LNH: LNH Comics Presents #501: Infinite Leadership Cry.Sig Episode 466 (2/5)

[EDMLite]

12:01 a.m., May 2, 2007

Net.ropolis Bandshell, Drayer Park

    It was one thing to watch Irony Man soaring in to save the
victims of a blasted blimp, thought Londonbroil, and quite another
to hear the distant cough of his rocket boots, see him loop around
in the sky, like a vengeful falling star, see the lights of the
city and the bonfire reflected in his armor and the thirty
thousand ways it had of hurting a person and know that the soul
inside that metal shell -- growing bigger and closer with each
second -- was very, very angry.

    With you.

    "By God and the Queen Mum," Londonbroil gasped, his words
drowned out by the sound of the rockets.

    "I'll take him," said Vector Prime.  The willowy redhead
stepped forward, her eyes sweeping the sky until they locked onto
the armored hero.  She smiled.  Her pupils glowed green...

    ...as did every light, portal and circuit array on Irony Man's
armor, just before all of them went dark.

    "I expected more of you, Toony Stark," the living embodiment
of the Melissa virus said, as Irony Man dropped like an anchor from
the sky.  "Then again, you're hardly the first man to disappoint
me."

    Irony Man watched the ground rush upward with the speed of the
interest rate on a subprime mortgage loan.

    "Have to switch to manual control," he said, toggling a tiny
switch inside his right gauntlet.  With a shudder, his arms and
legs were free to move.  He pulled himself into a ball -- it was
so hard to fight against the onrushing wind -- and fumbled, his
fingers feeling fat and clumsy and useless -- until he managed to
detach his left boot from the rest of his armor.

    "Got to... get it... yes!" he said, clicking the boot back into
place.  The lights on his armor blinked back into life, the heads-
up display in his helmet reappeared, and his boot-jets blazed with
renewed fury -- too late to keep himself aloft, he realized, but
maybe just enough to cushion his impact...

    Irony Man felt his jaw slam into his skull as he struck the
parking lot beside the Bandshell once, then twice, each time
sending up an explosion of sparks like a blown dandelion.  Damage
reports blared throughout his helmet.  His ribs would hurt for a
week, and it would take longer than that to buff the score marks
from his chest plate.  But he was alive.

    "Irony Man!  Toony!  What's your situation?" asked Fearless
Leader, his voice like an overweight mosquito in the helmet's
earpiece.

    "Down," Irony Man said.  "But far from out.  It's not the
first time a quick reboot has saved me from a crash."

    "Glad to hear it," Fearless Leader said, lowering his
wristwatch-sized comlink.  He and the other Legionnaires had
regrouped about two miles from the Bandshell, in a recently-
rebuilt section of the city's Map District.  Like the others,
Fearless Leader was exhausted, confused and more than a little
terrified by his recent encounter with Bart the Dark Receptionist
and the Bryttle Brothers -- the beings who had held them prisoner
in a futuristic graveyard for the last 500 days.

    He had no idea who or what he was facing.  The Net.ropolis he
had arrived in was so far removed from the one he had left -- so
much destruction, so much chaos, and so much news about Paris
Hilton everywhere he looked -- that the former Felix Landers
wondered if fate had, once again, thrown him into another parallel
universe.  He shook his head, refusing to let the thought take
hold.  Wherever he was, these people needed the Legion's help, and
Fearless Leader refused to let them down.

    "Okay, people!" he shouted.  "Master Blaster!  WikiBoy!  Irony
Man's down -- we're going to need you on the front lines sooner
than I thought.  Ordinary Lady and Cheesecake-Eater Lad -- be ready
to reinforce them.  Catalyst Lass, get ready to start the
evacuation of the riverfront area."

    "Crowd control?  Are you sure I couldn't be more helpful where
the action is?" Catalyst Lass asked, her wide green eyes searching
his.

    "Getting those people out of the way is the most important
thing we can do right now, and nobody is better at persuading
people to do the right thing than you are," Fearless Leader said,
placing a hand on the young woman's shoulder.  "I'm counting on
you."

