Do-Gooders Chapter #11 : A Rumble in the Music Store! And how many references can we make? When we last left our heroes and heroines, and decided that we would try being politically correct for no apparent reason, they were discussing the various dreams they had gone through the night before. (Yes, Nemesis had also had a dream, but he didn't discuss his, as no one challenged him to reveal his secret before they were put to death. There's an order to things.) Tejina dreamed she was dead, dying, and walking around all at once, and multiple times to boot; Matsuro had a short respite from his mother where a girl with her dark hair not up in buns and resembling Aki asked if Bishonen Guy could possibly save her; Aki, who might have powers we don't know about, found out about them; Kireiko also saw the lady, as well as his biological father; and Becky had a jam session with the Warrior of Joy and a living bass guitar. Also, there was these two cultists who got sorta posessed, and a small plan to catch a music store robbery in progress. Aki arrived home, head spinning. If her dream meant anything, she was apparently one of these superbeings herself. While nice to know, a casual glance over to her father trying to show up Michael Jackson and Victor Von Doom at the same time (and failing rather miserably at both) really made her wish she was good at tapdancing instead. Aki grabbed the phone as it rang. After a moment, she called out vainly over the helmet speakers, "Dad, phone call." A few more tries, followed by the adroit application of a finger on the hidden stop button near the hip, did the trick. Tapping a button on his wrist, Nemesis powered up his direct, scrambled link to the house phone line, shut off the external speaker, and began what on the exterior looked like whispering to himself. Aki sighed again and continued with her homework as her father finalized plans for pilfering a place of pianos and such. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- "So, when d'you think he'll show up?" asked an impatient Kireiko. "Don't ask me," Tejina said, resting against the store. "All I know is, he'd better show up soon, because I need my sleep. I have a busy morning ahead of me." Restraining himself from noting the strenuous activity shopping tended to be, he looked around again. Still no sign of the guy in the armor. Matsuro was idly juggling his sword, currently out of his chest cavity in anticipation. Becky was decked out in...something best left undescribed, save for the fact that drunk Sailor Moon fans driving by were sticking their heads out of their cars and begging for dates. Five minutes later, they were doing the same thing. Ten minutes after that, they were doing the same thing. A half hour after that, they were doing the same thing. An hour after that...well, you get the drill. At about 3:00 A.M., an hour when people with one shred of sanity left, as well as most members of the Cult of Cthulhu Local #39924-91, consider sleeping to be a good thing, Nemesis Serendipity Villyn made his grand appearance at the back door of the music shop, with two oddly-dressed goons on either side of him. It was time for the most important part of the ritual of skullduggery - the evil speech. "Here it is! With the proceeds from this and other robberies, we shall gather the funds necesary for global domination! Remember, my loyal minions, the glory of this day, and go forth and plunder the city into ruin!" He then chose evil laugh #24 and entered the building, followed by five evil cohorts and four superheroes that posed as band members. Once inside, Nemesis turned to the nearest cohort and told him to "shhhhh". The minion turned to his fellow disposable in crime and did the same. The second evil moron reminded the third in a similar manner. That nameless bad guy turned to his fellow evildoer, the fourth, and shush'ed him. The fifth was the next evil one to be reminded of silence by the guy in front of him. He then turned to Matsuro and reminded him to be quiet. Matsuro turned to Becky, in the spirit of surprise, and followed suit. Becky went "shhhhh" to Tejina. Tejina suppressed a groan and made a sound not unlike the air slowly leaking from a tire to the half-oni following her. Kireiko turned and gave the quiet signal to the monster in overalls and striped shirt in back of him. Nemesis Serendipity Villyn may be considered bad at being an evil overlord, but his math wasn't bad enough not to let him notice a slight overabundance of the phrase "Shhhhh!" A quick count told him turn around, just as Tejina hit the lights. In the room was his five subjects of evil, four Do-gooders, and a Hello Cthulhu. He came to the realization moments later that two of those three things didn't belong there. Tejina looked around. One warlord and five minions against four musical superheroes and a cute tentacle demon wearing Osh Kosh B'gosh. Not a...wait a minute.... "Um, Kireiko, I think you have the