LNH: Classic LNH Adventures #24: Omaha Project -- The Retcon Hours

[Drew Perron]

On 7/13/2016 2:31 PM, Arthur Spitzer wrote:
> In this weeks reposting of stuff you can find in the eyrie archive
> https://archives.eyrie.org/racc/lnh/
> we have the sixth part of RETCON HOUR and the sixth part of the
> Omaha Project.

:D Huzzah!

> Chapter 16 of the Omaha Project has Russ "Eagle" Allbery and David
> "No Animal Nickname" Anastasion dipping the Omaha Project cascade
> into to whole Retcon Hour craziness.

Lordy. <3

> Chapter 17, 18, and 19 are written by me.  I think I wrote all this
> weird stuff during the summer between highschool and college.  I
> believ this was my attempt to write a David R Henryish type story
> and parts of it I guess were inspired by a Seinfeld episode.

I love it. :D

> [ Continuity note:  This story takes place immediately after Pliable Lad
>   Annual #1 and before Robot Invasion.  It also takes place at the same
>   time as Generation Y Annual #1, at the same time as Omaha Project #6,
>   and just before Pliable Lad #17.  Oh yeah, and it's a Robot Invasion and
>   Retcon Hour tie-in. -- rra ]

:D

>      For a brief moment, the universe turned inside out.  Some subtlely
> powerful force swept through Omaha, slowed momentarily over the shades,
> and then rolled across the cornfields like a wave.  With almost inhuman
> intelligence, it struck directly at the root of the disturbance.  A pocket
> of scrambled reality suddenly disappeared and, like a magnet, jumped
> towards the largest disturbance in the vicinity.  Three months in the
> future.

Niiiiiice. :D

>      "WHY YOU--"  Parking Karma Kid's sentence turns into a scream of rage
> as he leaps at Boy Lad.
>
>      [Discontinuity]
>
>      Parking Karma Kid crashes hard into Boy Lad and they both hit the
> ground.

I like this, but I would've put some weird, disorienting pattern of characters here.

>      As Parking Karma Kid hit the force wave, he could feel the turbulance.
> The wave was focused entirely on the vote for rec.arts.comics.creative, an
> event that was now in the past.  The direction of the wave had enormous
> momentum and wouldn't change suddenly, so it was doubled back on itself,
> creating hundreds of ripples in the timestream.

Ohhhhh, I love it.

> He bounced across the fabric of the Looniverse, making cameo
> appearances in places he could never have been,

Useful!

>      PKK breathed a sigh of relief, and then realized that Ultimate Ninja
> was pointing towards him.
>      "Parking Karma Kid, Pliable Lad, Pocket Man, Kid Chivalry, and Echo
> Lad:  You take the robots in Net.Hampshire."

No rest for the heroic~

>      EDM and EDM Lite lost their grips on PKK as soon as they hit the
> force wave, but they managed to grab ahold of each other.

D'awwww. <3

> EDM Lite saw PKK go through the end of the force wave.  <We're
> going to make it!> he thought...
>      A thousand miles from Net.braska, wReamicus Maximus placed the Ring
> of Retcon on his finger.

Ohshit.

>  The anchors placed on the vortex in Omaha were
> three months in the past, and the other end pulled free from the dirt of
> the cornfield and lashed back.  With a shock that rippled through the
> Looniverse, the two ends met...
>      Two figures in garish costumes worked on a machine in the middle of a
> cornfield.  The younger one turns to the older and says, "I can't believe
> I let you talk me into this."

Noice.

> [ To be continued.  And yes, there is a reason for the tense shifts
>   throughout the story.  8-) -- rra ]

To increase the tension? `-`

>      "That's funny, when I was a little tyke infiniti was a whole lot bigger
> than that..musta shrunk or something..", a father says while showing
> infinite to his son.

Well. Indeed.

>      Infinity.
>      A cold place, yet a place where no heat is needed.
>      A dark place, yet a place where no light is needed.
>      A place where all is, yet all is nothing.
>      A place where jelly bean bags are devoid of those wierd blue one's that
> taste like toothpaste, yet a place where jelly bean bags are filled with
> nothing but those weird blue ones.
>      A place where those who argue about its existance are forced to go out
> in the real world to get jobs.