    Fearless Leader turned to wReamHack.  "Has everyone reported
in?"

    The Legion's master of technology checked his BlackBerry.

    "All except for Cannon Fodder, Pulls-Paper-Out-Of-Hats Lad...
and Ultimate Ninja, of course," he added.

    "Of course," Fearless Leader said, picking up his comlink.
"But keep trying his frequency, just in case.  Girlwatcher, what's
the situation at the front?"

    He heard a burst of static.  Then, "...fantastic, Fearless
Leader.  That Uma Thurman is so much more beautiful than the
last Waffle Queen.  And the Melissa virus..."

    Fearless Leader sighed.  "And the other villains?"

    "Oh.  Right.  Well, this giant flying goldfish -- Carassion --
just burst out of the river.  And there's a pirate ship coming down
from the other side, behind the Bandshell, and it's just loaded
with gorilla pirates.  And the different parts of Pencil Rain are
fusing into one being..."

    "Pencil Rain.  Right," Fearless Leader said, pointing to
wReamHack, who punched something into his PDA.

    "Oh yeah, and something just crawled out of the ground near the
cemetery," Girlwatcher said.  "I think... yes, I'm pretty sure...
it's the zombie version of President William Howard Taft.  Weird."

    "He never does give up on that dream of a second term, does
he?" Occultism Kid said.  "I'll take him."

    "Thanks, Occultism Kid.  And thanks, Girlwatcher," Fearless
Leader said.  "Just keep your eyes peeled.  You're doing a great
job."

    "Wow.  I mean, wow, Fearless Leader," Girlwatcher's voice
crackled.  "I mean... I probably shouldn't be mentioning this right
now, but... you do know I was rejected for membership in the
Legion, right?"

    Fearless Leader smiled.  "There are no rejects today,
Girlwatcher.  No back-benchers.  And that goes for all of you," he
said, turning to the crowd of Legionnaires preparing for battle.

    "Our enemies think they've already won," he said.  "They think
they've scared us into giving up!  They think by grabbing us one by
one for more than a year that they've divided us.  What they've
done is turn all of us into leaders.  Each of you," he said,
looking from face to face along the line of muster, "has learned
what it means to command.  You know what it's like to be
responsible for the safety of this world.  If need be, you would
face what we have to face today alone.  And you would prevail.

    "But you will not be alone.

    "You will fight as brothers.  As sisters.  As champions.  And
by God, you will make me proud.  Alone, you are heroes.
Together...

    "...we are LEGION!"

    "Well said," Catalyst Lass said, as the Legion of Net.Heroes
charged onto the battlefield.  "Can I make one suggestion?"

    "Of course, Cat."

    "April... this long April... it's finally over, right?"

    "Yes.  Thank God," Fearless Leader said.

    "In that case," Catalyst Lass said, touching Fearless Leader
under the chin, "it's probably all right for you to take off that
coconut bra and grass skirt Dr. Stomper made you wear on April
Fools' Day."

    The leader of the LNH blushed scarlet beneath his mask.

        *                       *                       *

12:30 a.m., May 2, 2007

Net.ropolis Bandshell, Drayer Park

    "There's too many of them!" Londonbroil said, watching Master
Blaster, WikiBoy, Sister State-the Obvious and a fourth Legionnaire
emerge from the helter-skelter alleyways of the Map District.
"Where the bloody blazes are they coming from?"

    "Time to even the odds," Vector Prime said, concentrating.  As
Londonbroil watched, the woman in the black catsuit seemed to blur,
then separate in two... then four... then eight... Within moments,
the stage was filled with women of every conceivable ethnicity,
hairstyle and height.  All were beautiful.  All were heavily
armed.

    "Nice trick, that," Londonbroil said, as the crowd of women
leapt from the stage, shouting "Time to be evil!"  "Let's rock!"
"Badness is cool!" and, inexplicably, "Kitty Pryde/Shadowcat is
hot!"