thing over there to deal with. Don't worry, we'll handle these guys." "What thing...oh." Kireiko tried not to gag on the sweetness as he ripped off his shirt to prepare for battle. Matsuro yawned. "Let's get this over with - I need some good sleep tonight." "In the name of Justice, Sailor Rapture will punk yo' @$$!" shouted Becky, to the dismay of the author. American upbringing, bah. Oh, we're writing? Excuse me. ^_^ Tejina wondered out loud in Japanese what exactly Becky just said. Becky, not understanding what Tejina had just said either, replied, "Nani what?" Procreation slang never translates well. "Never mind," Tejina said, trying to block out the unbidden recollection of horribly dubbed Mork and Mindy episodes. "I'll explain later. Right now, we have some criminals to hurt." ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Normally, a fight scene involving high pyrotechnics, long scenes as preludes to special attacks, and horrible pain and casualty would be placed here. However, since there wasn't that much of a fight to begin with against criminals of this stature so much as a literal cremation of evildoers, we'll skip most of that and bring you, instead, the fighting going on in the back corner of the shop between Hello Cthulhu and Kireiko. Kireiko sized up his opponent. Overalls, striped shirt, little red ribbon tied on his upper tentacle, black glass for eyes, black and fuzzy nose with whiskers for some odd reason, large magical aura. Normally, it's the sort of thing that's too cute to kill. Unfortunately for the living doll, Kireiko wasn't the biggest fan of "cute". One thing came unbidden to his mind, and, with the simple placement of the cute demon into its context, he found all the motivation he needed to kill the creature. He softly muttered (as if it was possible to mutter loudly), "Hello Cthulhu must die. All else is irrelevant." From there, it was five seconds before Brother Clarance was exorcized perforce. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- By this time, the other three had trashed four of the five minions. This left Villyn in a precarious position - three on two odds tended to leave villains in the hospital ward. Nemesis still had one option available to him, however. "You have done well, Do-Goodies," he said half-derisively, arms folded across his chest. "How unfortunate it is for you that you must now perish at the hands of my greatest disciple." "You mean your only remaining disciple," Becky said, tying up the Black Shadow minion, who would later have to change his name to include the color blue. "I leave you to your fate, musicians, at the hands of...The Blank Psychic!" he continued, paying no attention to the amount of pain and suffering in the way of Escape Plan A. Besides, he mused, he'd gone up to E for just such an occasion. The four band members, now all assembled, looked as a man with a fencing mask on stood there, hands on his hips, laughing rather maniacally for some odd reason other than him being a bad guy. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Meanwhile, Aki was fast asleep, having the same dream as the previous night. She'd wake up, breathing hard, then fall asleep, only to have it repeat over and over, like a recurring nightmare, until she was able to pull the creatures in and out of the graveyard every turn. Finally, on the tenth attempt, she had something different - a vision. She could tell it was a vision this time, and not just a dream, becuase she happened to be awake for this one. "The Icon and the Emblem are in danger, along with their protectors," said someone that looked just like her, right down to the lack of hair buns and blue holographic aura. "You must go and save them." "Um, isn't that the job of some bishonen guy with a mask and top hat or something?" "Their protectors are in danger as well," the girl repeated, for emphasis in the face of hard-headed...er, adversity. "You must go and save them." "All right," said Aki. "Let me get dressed first." ---------------------------------------------------------------------- WILL THE DO-GOODERS BE ABLE TO STAND AGAINST THE BLANK PSYCHIC? HOW WILL NEMESIS GET AWAY? IS THIS WHOLE THING JUST A SHAMELESS PLUG FOR ANOTHER IMPROFANFIC, TITLED "ALIEN FIGHTER ALPHA", THAT STILL HAS TOO MANY OPEN SLOTS AND, COINCIDENTALLY, WAS ALSO STARTED BY THE AUTHOR OF THIS CHAPTER WHO, AT THIS MOMENT, IS GETTING READY FOR PAIN AND TORTURE OVER A THREE-MONTH PERIOD, AND HAS A WEBSITE AT http://campus.fortunecity.com/law/44/fanfic.html WHERE YOU CAN FIND EVEN MORE INSANE FANFICTION HE'S PLUGGING RIGHT NOW, INCLUDING A PIECE CROSSING SAILOR MOON AND DILBERT, AND FIND OUT WHY THIS AUTHOR WOULD BE SO BOLD AS TO GO AFTER THE RECORD FOR LONGEST RUN-ON SENTENCE IN THIS FANFIC, WHICH, HE MIGHT ADD, HE SHOULD HAVE RIGHT ABOUT, SAY, NOW? CAN THIS GET ANY CRAZIER? AND WHO CAN WE MAKE AKI TURN OUT TO BE? Ask Will for most of this, and reply yes to any sentence over thirty words.