Feh! Feh, I say!

>      So if you're planning on going, you had better bring your Visa Card.
>      Because here in the deep reaches of infinity they don't take kindly to
> depraved deities trying to get free parking.  And they don't take American
> Express.

Oh, yeah. I remember those. XD

>      The body floats along at a constant pace to nowhere in particular, past
> waves of color never seen nor could be imagined even if seen.  The body is
> that of an athletic man in his early teens.  The clothing covering the man's
> body is color coordinated, skin tight contrasted by a color coordinated cape
> hanging loosely around his neck.  On the chest of the man's apparel is a
> bold black circle within the circle are large white symbols representing
> what appears to be the letters B and L, or a 7 and 8 that were written by a
> two year old.

Oh wow, an actual description of Boy Lad. :o I should put this on the wiki.

>      The face of the man is cleanly shaven and his jaw incredibly square.
> An intelligent face that shows the wear of many battles and the pain those
> battles caused, yet still has a boyish quality to it.  A dark mask covers
> his face.
>       There is a twitch in the man's fingertips.  Several minutes later the
> man blinks.  It is at this moment that one wonders what would happen right
> about now if one were to fill both of the man's hands with whip cream or for
> that matter shaving cream.

*snerk*

>      "Where Am I??"
>      "Who Am I??"
>      "Why Am I??"
>      "And Why Is It That I Can Still Speak Perfect English Even Though I'm
> Supposed To Remember Nothing At All???"

Oh, man, the way amnesia can work is *fascinating*.

>      He was the first.
>      He will be the last.
>      And is the Loonverse's only hope from its own demise.

Dun dun dunnnnn...

>      He looked at his fellow companions: the eagle, the man in the
> trenchcoat, the shapeshifter and his tour guiding girlfriend, the karma
> endowned parker, the professor and MaryAnn here on Gil... whoops wrong
> story.. um and finally the professor and his reluctant ninja joke telling
> pun slinging sidekick.  These would be his companions on one of the most
> twisted and deadly journeys ever attempted.  He would also witness each of
> their horrible deaths.  No, he thought, It wouldn't be like that again.
> What was he thinking?  No, it had never been like that.  Boy Lad began to
> recall, as he observed his companions, the events that had caused him to be
> in this jam in the first place and why he had led them in this ungodly void.
>      But it didn't really matter seeing as in a few seconds he was crushed
> by a meteor and replaced by an evil clone.
>      And somewhere a corn field exploded.  And it had begun again.  And
> there was no popcorn.  And if there was, the people who ate it died of
> cholesterol, because they were foolish enough to have butter on it.

That's... a chapter, all right?

> [ Cover: In the background every villain, hero and bystander there ever was
>   is shown as ghostly white spirit.  In front of that are two eye balls,
>   one which shows a grinning Time Crapper, the other one a grinning
>   wReamicus Maximus and a giant sadistic grin to complement the eyes.  In
>   front of that is a giant hand crushing Continuity Champ with a giant
>   bottle.  The bottle says 'New and Improved: Ultimate Paprika".  A smaller
>   figure in a Continuity Champ Style Uniform struggles with all his strength
>   to move the bottle off Continuity Champs body.  On the bottom of the cover
>   in bold letters is the title: 'Now that's a Man's Super Villain!' ]

That is a *nice* cover. :D

> I ain't no Netrigan so don't you scream
> When you find out this thing don't have no pansy rhyme scheme.
> I'm rappin' Kid Recap and I'm here to tell you how

Oh god, this is great. XD The '90s.

> A place called Omaha blew up and no one had a cow.

THE NINETIES

> Touri, Pliable, Parking Karma too
> This whole crossover was becoming a freakin' zoo.

You got that right!

> It would have ended here if others had had their way.
> But the OP Writers (well me) decided to keep on and stay.

:D

> "Mimes are just something you have to deal with like flies", his manager
> said, "They're a natural part of the Looniverse".  No, his manager was wron
> g and Frits knew it.  Flies at least ate decayed animals.  Mimes didn't even
> do that much.  Give mimes an inch and they'll expect applause and money.

Still really glad we don't do mime jokes anymore. (I wonder if that's part of 
the residual anti-France-as-home-of-froo-froo-art strand of anti-intellectualism 
culture?)