    "The next time I'm in me cups, I might forget that you're a
virus," he added, watching the women join the fray.

    "And I might forget I was a lady," Vector Prime glowered.
"Those clones won't last long, but they'll give us a tactical
advantage until our pirates arrive."

    "I'll add to that," Downyflake said, cramming blobs of white,
sticky dough into a toaster-shaped shoulder pack.  After loading
the device, he grabbed a ripcord at the side and yanked hard.

    "Time to unleash... the DOUGHBOYS!" he said, as the device
fired, burping circles of dough at the advancing heroes.  As each
landed, it bubbled, hissed, and stretched itself into a raging,
maniacal -- though surprisingly pudgy and cute -- twelve-foot
giant.

    "And you don't even have to pay them union wages,"
Downyflake said, as the Doughboys lashed out at the Legionnaires.

    "My turn," Uma Thurman said, grabbing two of the waffle-shaped
plastic circles from her uniform.  "Eggobots, transform!," she
said, throwing them from the stage.

    The waffles fell to the ground.

    "Dammit!  Those were the decorative ones," Thurman said,
detaching another pair.  "I'll never get this costume figured out.
Okay, second try.  Sugarshear!  Butterbeak!  Transform!
Operation... warfare!"

    With a clicking, grinding sound, the two waffles sprouted
wings, talons, long necks and wicked-looking beaks, and flew in the
direction of the charging net.heroes.

    "Yes.  Wonderful.  Great.  But what about us?" Londonbroil
said, turning to Mynabird, who had not left his place on the stage
since firing on the blimp.  "You're supposed to be our all-wise
leader.  What's your plan?  How do we get out of this?"

    Mynabird remained impassive.

    "Something's wrong," Vector Prime said.  "I'm sensing no
activity in his armor's systems."

    "It's her!" Londonbroil said, pointing at the silhouette of a
flying woman.  "Writers Block Woman!  She's got him all jammed up!"

    "Then we'll have to do something about that," said Barrage.

    The little gray cat lifted his paw.  "Time for a fastball
special," he said, concentrating.  Beside him, the squat, surly
super-villain called Plummet began to rise.

    Barrage maneuvered the magenta-clad villain higher and higher
into the air, until he was just above where Writers Block Woman
hovered.  The net.heroine seemed not to notice, her attention
focused on the battle below.

    "And now," Barrage said, his tail twitching back and forth,
"here's how you break through a case of writer's block."

        *                       *                       *

12:35 a.m., May 2, 2007

Drayer Park

    "Now that's what I call a disaster," Writers Block Woman said,
watching the crowd of screaming Net.ropolitans fleeing the chaos
below her.  "Horizontal stripes and a plaid skirt?  I can't believe
she even let herself leave the house wearing that.  And... are
those Crocs?  Are people still wearing Crocs?  In the entire year
we heroes have been battling in the beyond, has no one had the
fortitude to inform people that not a soul upon this earth looks
good in colorful plastic shoes?  Truly, I have returned at the right
time!"

    "What's going on over there?" the heroine added, turning to her
side just as Plummet tore past, missing her by a hair's breadth.

    "My goodness!" she said, as the villain with the power to fall
faster than any living thing rocketed toward the ground.  She
followed his progress with her eyes, covering her mouth when she
saw him crash into another super-hero.

    "Oh, dear," she said, looking downward.  "That looks like it
must have hurt.  I hope that poor fellow is all right."

    Hundreds of feet below her, the hero in question stood up,
wiped the dust from his tights, and grinned at Plummet.

    "Boy," said You're-Not-Hitting-Me-Hard-Enough Lad, "did you
ever pick the wrong guy to smash into."

    The Hero Whose Strength Grows Each Time He's Struck wound up
and launched a tremendous uppercut at Plummet's chin, sending him
back up into the sky again.

    "Hello!" Writers Block Woman said, waving, as Plummet flew up,
then down again, his hands clawing at empty air.

