Visionary awoke in a dark, damp, confined space that smelled vaguely of Falafel. Despite the rather painful bump behind his left ear, he was pleasantly surprised. More often than not, when a person wakes up after decidedly not having gone to sleep, they are greeted with far worse. Yes, he was flat on his face in what appeared to be the back of a somewhat damp catering truck, but at least there was no one around to stick a gun in his face. For that matter, he wasn't even tied up. All this was actually quite considerate of the guy who cold-cocked him.

The L.L. leader sat up with the practiced slow motions of someone who received a lot of blows to the head and checked his watch. An hour had gone past since he last remembered! Visionary grinned happily (although his left eyelid fluttered in pain from the effort). With luck, not only had the bad guy already been subdued, but he had most likely missed the roast altogether! He was ecstatic… As far as he was concerned, his various teammates had far too much material to make roasting him very sporting… although he did have to admit to being amused when spiffy finished his speech and was suddenly set upon by Asil. He winced in memory of the resulting attempt to 'weed' spiffy, and the discovery of just how extensive his fern's root system really was. In fact, he had been on his way to gather up some Bactine and Miracle-Grow when his mysterious assailant had struck.

It wasn't until his memory of the events came full circle that it occurred to Visionary that, with now two full inches of water on the floor, the caterer's truck was perhaps excessively damp. (Despite the various cracks that had been made about him at the roast, one should keep in mind that even relatively mild head trauma can interfere with the keenest mind, and Visionary did not have the benefit of either of those extremes.) With a lurch, he staggered to the fogged-over back windows of the truck and hurriedly wiped them clear with his sleeve.

"Aw, crap" he complained to the common Parodiopolis Bay bottom-feeding mucksucker bass that peered back at him.

Now he was only mildly glad he had missed the roast.

---

Dancer weighed the options, and decided to go straight to the First Lady of the Lair Legion. She sensed an impending crisis… being attuned to probabilities gave her strong instincts, and right now she felt the odds were that something unpleasant was about to hit the fan. "Lisa!" she cried, spotting the lawyer off to the side of the proceedings. "I think something's come up!"

Lisa looked up from her clipboard and smiled at the sight of Parodiopolis's newest heroine. "Heya Dancer… glad you could make it. Be with you in just one minute" she added, glancing down at her notes again. "Troia!" she called out to the Amazonian secretary. "You're up next after Zemo concludes his remarks about trampling the woefully directionless, undisciplined, pathetic, Visionary-lead Legion, leaving the world ripe for his bloody conquest." She made a face. "That might be a bit of a downer, so try to start with a joke."

"I've never roasted anyone before" Troia admitted, coming over. "Well, actually that's not true. There were the occasional castaways that washed up on the shores of my island when I was growing up. The whole 'anti-man' stance was a bit more militant in those days…" She smiled briefly at memories of good times past. "Um… anyway… what am I supposed to say?"

Lisa shrugged. "Well, you could go the kind route and heap glowing praise on him…" she suggested. "Or you could take the fun route and mock, humiliate and ridicule him in front of the most important people in the city. During a roast, that's called 'gently poking fun at his foibles'."

"I once paid a hooker to poke my foibles…" Space Ghost slurred from under the open bar. "Well, actually, it was Connie Chung… but it was the best three dollars I ever spent…" He belched. "That Maury Povich is a lucky man."

It didn't take Troia long to decide on a course of action… After all, they were talking about the man who insisted that she keep her lunch hour down to a sparse 240 minutes. "So which foibles do I poke?" she asked, hefting her obsidian tipped spear.

Lisa bit her lip thoughtfully. "Well, there's his intelligence, but there are only so many ways to say 'severe mental handicap'. Then there's the whole 'fake man' angle, but he doesn't even acknowledge those jokes any more, so the fun has kind of gone out of them. Even excluding those, however, you have a wide selection: His taste in fashion, his taste in music, his general appearance, his pathetic need for approval, his whiny insecurity, the way he keeps telling the same damn stories over and over again no matter how many times we've all heard them…"

"I hate to interrupt…" Dancer interceded truthfully. It was especially true now that she wasn't sure whether she bore good news or bad. "But the guest of honor seems to be missing."

"What?" Lisa asked, scanning the crowd. "Damn! I told Cheryl she ought to have one of those tracking tags attached to his ear like we saw on 'Animal Planet'…" She sighed and brushed her hands together. "I summon Visionary… consider yourself served!"

Dancer felt an odd tug at the corner of her mind, then there was a gentle *poof*, and suddenly Bill Gates was sitting before them eating a bran muffin.

"Eew" Lisa, a noted Apple user, declared. "Wrong visionary."

"Um… is this about the appeal?" Gates asked nervously. "You know, those anti-trust laws can be interpreted in many ways…"

"Shut up, nerd-boy" Lisa snapped, waving him off. "I summon Visionary, dammit!"

Another tug, another poof, and a very dead Buckminster Fuller collapsed in a boney heap into the melitzanosalata.
.
"That's probably a health-code violation of some sort" Space Ghost noted.

"What the hell's going on here?" Lisa pondered darkly as the assorted guests began to avoid their end of the buffet table.

Dancer scanned the room, searching out the source of the odd tugs she was feeling. Surprisingly, she found it in the corner wearing a white ten gallon hat. Leaving the more experienced Lisa to dispose of the body, she crossed the floor to stand in front of his table. "Carlsbad Carl, the Albino Probability Cowboy… I should have known it was you."

"Why, Miss Dancer, I do declare…" the pasty man in chaps replied in an oily, albeit twangy, voice. "I was bettin' you'd show up at this shindig… and as you know, I'm a gamblin' man."

Dancer sighed. It looked like she would be working at this party after all. "Yes, Carl, I know." She pulled out a chair and sat down opposite him. "So how did your mother's gall stone operation go?"

