[SG]: Paradigm Incorporated #3.975: Catching Up

[Brism Wanor]

                          Paradigm Incorporated
                           #3.975: Catching Up
                               Brism Wanor

     Hi there. Name's Jessa, Jessa Harper. Sorry about the snow, its
something to do with being in cryochronal suspension, or so they tell me.
Me, I think its just 'cause my author's in the middle of a cold snap.
     Anyway, we're all out, and getting ourselves back in gear to share
the rest of our stories with you all, but I've been thinking, well, six
and a bit months is a really long time.
     Yeah, I know, I know, the logs just got posted, but not everyone
reads those, so...
     So, I thought, you know what'd be useful? Someone ought to summarise
previous events. And, since I've got the most story time, and I'm the
Author's favourite, and I'm the cutest one, I'm the one who got elected to
tell you the back story.
     (Shut up, I didn't hear you volunteering.)
     Sigh, my co-stars are *such* a pain.
     OK, here we go with the synopsises, er, synopseeses, er, synpose, um,
synopses. (I know, I know, I'm just a little nervous, OK?!)
     The first episode is all about me, me, me, me, me, me, me, which
makes it, in my opinion, the best episode, even if not much happens.
     Right, the premise. I'm a rather sickly teen with an internet
connection, and a love of writing, both my parents are authors, you know,
and I read through Superguy, and think, hey, I can do that, so I write a
story about me, or a girl a lot like me, becoming a superguy, and submit
it to the list, only, somehow, instead of sending my story to the Superguy
list, I send myself to the Superguy universe. Whoops!
     The cool part is, I've got all the abilities of my hero self, which
is good, because otherwise there wouldn't be much of an adventure. Its
hard to have adventures when walking across the room means lying down for
a half hour afterwards. So, where was I?
     Oh, right. I end up in the Superguy universe, in Cleveland. Then, I
have dinner. Pretty sad ending, but I think my Author was hungry, so she
let me eat.
     Second episode has nothing to do with me, which is a real bummer. It
introduces this loony criminal type named Victor Viola, who's kind of like
a failed Dr. Evil, or something. Anyway, he's got these two henchmen, a
professional idiot named Becks, and a long-suffering gentleman's butler
type named Thuddmann. There's this really long, stupid, drawn out rant
about the evils of little dogs, then Viola's monologue is interrupted by
this hero we've never heard of before called Paradigm.
     Anyway, Viola whines some more about how hard it is being a villain,
then finds out that Paradigm hasn't done what he was supposed to, which
was inadvertently further Viola's plans.
     After that, Viola throws a hissy fit, and orders Becks to shoot
Paradigm, which is really lame, I mean, a really good master villain ought
to have at least three fallback plans at all times. If I were writing
these stories, I'd... Wait, I am, or at least, a version of me is. Hmm,
things look a lot different from inside, I guess. Actually, I think my
Author was just looking for a cliffhanger.
     On to ep three, where there's a recap of the cliffhanger, er,
stoophanger, from ep two, then to me, me, me, er, sorry...
     I'm having dinner, enjoying foods I've never been able to eat before,
because I used to be sick. I'm also thinking about my powers, which are
all based on being hypersensitive. I can hear an individual conversation
from across a room, I can see the last line on an eye chart, I can feel
single grains of sand, I can separate smells and tastes at will, and, I
can choose which chemicals get used to build my body. Pretty neat, I'll
never have to diet, ever, hahahahahahaha. Yipe!
     (Who threw that glass of water at me?)
     (If that was you, Paradigm, I'll ...)
     (OK, OK, back to the story.)
     Anyway, I finish stuffing myself, then go looking for heroic things
to do. Why? I'm in a superhero universe, I've superpowers, what *else*
should I be doing. Besides, the Author said I should.
     So, after putting on a demonstration of how fit I am, running past
cars on the highway, you should've seen their faces, I get to this
warehouse that smells of dogs.
     I overhear most of Viola's plan, superhearing, remember, and go in to
stop him. How? No clue. Plan? What is this *plan* thing.
     (You know, I'm really starting to have doubts about the author,
here.)
     (Yeah, but really, none of my stories were ever this poorly plotted.)
     (Well, no, you haven't read any, I never showed them to anyone.)
     (They're personal, and they're... not... very... good...... Uh-oh.)
     So, Paradigm's back in the hall, no, wait, we've slipped back in
time, and all of the later part of ep two plays out again, only with me
there.
     Paradigm does something weird to the bullets in Becks's gun, making
them disappear and reappear, which I'm going to have to ask him about,
soon.
     Then, Becks decides to shoot Paradigm, which is when I attack him,
and knock him out. Paradigm takes out Thuddmann, and Viola folds up in the
corner, sobbing like a little child. Another glorious victory, or
something.
     After that, we were supposed to do ep four, but our Author moved,
then had network problems. Turned out, it was the Eternal Enemy, the Great
Evil, the Duke of Smelly Feet himself, Satan.
     The Author confronted Satan, and told him to go whistle.
     Then, nothing.
     Well, OK, bad writer's block, settling in hassles, and generally
having the writing routine blown to Hell(TM). But, six *months*!
     Anyway, every so often, one of us would nudge the Author, and a
little more'd get written. Now, finally, ep four is ready, and it'll be
out just as soon as I get the rest of this ice out of my hair.
     So, thanks for your patience, and thanks to the one person who
responded to an episode. Keep those letters and postcards coming. We can
only do so much from this end.
     Oh, and by the way, why's the series named for Paradigm, when its
supposed to be my story?
     Um, did I say that out loud?
     Paradigm, wait, please, put down the garden, er, that's a fire hose,
isn't it? Yipes!
     AAAAAAARRRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!!
     PPPPPPFFFTTT, Pppfffabbft, pttfft.
     Would it help if I said I was sorry?
     Anyway, stay tune for Paradigm Incorporated Episode Four, starring,
well, Paradigm, and me.



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Brism Wanor, Lord Dougl, Keeper of the Eighth Echo
brism at earthlink.net

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