    "Back for more, eh?" You're-Not-Hitting-Me-Hard-Enough-Lad
said, as Plummet fell toward him even faster than before.  "All
right, then.  Let's see how you like it this time..."

    SKA-DOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!

    "Looks like this could go on all night," Writers Block Woman
mused, as Plummet flew upwards again.  "Ooh!  And it looks like
Master Blaster and Sister State-the-Obvious have themselves
surrounded," she said, peering down at another part of the
battlefield.

        *                       *                       *

12:45 a.m., May 2, 2007

Net.ropolis Bandshell Parking Lot, Drayer Park

    "This could be the greatest night of my life," Master Blaster
said, shell casings spilling from his rifle like freshly-minted
coins from a slot machine.  "Here I am, completely surrounded by
women... each long-legged beauty more luscious than the last..."

    "Your wife happens to be right here," Sister State-the Obvious
said, bashing one of the Vector clones with her purse.

    "...each one more delicious than the next, and they're all
viruses, so I can shoot them without worrying about the paperwork,"
the Legion's sharp-shooting satyr sighed.  "I must have done
something pretty damn wonderful in a previous life."

    "I can't imagine what that would be," WikiBoy said.  "And I'm
not sure it was a good idea to let ourselves get cut off from the
rest of the Legion."

    "WikiBoy, edit yourself to grow a pair," Master Blaster said,
mowing down a row of Vectors.  "And while you're at it... edit
yourself into a berserker rage!"

    As Master Blaster spoke, a headband appeared on WikiBoy's brow.
His shirt disappeared, as did his pupils.  A chainsaw popped into
existence in one of his hands, and a .50 caliber machine gun,
against all probability, appeared in the other.

    "YEEEAAAAAAAAAARGH!" screamed the Legionnaire Anyone Can
Edit, bellowing like Howard Dean as he plunged into the sea of
Vector clones, blasting and slashing as he went.

    "I will never understand why you abuse that boy the way you
do," Sister-State-the Obvious began, than gasped.  "Husband!  It's
coming right for you..."

    Master Blaster looked up.  An Eggobot swooped toward his head,
its needle-sharp talons extended...

    ...and then exploded into a flaming heap of plastic splinters.

    Master Blaster and Sister State-the-Obvious turned to see Jo
Nysegi blowing smoke from the end of a revolver.

    "You did it, old buddy, old pal," Master Blaster said, throwing
an arm around his friend.  "I hereby take back everything I said
about you being completely and totally useless without your
Sarcastic Lad powers."

    "Uh, thanks," Nysegi said, wiping bits of waffle-colored robot
from his shoulder.  "What the heck did you do to WikiBoy?"

    "Him?  Oh, nothing," Master Blaster said, as WikiBoy, shrieking
like a madman, cleaved arms and legs from Vector clones.  "I just
gave him a pep talk.  A little jolt of confidence."

    "And a chainsaw, I see."

    "It's a lot easier to be confident when you're carrying a
chainsaw," Master Blaster said.

    "It doesn't look as though that chainsaw works very well
against those dough creatures," Sister State-the-Obvious said.
"The one he's fighting seems just to be sucking him in."

    SCHLOOOOOOOP!

    "You always hate to see someone get caught up in their work
like that," Master Blaster said, shaking his head.  "Poor guy.
Look at those legs of his, still kicking away while his body gets
absorbed by the dough.  A shame to see someone his age go that way.
But WikiBoy knew the risks."

    "No he didn't," Nysegi said.  "You edited him to fight like a
maniac."

    "Good point," Master Blaster said, cocking his rifle.  "Let's
get him out of there."

    "While we're at it," said Sister State-the-Obvious, "we might
want to do something about those things, too."

    Master Blaster and the former Sarcastic Lad looked to the left,
where Pencil Rain -- a towering monstrosity formed of five powerful
super-villains fused together -- charged towards them, one hand
blazing with nuclear fire, and to the right, where a goldfish the
size of Dodger Stadium came swimming through the atmosphere, its
lips puckered with rage.

