LNH: Legion of Net.Heroes Volume 3 #3: "Sequels are Always Worse" [4/6]
Jeanne Morningstar
mrfantastic7 at gmail.com
Tue Nov 10 10:20:08 PST 2020
"Hmm, OK, what now..." said Mashup Laq. What powersets would best
enhance their already considerable puzzle-solving and lateral thinking
abilities? Then they had it! Combining the powers of Gamer Boy and
Deductive Logic Man, they became Adventure Game Puzzle Solving Enby! Who
had the power to solve the cat hair moustache puzzle in Gabriel Knight
in five seconds without a walkthrough!
"Okay," they said, "by setting up all the jukeboxes in the room to play
What's New Pussycat except for the one that plays It's Not Unusual, a la
Salt and Pepper Diner, I can create a glitch that allows me to break out
of the dream scenario!" They realized, too late, that they could have
just used the powers of Glitch Girl, but unnecessarily overcomplicated
solutions to simple problems were a foundational element of both
adventure games and Silver Age comics.
They sent another ghost body over to Occultism Kid and Doctor Stomper.
"I can get out now!" they said.
Occultism Kid nodded. "I can link you up with Doctor Stomper's mind and
help him escape," he said, "but I'll have to stay here to use illusion
magic and fool the system into thinking you're both still there."
"All right." Doctor Stomper and Occultism Kid nodded nods of uneasy
mutual respect.
After jimmying the jukeboxes, Mashup Laq felt themself rising out of the
pod they'd been trapped in. They surveyed the dreadful scene. The
demonic virtual-reality machine that had hellfire decals on the side
contained a huge number of suspended animation pods that held every
LNHer (and a couple of villains) who'd been dragged into this. Two of
the pods were empty, though. Doctor Stomper, who'd been having a lot of
sleep problems lately, was still struggling to wake up.
They poked their head through the wall and saw Catalyst Lass manacled to
a metal slab by techno-manacles you see all the time in superhero
cartoons, and the villains responsible standing over her.
"Sarcastic Lad and Token Girl have escaped!" growl/shout/whispered
DNSDaemon.
Mashup Laq wasn't surprised, both because of Tara's strength of will
(except when it came to impulse-buying merchandise for anime she liked)
and how closely linked she was to Cat.
"A shame," said Romantic Innuendo, "but . It's time to move on to the
next phase of our plan... Go bring me the pod of Sister State-the-Obvious."
====
Sister State-the-Obvious, of course, had been talking with Loquacious Lad.
"You know," said Loquacious Lad, "this scenario has an aura of the
distinctly surreal, or unreal, and likely demonic in nature. I wonder
if, in fact, we are experiencing a sort of artificial reality or dream
state..."
"We're in an evil virtual reality machine," said Sister State-the-Obvious.
"Now as I was saying..." said Loquacious Lad. Their whole conversation
had gone like this.
It was one of those times when a minor frustration suddenly drew in all
the major frustrations that had been hovering around it that she hadn't
known how to put into words and it all snapped into place at once. She
thought about how intensely heteronormative the early LNH was. She
thought about all the awful lines in otherwise great issues; all the
jokes that were based on oppressive thinking that the writers might not
even have been aware of but were still there. She thought about
Contraption Man, torturing himself with guilt even though Self-Righteous
Preacher had literally tortured him with the, however uneasy, approval
of many in the Legion. [LNH Triple Play #5]. She thought of just how
much frankly abusive behavior the LNH had tolerated for the sake of Comedy.
And of course, she thought of her ex-husband, who was involved in so
much of that. Someone who was frustratingly *almost* good but who kept
being drawn back into the same awful behavior patterns, who kept
harassing his teammates and making their lives miserable and never faced
any consequences.
All her frustrations fused into a core of white-hot rage.
"It's time now." She heard a voice from above her, not really absorbing
the words it was saying. " This is a spare Revampire Amulet I, er,
borrowed from my once-lover, Revamp Lass. It will be used to channel the
Power Byrne, which through the Flames of Silver Age Female Character
Rage will turn her sexy and evil, as happens in every John Byrne run.
You see, the other part of my plan is to get Sister State-the-Obvious to
rejoin the Brotherhood. We could use another woman, you see, since
Doctor Killfile isn't really interested in relationships. I could set
her up with Marvel Zombie Lad, or Polybag Person--or both!--but first, I
will use her to kill you!"
At that exact moment, Token Girl and Sarcastic Lad charged into the
room, with Mashup Laq close behind; the still-not-quite-awake Doctor
Stomper staggered in after them. Token Girl knocked over DNSDaemon with
a volley of bus tokens, and Sarcastic Lad charged in on him like a bull
on Red Bull, pitting his own demonic sarcastic powers against
DNSDaemon's hellborn hypertech.
"You call yourself a demon from Hell?" Sarcastic Lad said to DNSDaemon.
"You'd never make it in a KISS cover band!"
It backfired. DNSDaemon, who'd been feeling anxious all day, suddenly
felt their anxiety and frustration coalesce into anger. The flame on
their coattails shot upwards. "Yikes," said Sarcastic Lad as DNSDaemon
slashed at him with the mighty techno-hellfire claymore they had summoned.
Mashup Laq transformed themself into a combination of Self-Righteous
Preacher and the X-Intruder, the Uncanny X-orcist, and blasted the
DNSDaemon with a giant Liefeld squirtgun of holy water.
DNSDaemon screamed. Their techno-claymore transformed into two hellfire
pistols and blasted Mashup Laq's squirtgun rifle out of their hand.
Mashup Laq pulled out two squirtgun pistols and the two of them engaged
in an operatic, balletic John Woo gunfight.
Gradually they grew closer to each other in the dance of battle. They
came closer and ever closer to making out, just like Nicholas Cage and
John Travolta in Face/Off. John Woo's original idea, of course, was that
Nicholas Cage and John Travolta were ex-lovers, but the studio
intervened. Since this is a 2020 netfiction story rather than a 1990s
action movie, there was nothing to stop Mashup Laq and DNSDaemon from
making out. They threw aside their guns and rolled around together in
the heat of passion.
"Eeeep," said DNSDaemon, and disappeared in sudden burst of anxiety.
"Huh," said Mashup Laq, not entirely sure how to feel about what had
just happened. "I guess I... won?"
But it was too late.
The flames of the Byrne-power of the amulet consumed Sister
State-the-Obvious. When they faded away, she was wearing a kind of red
dominatrix outfit. Dr. Stomper had to admit that he could see the appeal
of this.
"Sister State-the-Obvious is no more! I am Sister Sexy, Evil and Mad as
Hell!"
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