LNH: LNH Comics Presents #51: Infinite Leadership Crisis Episode 16

Martin Phipps martinphipps2 at yahoo.com
Sun Apr 15 16:00:12 PDT 2007


              INFINITE LEADERSHIP CRISIS

                      EPISODE 16

April 16th, 2007

  Ordinary Lady knocked on the door to Kid Kirby's
laboratory.  "Kid Kirby?  Are you busy?" she asked.
  She heard a voice from inside the laboratory.  "Come
in," it said.  "It's not locked."
  She did as she was told and entered the laboratory.
"So... any luck?"
  Kid Kirby shook his head.  "I must apologize.  The
energy signature that Doctor Stomper had recorded
before he disappeared looked familiar.  But I was
unable to determine where your teammates had been
taken to."
  "Have you at least been able to determine who or
what is behind this?"
  "Unfortunately, no.  Although I have my suspicions."
  "Well?"
  "I prefer not to say at this point," Kid Kirby
admitted.  "What I can say is that whoever is behind
this would be capable of taking all of us if he wanted
but has chosen to only take the leaders."
  "What does that tell us?  Are we just being toyed
with?"
  "Perhaps.  Or perhaps a legionaire becomes more
valuable once he or she has had a turn as leader."
  "Valuable?  In what sense?"
  Kid Kirby shrugged his shoulders.  "I can only
speculate."
  "Please do."
  "There are two possibilities, either an LNH leader
serves a practical purpose to the fiend that is taking
them... or we are just being taken one by one to fill
some madman's collection."  He sighed.  "Now, please
go.  I may have more to say once I have finished
analyzing the data from Sister State-the-Obvious's
disappearance last night."
  "Okay."  She left Kid Kirby to his work.

  When Ordinary Lady stepped back out into the
hallway, she was greeted by Frat Boy and Adamant
Authority-on-Everything.
  "So has he figured it out?" Frat Boy asked.
  "Not yet," she said.
  Adamant Authority-on-Everything nodded.  "I could
have told you he wouldn't be any help.  If _I_
couldn't figure it out then I don't see how he could."
  Ordinary Lady nodded.  "Let's go.  It's almost
time."

  The three of them headed downstairs to where
Pulls-Paper-Out-Of-Hats Lad was about to announce the
next leader of the LNH.
  Pulls-Paper-Out-Of-Hats Lad looked at the slip of
paper he had pulled out of the hat that he had been
using to select legion leaders for the past couple of
weeks.  "The next LNH leader is... Super Apathy Lad."
  There was no reaction from the crowd of legionaires
present until finally Sarcastic Lad spoke up.  "Well,
it was bound to happen eventually, I suppose."
  "Is Super Apathy Lad even here?"
Pulls-Paper-Out-Of-Hats Lad asked.
  "I guess somebody could go look for him,"
Procrastination Boy said.
  "He's probably up in his room watching TV," Adamant
Authority-on-Everything said.  "That's all he ever
does."
  "You know, if Super Apathy Lad doesn't even know
that he's been chosen will he still disappear?" Frat
Boy asked.
  "Hmm," Ordinary Lady said.  "That's a good
question."  She pointed to Time Waster Lad.  "Time
Waster Lad, you go with Procrastination Boy.  I want
the two of you to go find Super Apathy Lad... but
don't tell him he's the new leader.  If he doesn't
know he's been chosen  and, thus, doesn't accept the
role of LNH leader then he won't disappear, will he?
That could give us more time to figure out what is
going on and maybe find a solution."
  "Okay," Time Waster Lad said and the two of them
slowly began to make their way up to Super Apathy
Lad's room.
  "In the meantime, we don't have a leader then, do
we?" Sarcastic Lad said.
  "I suppose not."
  "Then I guess it's time to party!" Sarcastic Lad
said.
  "How do you figure that?  We still haven't found our
missing teammates."
  "Maybe not, but I figure the rest of us have a good
reason to celebrate every time our name isn't called,"
he said with a smile.
  Ordinary Lady placed a tongue firmly in her cheek.
"We could always elect you leader right here and now."
  Sarcastic Lad gave her a dirty look.  "Party
pooper."

