Tales of the Parodyverse

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J. Jonah Jerkson
Sun Mar 27, 2005 at 11:51:08 pm EST
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The Baroness, Part 27. Catching Up
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The Baroness, Part 27
Catching Up


The long, black Maybach swept up the driveway to the entrance to Schloss Schreckhausen, halting as it slipped under the archway shielding the front door.
Silicone Sally slipped out of the left rear door and scurried around to open the right one for her employer, the Baroness.

“Why isn’t Franz here to do that?” Elizabeth asked as she alighted from the limousine.

“Er,” Sally said, “I don’t know. Ew, what’s that?”

A pile of sooty black and ash gray rags lay crumpled by the front door. As the two looked more closely at it, the pile seemed to tremble.

“A vagrant,” Elizabeth spat. “Have him cleaned up downstairs, give him a sandwich and have him sent to the shelter.”

“I’ll tell Franz,” Sally said with a disgusted look at the bum. “Wait – that patch on the gray coat – isn’t that Baron Otto’s?”

A few minutes later the unconscious Baron Otto was lying in his sumptuous bed while Franz and Bruno finished removing his soiled garments and cleaned him up.

“Had a few too many brandies, Grandfather Baron Otto?” Elizabeth sniped.

“He’s mumbling something,” Sally interrupted. Hesitating a moment to collect herself, she then extended her ear almost two feet toward the Baron, while molding the lobe into a parabolic shape ideal for listening.

“I didn’t think you could do that kind of thing, Sally.”

“Pilates,” she whispered back. “Now let me listen. Hmm, something about Lemuria and Great K’Martu. Then something about Wilton . . . and a movie. Now he’s mumbling about a blue light and a Losiira.”

“Losiira! She was one of the Caphans at Sir Mumphrey’s. They were supposed to have been whisked away to some sanctuary across dimensions. What else is he saying?”

“Wilton again – production money. Movie and reality at the same time. Tissues of Reality. He’s falling asleep.” Baron Otto groaned and began snoring loudly.

“Let him rest. It’s not as if we don’t have anything to do ourselves.”

A few minutes later, Elizabeth Zemo was seated in her study, sipping a rare Asian blend of green teas brought to her by Franz, while riffling through the mail and her messages.

“Let’s see, here’s a pledge notice for Adele Jerkson’s Parodiopolis Variety Theater. Sally, how much did I promise the old raccoon face?”

“Two million, $500,000 up front and the rest when all the objections stop.”

“O.K., have the half mill check cut. It will probably be forever until I have to pay the rest.”

“How come? You don’t think she can call her husband off?

“She probably has him so well trained he pees on command. But that Wooster woman, Agnes, doesn’t seem like the type to follow Adele’s lead. She has a streak of ruthlessness that the other society types lack.”

“So we have to bribe her separately?”

“I doubt that will work. Take a look at this file.” She handed Sally a folder emblazoned “spiffy and Banjoooo Detective Agency – Confidential Report – Mrs. Agnes Wooster.”

“I thought spiffy was the President of Badripoor and Banjoooo was back in Atlantis,” Sally mused.

“These P.I.’s are a bunch of second-raters who licensed the name from the founders,” Elizabeth explained. “But they’re cheap, methodical and right for this kind of job. Agnes is too uptight to have the imagination for any real secrets.”

“Poor but proud daughter of an Episcopal vicar . . . married into the Wooster family . . . eccentric son Michael and two wild daughters . . . minor real estate finagles . . . . Yep, tight-assed, boring, and unbelievably determined.”

“Right. Well, we can wait for her to act first. Let’s go on . . . oil prices . . . good, insurance claim for the zeppelin – denied! Get the lawyers on it – wait, don’t get the lawyers on it, it will never get resolved. Here’s the name of the claims adjuster, Sally, get to know the little weasel and turn him around.”

“Frankly, your excellency, I’m better at the higher level work. This is more a Velcro Vixen job, or even a PsychoAcidPervGirl! gig.”
“Developing a sense of morals, Sally?”

“No, just drawing a line. If I’m worth the $25K a week you pay me, it’s a waste to use me on a minor seduction. I mean, I do have standards.”

“When did you develop this taste for luxuries, Sally?”

“About the time you put me up in the Connaught Hotel, I’d say.”

“Otto was right,” the Baroness grumbled. “All right, put Velcro Vixen on it. She probably thinks it’s beneath her, too, but she hasn’t had many gigs recently. Just keep the cost well below what the lawyers would charge – she’ll still be overpaid. Let’s see now, bill for expenses of capture of Hallie MacAllistair – Hallie! We forgot all about Hallie! Is she down in the dungeons?”

“Don’t know, your excellency.”

“Franz! Franz!”

The major-domo appeared out of nowhere, cool and unruffled. “Ja, meine hochwohlgeborene Freiin?”

“In which dungeon are we keeping Hallie?”

“Regrettably, your excellency, we are not keeping anybody in the dungeons. Even Baron Otto is in bed.”