>      "Hello all you crazy nazi dudes.. dudettes.. and the big guy out
> their..  H-Man.. the Adolfmeister.. are you ready to hear some optical
> physics lectures??"  A man with a funny little mustache and haircut looked
> up only to say, "Like, vertical dude."
>      A big roaring mega -Ya came from the crowd.
>      "I mean.. are you really ready..  READY FO SOME OP-TICALL
> PHYSICSSS???!!!!!"

I am so confused as to where you were going with this, Arthur. XD

>      "Hmm.. How many mimes.. How many mimes indeed!!??  But then again
> there's always room for MIMES!!"  These would be the last words he would
> ever speak outloud.
>      And then he cackled madly like most people who come right out of
> optical physics concerts spouting philosophical mime trivia.  In the coming
> years, he would become a force to reckon with.  And he would call
> himself.. THE TIME MIME II...
>      And the circle came to a close.

Ahhhh, we're parodying the Time Crapper II origin? That's ballsy.

>      Ted Green probably had the most stress free life of anyone in the
> Looniverse.  Philosophers, who had spent their lives climbing mountains,
> talking to goats, counting the amount of red cars on the highway, and any
> other means of finding the meaning of life could have just as simply talked
> to Ted Green.

Huh, well, that's ni--

>      Ted Green's parents on the other hand led an incredibly stressful life.
> One of the reasons this was, had to do with the fact that their 40 year old
> son had been living in their bathroom for almost an entire decade.

--huh.

> It eventually
> came clear that the only way to peacefully coexist with reality was to lock
> himself in the bathroom and ignore reality.  Amazingly enough this happened
> to work.

He was a trailblazer, and informed the standard way millennials would come to 
deal with the crushing pressures of society.

>      At about this time another had entered the scene, a man with a pale
> face, suspenders, and a funny looking hat.  And he had a gun.  And like
> space and time as the man fired his gun no sound was heard except the
> bickering of the Green family.  Although this author really meant, like
> space and time the gun wasn't heard, not the bickering of the Green family,
> although it is possible that the Green family's bickering can defy the laws
> of physics like Rosanne Arnold jokes, vomiting, and cool Sound tracks
> written by John Williams or Leonard Nemoy.  But in this case it wasn't the
> laws of physics going askew, but the fact that the gun was imaginary and the
> man was a mime.

Here, we see Arthur trying really hard to make the joke funny. It's okay, 
Arthur. We already think you're funny. <3

> First he had managed to ditch that loser Chronos the Clown.  Then he had
> manipulated another's destiny incase his own life was cut short by Retcon
> Hour.  And finally he had stolen a machine which would aid his fellow mimes
> greatly for their goal of forcing all life forms in the Plural Realities to
> appreciate and give mimes loose change instead usual obscene gesture.

Ahhhhhh, nice.:D

>      And the circle became a pretty triangle.

It does fit together nicely. <3

>      "Err.. yes sir.  Isn't what we're doing right now illegal I mean where
> do we have the right to just attack anyone we feel like even if they are
> infringing on our copy right laws??"
>      "Son, I'm surprised at you.  Have you read the Constitution?"
>      "Uh.. yes sir."
>      "Then you know that nowhere in it is the sentence 'And this
> constitution also applies to the Major Foods Corp.'  Next question."

*snerk*

>      Mr. Paprika looked unenthusiastically at the fireworks display of his
> making.  He knew his brother wasn't on the helicopter.  His brother he hated
> so.

Interesting idea.

>      He touched the source and traveled like a spirit to another realm.  A
> realm where he and his Looniverse were an idea.

Ahhhhh, interesting.

>      He was staring at his creator.  His creator was an idiot.  This could
> work out.

*snerk*

>      The creator was putty in his hands.  What others, like the Crossover
> Queen and Acton Lord had dreamed about, he had accomplished.  There was
> still a problem though.  His creator was an idiot, and was lazy.  Make that
> two problems.

It's interesting that skipping over the sheer scale and impossibility of this 
idea is not good writing, but at the same time, the unskillfulness of it is made 
part of the idea? Which itself rather thoughtful.

Drew "fascinating" Perron