"Hmmm? Oh! Heck, she was back on her feet quicker than a rattlesnake shakes its tail" he answered, turning his head in search of a spittoon. Finding none, he made do with the nearest potted fern, which was actually the back oc spiffy's head. "She really appreciated the flowers, by the way."

"And Lucille?"

He made a face. "Still gougin' me for alimony… even with that big show a hers at Caesar's."

Dancer shrugged. "Should have kept your hands off the Keno girls."

"Yeah… pushed my luck, I suppose" he nodded. "Reckon, that's why I'm here."

"I'm supposed to be a pumpkin by midnight, so let's get to it… What's it to be this time Carl?" she asked pleasantly, although she already could guess the terms.

"One hand" he replied, producing a deck of cards. "You win, you git that Visionary fella… I win, I git to add your powers to my own."

Hardly fair, she noted, seeing as she personally had no use for Visionary. Still, being a hero meant the occasional raw deal to protect the helpless. "One thing Carl…" she asked curiously as she cut the deck. "What's to keep the Legionnaires from slapping you silly with your own huge belt buckle until you cooperate?"

"Oh…" the pale cowboy answered as he prepared to deal the cards, "Odds are somethin' will come up."

---

"Bad Sea-Snake! Bad!" Banjooo, the King of the Sea Monkeys, declared as he whapped the gigantic serpent across the nose with a rolled up newspaper. Even though it was the Sunday edition, the sea-monster didn't seem to notice much… it continued to squeeze the oil tanker within its coils. "He's not paying any attention" he said apologetically to his teammates.

"Can't you telepathically talk to fish or something?" spiffy asked acidly as his fern tried to pry the massive coils off of the deck of the tanker. "I thought that's what undersea kings did with their time."

"Hey, does the leader of Canada telepathically talk to moose?" Banjooo bit back.

"Well… it would explain a lot of our social programs…" Hatman admitted as he put on his Seattle Supersonics hat. Running fast enough to walk on water, he sped in a tight circle around the leaking tanker, creating a whirlpool that kept the crude oil from dispersing too far out into the bay.

"What's taking Finny, anyway?" spiffy grunted as his fern exerted itself.

"He had to tow that foundering tour boat to safety, and the rest are escorting people out of danger" NTU pointed out while he worked to seal the widening cracks in the tanker's hull. "I thought Banjooo could handle the snake… We're going to have to try something else to soothe the creature."

spiffy snorted. "Hell, why don't we just sing to it."

NTU nodded. "Good plan. My readings indicate something by Barry Manilow would work best."

"Um… actually, I was just…"

"You should probably get up closer to his head, though…" NTU suggested helpfully before powering up his boot thrusters and rocketing skyward to join Banjooo. "Any luck?" he asked.

Banjooo looked embarrassed. "He's almost never like this… honest" he proclaimed.

"How'd it get into Parodiopolis Bay, anyway?" NTU asked as he watched spiffy lash himself to the snakes head ala Gregory Peck in Moby Dick, but with fronds instead of harpoon cables.

"I guess he followed me to work… I must have forgotten to latch the gate when I left this morning" the Sea Monkey admitted. "Um… what's spiffy doing?"

NTU adjusted his audio sensors. "He seems to be serenading the creature with 'I Write the Songs'" the Legionnaire responded calmly.

Banjooo nodded. "Does he realize that giant sea snakes don't have ears?"

The armored man shrugged. "I just figured it would keep him from making smarmy comments for a while."

Banjooo cast the man an admiring look. "And you wondered if you'd make a good substitute leader…"
___

Dancer glanced to her five cards, all still face down, and flicked the last card away. "I'll take one."

Carl nodded and shot a single card off the top of the deck to line up next to her remaining four, then turned to his own hand. "Two for me darlin" he said as he discarded and redrew, but left his new cards face down on the table. A smile came to his thin pink lips. "Three aces" he announced, laying his remaining cards down with a flourish, "So far." He leaned back, licked his gums and tapped his fingers on the two unturned cards.

Dancer nodded and began revealing her cards from left to right. "Ten of hearts, jack of hearts, queen of hearts, king of hearts…" she noted, resting her hand on the last card. "It seems the ace of hearts is still at large." She shot him a bright smile. "Care to raise the stakes?"

"Hell, woman… I like you!" Carl grinned. "You're the only one left that can give me a run fer my money. Whatcha have in mind?"

"If I win, you give back Visionary and turn yourself in to the authorities" Dancer suggested brightly.

The albino cowboy chuckled. "I still got two chances to draw that ace of yers, missy… I'll take that bet… provided you offer up somethin' new as well." He eyed her lasciviously.

"You're not that lucky, Carl."

"Care to find out?" he shot back.

Dancer chewed her lip, but finally nodded. She bet that the Dark Knight had never had to make a bust this way…

With flair, Carlsbad Carl flipped the first of his hole cards. His face fell. "Seven of clubs" he spat.

"Nervous?" she asked, feeling a bit more cocky.

Carl ignored her. Instead, he tugged his left ear twice, closed his eyes and rubbed his belt buckle, chanting "Common' baby… common' baby". (At least, she hoped it was his belt buckle he was rubbing…) Finally, he opened his eyes and flipped his final card…

The ace of hearts.

"YeeeeeeeeeEEEEE-HAW!" he screamed, throwing his hat up in the air. He peered at her through the stringy white hair that fell down in front of his eyes. "You'll have ta let me know what you want fer breakfast, Missy…" he drawled. "You should have known better to shoot for a royal flush against the luckiest man on earth!"

"Well, see… that's the thing…" Dancer replied softly as she flipped over her last card… the nine of hearts. "I'm not really that ambitious."