado or simple stupidity which fortified his voice, or was the fool not so foolish anymore? And was it just an artifact of my artificial vision, or could I see a hint of his father in him? I'd read stories about his father when growing up, how the man had invented the Cosmic Tap and used it to protect Onyx City. Part of why I was so eager to take down this Barman was that he'd fallen so far from his father's example. Still, he stood between me and freedom, regardless of any growing up he may have finally done. And he still had a long way to go before he could undo the bad name he had given himself in my eyes. With a gesture, I caused a tall pine tree to shoot up from the ground, the unnaturally sharp edges creasing Barman's leg and sending him into a barely-controlled fall as he clutched his thigh in pain. Then I turned to make sure Macroman wouldn't cause me any further trouble. Another young net.hero taking up the name and powers of another, at least he wasn't as bad a copy as Barman was.... * * * * DAMN! What was that tree made from, painted knives? I almost cursed louder a second later when I used the Cosmic Tap to clean the wound...I didn't need any funky nano-crap getting into me from that weird computer-generated tree, but it stung worse cleaning the wound than it had *getting* the wound. I looked back over at Myst, and she'd gotten the chest out. That was how she got me last time...put me in the thing and suddenly everything went away...best guess is she put the chest back wherever she got it from, and the shock knocked me out. And now she was putting Macroman into it. Thing is, she had to pull me out before I died, she was arresting me. She *wasn't* arresting Macroman. No guarantees he'd survive the trip. I landed HARD. The pain was too much to concentrate on flying. And it got worse when I hit the ground...my leg nearly gave way on me, and everything turned red for a second. But I didn't have time to pass out, even if it *was* something I did well. I'd only get one shot at this, and if I botched, Macroman was probably dead...at best Myst would have a hostage to make sure I let her go. Nothing to do but do it.... * * * * Doug felt himself being manhandled into something, like a trunk or coffin, and tried to move. No dice, he was bound hand and foot by oversized gears of some sort, and they seemed to be interfering with the energy field generated by his artificial nervous system. Now he *really* wished he'd worn his flight harness, since it had a few weapons in it which might have been useful even without his speed powers. Then the world turned yellowish-white with foam. The container he was in was pushed back savagely and tipped over, Doug rolling out quite easily thanks to the round gears encircling him. The smell tipped him off pretty quickly, it was the brew from Barman's Cosmic Tap, which meant he hadn't folded as quickly as Doug thought he would. The world's a place of wonder and surprises, Doug thought. Annnnd...with the cogs all slippery with beer, Doug managed to worm out of one, which proved just enough to let him use his powers. Time to rock. * * * * Bang, Macroman was up and Myst was down. One punch. He made it look so easy I could have cried. Actually, I was pretty close to doing that anyway, I was really starting to feel the cut by that point. I mean, if he hadn't been surprised by Myst's sneak attack, the fight would have been over before I had a chance to blink. On the other hand, he *was* surprised, and I *did* save his speedy butt, so I guess it wasn't a total loss, right? "So, is it Mil.ler time?" I forced a grin. * * * * So, here I sit in a jail I once helped populate with net.heroes. I went willingly, pleading guilty to charges of tampering with police computer files. A minor offense compared to what I could have been charged with... although I somehow doubt the conspiracy charges could have been made to stick. But I lost to that fool, Barman, and for that alone I deserve to be punished. I will stay here and serve my time until I think I have paid for that mistake. And if that happens before the judges and parole boards think I have? Well, my keys let me leave places, too.... ============================================================================ Next Issue: Zwarghoff makes a deal! Dvandom Force goes to Germa.net, where net.heroes have been banned [DF86 takes place before the formation of LNH Europe]! The Constellation Gang (minus Hunter Red) returns! Be there in the second installment of Loose Ends, "Ultimate Umlaut!" ============================================================================ Author's Notes: It's always dangerous to parody something you haven't read, or seen, or played. Not that this has stopped me in the past...just look at Squidquest: the Charade. Then again, it didn't have a whole lot in common with Knightquest: the Crusade, other than a vigilante detective character finding a way to recover from the sort of thing normal people don't recover from. The fight against Myst was original intended to be maybe a 50-70 line scene, since I've never played the Myst computer game, nor do I read the current Starman series (aside from a few preview copies DC has sent me). But somehow it ate up most of the issue in my attempt at a Robinson riff. Why was Macroman in third person while Barman and Myst were in first-person? Dunno. After all, Macroman is largely a Flash homage, and Flash has been done in first-person narration for quite some time. I guess it all boils down to "it felt right" to do Barman and Myst in first-person, and "it felt wrong" to do Doug that way. Wonder how close I got? }-> Oh, and I don't really plan on doing much more with Barman, Myst or Onyx City, as I probably pushed my luck far enough already. But if there's a Starman fan out there interested in picking up the characters, drop me a line, we can work something out.