    "On the other hand," Master Blaster said, "finding a mindless
monster made of dough to jump into is beginning to look like a
viable exit strategy."

    "NEVER FEAR," said a voice with the volume of a jet engine and
the deep, resonant pitch of James Earl Jones passing through
puberty.  "THE CAVALRY IS HERE!"

    "Wait," said Master Blaster.  "Is cavalry the thing with all
the cowboys shooting Indians, or is it the name of the hill where
they stuck Jesus on the cross?"

    "In this case," said Sister State-the-Obvious, as two massive
fingers plucked WikiBoy from his doughy fate and dropped him into
a crowd of Vector clones, "it appears to be Very Big Boy."

    The skyscraper-sized net.hero scooped up the feisty Doughboy
in two hands, compacting the creature into a pale, sticky ball.
Very Big Boy placed the ball on the ground beside the remains of
a ruined boathouse, where another super-hero ran up to it with
excitement.

    "Thanks, big guy!  This is just what I needed!" said Kid Pocky,
who had been defending a nearby Sanrio store from a crowd of
vandals.

    The net.hero began pushing the ball of dough in front of him.
As the sticky sphere gained momentum, it began to catch and hold
everything in its path, from bits of glass and rubble to a few
unhappy Vector clones.

    "Da DA da dada DAda da da, katamari damacy," Kid Pocky sang, as
another group of Vectors ran screaming from the ball.

    "DON'T MENTION IT," Very Big Boy replied, picking his way with
care between the on-ramps of the Filled-With-Innocent-Bystanders
Expressway.  He reached a giant fist toward Carassion, but the
titanic goldfish slithered under his arm, screeching like Godzilla
as it did.

    Very Big Boy turned -- upsetting a row of billboards as he did
-- and grabbed the colossal fish by its tail.  Carassion writhed
and shivered in his grasp, but Very Big Boy kept his grip just long
enough to swing the fish around and clobber Pencil Rain.  With a
loud, wet smack, the gestalt villain soared through space, arcing
over Writers Block Woman and splashing down in the Net.ropolis
River.

    "PROBABLY SHOULD HAVE YELLED 'FORE!' BEFORE I DID THAT," Very
Big Boy said, tossing Carassion toward a six-story building covered
in signs reading "Scheduled for Demolition."  As luck would have it,
however, the fish missed the building by several feet, crashing
instead into another structure whose signs declared "Future Home of
Yet Another $tartup.bucks Coffee."

    "WHOOPS," Very Big Boy said, as the building exploded in a
towering cloud of glass, bricks and dust.  To Very Big Boy's
surprise, however, the building's debris did not collapse.
Instead, it hung in the air for a moment, like the coyote in a Road
Runner cartoon, before flying through the air to strike him in the
head.  Brick after brick sped towards him like bullets fired from a
machine gun, until the world below Very Big Boy seemed to scramble
itself like the colors of a kaleidoscope.

    Somewhere in the middle of the cyclone that was attacking him,
Very Big Boy saw a tiny, cat-sized shadow.

    "BA...BARRAGE," he gasped, as he began to stumble.

    "Now don't go falling all over the city just yet," said Kid-Not-
Appearing-In-Any-Beige-Midnight-Story, flying through the maelstrom
of mortar and bracing himself behind Very Big Boy's hill-sized
shoulder blade.

    "I think I can hold him until he gets his bearings," the
improbably-named crusader from a lost universe said, speaking into
a comlink strapped to his wrist.  "But somebody else is going to
have to stop that cat."

    "Leave that to me," said Ordinary Lady.  The slender, steel-
eyed martial artist vaulted from a sawhorse near the condemned
building to the scaffolding surrounding it.  Catching one iron bar
with her left hand, she swung from the rickety metal surface into
the middle of the brickstorm, where -- using skills she'd learned
spending hour after hour in the Legion's Peril Room -- she sprang
from one chunk of rocky debris to another, finally landing on the
balls of her feet beside Barrage himself.