  By the time Time Waster Lad and Procrastination Boy
had arrived in front of Super Apathy Lad's room the
morning was almost over.  Time Waster Lad knocked on
the door.  "Super Apathy Lad?  Are you there?"
  "He's not going to answer you," Procrastination Boy
told him.
  "We can't just walk in."
  "Why not?  He won't care."
  Time Waster Lad and Procrastination Boy walked into
Super Apathy Lad's room.  Sure enough, Super Apathy
Lad was watching TV.  They sat down on either side of
him on the sofa.  Super Apathy Lad did not acknowledge
them: he just continued flipping through channels with
his remote control.
  "What are you watching?" Time Waster Lad asked him.
  "He doesn't seem to be watching anything,"
Procrastination Boy noted.  "He's just flipping
through channels."
  "He's probably just looking for something good to
watch."
  Super Apathy Lad continued flipping through channels
and still continued flipping even after he had flipped
through all the channels available on his TV.
  "This is getting silly," Time Waster Lad said.  "Why
can't he find something he wants to watch and stick to
it."
  "There's nothing he likes to watch," Procrastination
Boy told him.  "There's nothing that entertains him.
He's completely apathetic."
  "Then why does he even bother turning on the TV?"
Time Waster Lad asked.
  Procrastination Boy shrugged his shoulders.  "I'll
ask him.  Hey, Super Apathy Lad, why are you watching
TV if there's nothing on?"
  Super Apathy Lad didn't answer: he just continued
flipping through channels.
  "Well this is getting on my nerves," Time Waster Lad
said.  He grabbed the remote from Super Apathy Lad.
Super Apathy Lad didn't put up a fight: if anything,
he was relieved because he didn't have to expend any
effort changing channels any more.  Time Waster Lad
started flipping through channels himself but had no
more luck than Super Apathy Lad.  "There really is
nothing on," he said.
  Hours later, the three of them were still sitting in
front of the TV.  They'd watched several music videos
on several music channels, about a half hour of
sports, the last half hour of some action movie which
made no sense to them because they hadn't been
watching it up to that point, a few minutes of a talk
show interview with some celebrity they hadn't heard
of promoting a movie that none of them were going to
go see and almost a full hour of some documentary
about the mating habits of fruit flies.

  Finally, it was evening and it was time for the top
rated show in the Loonited States: American Convict.
It was elimination night so people all over the
country were watching.  The show's host came out and
gave the people at home a big smile as he spoke into
his microphone.
  "Good evening and welcome to American Convict!
Tonight's the big night!  One of our contestants will
not becoming back next week!  But first, let's remind
everybody just what they've been accused of and what
the evidence against them is."
  The next twenty minutes of the show was devoted to a
graphic description of twelve brutal murders.  The
accused were all charged with the murders and
sentenced to death row but the winner of American
Convict would get to have his death sentence commuted
to life in prison.  With the recap over, the show's
host went down the list of contestants and announced
which ones were coming back until he got down to
the final two contestants.
  "Larry, Bob," he said, "one of you will be back next
week and the other... won't.  Larry?"
  "Yes, Ryan?"
  "The people at home are going to see you..."
  "Oh God."
  "Come back next week!  That means you, Bob, will
have to come with me."
  "NOOO!" Bob screamed.
  The host suspected he might have a problem.
"Security?" he said.  Two big burly men in uniform
came out and grabbed Bob and led him over to the
execution area where the electric chair had already
been set up.
  "Hmm," Time Waster Lad said.  "I actually thought
that Bob might have been innocent."
  "Yeah," Procrastination Boy said.  "Me too."
  Super Apathy Lad just shrugged his shoulders.
  With Bob having been executed, Time Waster Lad went
back to flipping through the channels.

  Finally, it was almost midnight.  Time Waster Lad
looked at his watch.  "Hey, Procrastination Boy.  What
time do you have?"
  "11:59."
  "So I guess we'll know any second now if Super
Apathy Lad is going to disappear."
  Super Apathy Lad looked at them quizically.
"Disappear?"
  "Yeah," Time Waster Lad said.  "This morning you
were elected LNH leader.  We all figured that if you
didn't know you were the leader then you wouldn't
disappear."
  "Really?" he said.  "I'm the leader of the --"
Super Apathy Lad disappeared.
  "Oops," Procrastination Boy said.
  Time Waster Lad's eyes widenned.  "Let's not tell
anybody I told him."

                    TO BE CONTINUED

Sister State-the-Obvious and Adamant Authority on Everything are
wReam's
Frat Boy is uplink's
Pulls-Paper-Out-Of-Hats Lad is Arthur Spitzer's
Kid Kirby is H. Jameel AlKhafiz's
Doctor Stomper is T. M. Neeck's
Sarcastic Lad is Gary St. Lawrence's
Time Waster Lad is Ray Rich's
Procrastination Boy is Jason Kanner's
Super Apathy Lad is Jacob Lesgold's
Ordinary Lady is mine.

Martin




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