    Still crouching, Ordinary Lady drew a pair of nunchaku sticks
from the sash around her waist, and dangled them in front of
Barrage.  The small gray cat meowed with delight, batting a few
times at the chained stick.  He blinked his yellow eyes at Ordinary
Lady...

    ...whereupon she backhanded the creature into
unconsciousness.  The flurry of bricks immediately stopped.

    "That was amazing," said Cheesecake-Eater Lad, using his wrist-
mounted cheesecake-shooters to build a dome of quick-drying
cheesecake that deflected what was left of the falling debris.
"But... why did you offer Barrage your weapon before hitting him?
He might have killed you with it."

    "It is considered a mark of honor among his kind to play with
your enemy before defeating him," Ordinary Lady explained.
"Someone... a cat-girl, a fellow warrior... told me of this once.
For some reason, I cannot remember her name."

    "Odd," Cheesecake-Eater Lad said.  "Well, at least you nabbed
him.  I'm beginning to think our side might end up winning this
after all."

    "Perhaps," Ordinary Lady said, taking in the two ruined
buildings, the shattered streetlamps, the haze and smoky dust that
clung to the battlefield like a pall.  "But to those innocents now
running and screaming for their lives, I doubt this feels like
victory."

        *                       *                       *

1 a.m., May 2, 2007

Suddenly-Exploding Boy Memorial Grove,
Northeast of Drayer Park

    Pointless Awards Man II weaved, elbowed and shoved his way
through the crowd fleeing from the battle before the Bandshell.
His eyes stung and his throat itched from the smoke of the bonfire,
which had burned out of control, as well as the dust and soot
kicked up by the various heroes and villains fighting all around
him.  He had stopped running with a purpose long ago, and now was
moving out of fear, convinced that if he paused for a moment
something or someone would drop on him or set him on fire or
explode.

    He'd lived through chaos before, of course -- having spent
almost all of his professional life in Net.ropolis, it was
practically a daily occurrence.  But he'd never seen anything like
the melee that had begun when Mynabird fired on the blimp.  Most of
the battles he'd witnessed between heroes and villains ended
quickly, when either the heroes were captured or they managed to
discover, and defeat, the villains' plans.

    From what he'd seen on the stage at the Bandshell, however,
Mynabird and the other villains didn't seem to have a plan.  They
were simply lashing out at everyone around them.  The second
Pointless Awards Man didn't mind villains -- on the contrary,
Y-Plex Burp told some of the funniest jokes he'd ever heard, and
Acton Lord had treated the RACCies staff to a round of drinks each
time he'd won Best Villain -- but he hated fanatics.

    He stumbled past the wide stone steps of St. Lawrence's
Cathedral, where one of the Legionnaires seemed to be comforting a
little Asian man with glasses.

    "It's all right," the Dismal Hope Kid was saying.  "I know
you're going to defeat me.  I really don't have a chance against
you.  We might as well get this over with."

    "Now you're just rubbing it in," Easily-Discouraged Man
replied.  "As though I had even the slightest possibility of
victory in any aspect of my life!  I don't know why I even bother
to get up in the morning any more."

    The little villain began to cry, prompting the Dismal Hope Kid
to hand him a handkerchief from his futility belt.

    Pointless Awards Man II shook his head, then looked around in
a panic.  He'd allowed himself to get distracted, and now he was no
longer sure in which direction safety lay.  He heard the sound of
an explosion -- too close, much too close -- and began to run,
using self-esteem and participation awards and even a couple of
Grammys to knock others out of his way.

    Suddenly, he felt a sense of deep and abiding peace.  His
shoulders relaxed; he let himself drop the People's Choice Award he
had been using as a club and turned to smile at the refugee beside
him.  This wasn't so bad, he thought.  Everything was going to be
all right.

    "Everything is going to be all right," Special Bonding Boy
repeated, shouting through a megaphone from the top of a scorched
gazebo.  "Just keep walking in an orderly fashion toward the
light."

    Pointless Man II stared through the swirling mists of dust and
smoke.  He saw the glimmering green outline of a man shining
through the darkness.  Safety, he thought.  Follow the green light
to safety.

    "Not sure... how much longer I can do this," Special Bonding
Boy said, lowering his bullhorn.  "But it's worth it, if we can get
everybody out of here without someone getting hurt."

    "Easily-Discovered Man said another 200 have passed through the
Red Cross check points," Catalyst Lass said, holding a comlink to
her ear.  "It's going more quickly than we expected.  I'm just
wondering where Weirdness Magnet and the others who were supposed
to help with the evacuation ran off to.  It's not like anyone could
get lost looking for Easily-Discovered Man..."

        *                       *                       *


1:15 a.m., May 2, 2007

Somewhere in the Net.ropolis Map District

    "Is this the best of times, or what?" the Incredibly Stupid Man
said, walking with arms draped around Weirdness Magnet and Bad-
Timing Boy through the empty streets of Net.ropolis.  "A desperate
battle against incredible odds... and the three of us get to be in
the thick of it! I feel like the luckiest guy in the world!"

    "Uh, sure," Bad Timing Boy said, turning a well-creased sheet
of paper over and over in his hands.  "Listen, I've been checking
out this map we picked up at the Surrealist Map Shop, and I'm
thinking we should've taken that left turn at my raining dance
harvest is set about with stars."

    "I think we're in someplace called 'Accidental Self-
Immolation Alley,' if that helps," Weirdness Magnet said.

    "Wow!  That's the greatest thing I've ever heard in my life!"
the Incredibly Stupid Man said.

    "Listen, Incredibly Stupid Man," Weirdness Magnet said.  "I've
been thinking about it, and I'm not sure that it's... safe... for
you to be hanging around with the two of us."

    "Are you kidding?" the Incredibly Stupid Man said, squeezing
his comrades-in-arms a little harder.  "I'm wandering through the
greatest city in the world with two seasoned, professional super-
heroes.  What could possibly happen to me?"

    "YEEEE-HAAAAH!" screamed a small rodent riding a cow, galloping
into view at the end of the alley.

    "Yeah," Weirdness Magnet said.  "That's pretty much what I was
worried about."

    "And now," screamed the rodent, who was wearing a tiny cowboy
hat and had the half-shriveled look of one who had suffered a minor
stroke, or perhaps had his cheek pinched too frequently by an
overly affectionate maiden aunt, "the three of you are under MY
POWER!  You shall run to your deaths beneath the trampling hooves
of UDDER DOOM..."

    "Moooo," Udder Doom added, by way of agreement.

    "...at the behest of the all-powerful TWISTED LEMMING!  HA ha
HA ha HA HA HA HA ha..." the rodent cackled, as the cow reared back
and mooed in triumph.

    Bad Timing Boy and the Incredibly Stupid Man looked at each
other, shrugged, and began running toward the cow.

    "Wait!  Stop!  You idiots!" Weirdness Magnet shouted.  "Doesn't
either of you have the slightest shred of will power?"

    "Yes!  YES!" the Twisted Lemming chortled.  "Come... to your
final stampede!"

    "Whoooah!" Bad-Timing Boy said, stumbling over an untied
shoelace.  The Incredibly Stupid Man, unable to stop his forward
momentum, tumbled over Bad-Timing Boy, flying forward and knocking
a startled mind-controlling rodent from the back of the cow.

    "Wow!" the Incredibly Stupid Man said, climbing to his feet.
"Now that's what I call teamwork!  Hey... this lemming doesn't look
too good.  Do either of you guys know how to give mouth-to-mouth to
a rodent?"

    Weirdness Magnet sighed.

    "I always knew that particular skill would come in handy one
day," he said, kneeling down.  "And yet I'd always hoped it
wouldn't."

    TOMORROW: An ancient evil returns, the winner of the "Name
the Net.ropolis Baseball Team" contest revealed, and a member of
the LNH makes a final appearance...