“Then what happened to Hallie?”

“The woman you ordered Helmut to pick up? I will find him to explain.”

“I don’t like that word ‘explain,’” Sally muttered archly.

“Well, let’s keep going ‘till he gets here. Phantomhwk Memorial Hospital. I still owe them more money – how can that be? I ought to buy the place and fire Allan Harsch personally. Subpoena to appear before the President’s Adviser on Metahuman Affairs – that jerk Garrick. Call Lisa Waltz and send her whatever retainer she demands. Accountants . . . I need another source of income?”

Sally stretched her neck to peer over the Baroness’ shoulder. “Oil prices up 12% per month, but your operating expenses are up 20%. The cost of mad science is really going up. Yep, I’d say you were approaching a cash flow squeeze.”

“Damn, and we haven’t made any progress on the Movie Gun. O.K., Sally, I’ll see Expired Warranty and Razor Ballerina in the Green Conference Room at three today. You also. Project Excelsior is going to happen.“

“Your excellency,” Franz had reappeared from nowhere again, “they are waiting for you in the Blue Ready Room.”

In the Blue Ready Room, Leo, Karl and Fritz were standing, shifting their weight from foot to foot, cracking knuckles and fidgeting generally. Every few seconds one or another glanced briefly at the door and returned to his worrying. Even so, the quiet “swoosh” of the steel doors sliding open surprised them, causing all three to snap clumsily to attention.

“Where’s Helmut?” Elizabeth barked.

“He’s not here,” Leo grinned inanely.

Fritz countered, “I’m sure he’ll be here in a moment.”

“He said he couldn’t make it,” Karl noted.

“Sally, if Helmut doesn’t show up in the next 10 minutes, put the Huntmaster on him. He owes us one after that flying fiasco.”

“Right, Baroness.”

“Well, boys, where’s Hallie?”

There was silence while the three henchmen stared at the tips of their shoes. Finally, Fritz spoke up. “It wasn’t our fault! We staged the snatch perfectly! It was Helmut who decided to use this stupid capture device.” He stepped aside and pointed to his rear, where a five foot tall, half red and half white sphere stood. On the seam line was a black, red and white bull’s eye.

“A giant Pokemon ball?” Elizabeth exclaimed.

“Helmut said she might have some metahuman powers, so he ordered up this capture ball,” Fritz went on.

“This is for Japanese kiddie monsters! What was he thinking!”

“Er, he said something about getting it cheap from Bautista Enterprises. They’re really good at super stuff.” Leo was not the brightest streetlamp on the boulevard.

“It looks like she short-circuited the latch control with a hairpin.” Sally had been examining the sphere.

“Hey, but they worked really good when we tested them,” Leo claimed.

“And you tested them with?”

“The lion, the tiger and the bear, over there,” Leo continued.

“Your excellency, these are Bautista machines.” Sally’s eyes grew wide. An ominous series of clicks was coming from the three large red and while spheres nearby.

“Everyone, out of here, right now!

They got to the doors about a half second ahead of the tiger.

* * * *

As they stood gasping for breath just outside the ready room, Elizabeth called to Sally, “Tell the Huntmaster I want Helmut dead or alive.”

“Could you yell a bit louder, ma’am? It’s hard to hear you over the roaring and that growling from the bear.”

The Baroness repeated her instruction and then turned to Fritz, Karl and Leo. “All right, that’s enough for now. Go to your barracks and get cleaned up. I’m not going to do anything to you.”

The three sighed in relief and then saluted. “Thank you, Baroness, you are very merciful,” Karl toadied.

“I’ll leave your discipline to Baron Otto.”

The three henchmen froze, and then wildly looked around for an exit.

“The exits are shut down, boys. Enjoy your free time, while you have it.”

A few minutes later, Elizabeth and Sally had returned to her study.

“Franz, two Irish coffees, please. Make them strong.”

“Jawohl, Excellenz.”

“That bad, huh?” Sally probed.

“It gets harder and harder to keep up with it all, Sally,” Elizabeth groaned. “Did you set off the sleeping gas in the Blue Ready Room?”

“Er, no. But I don’t remember you mentioning it.”

“I probably didn’t. Take care of that now for me, would you?

Sally left the room as Franz delivered the steaming drinks. Elizabeth gratefully sipped hers as she continued scanning the pile of messages. Just as Sally returned, however, a small red light began flashing in the corner of the room, and Elizabeth’s bracelet began vibrating.

“Someone’s in the castle, Sally,” the Baroness sighed. “Someone metahuman, it seems. Let’s take a look.”

The wall slid back, exposing the usual battery of monitors. “Whatever it is, it’s poking around Otto’s dungeons,” Elizabeth said after scanning the video feeds and reports.

“I don’t see anything.”

“It could be a force field, a ghost, a gaseous being or something electrical. But Heinrich Zemo was a genius at paranormal detection. There’s somebody snooping around here, Sally, not that they’ll find anything all the way down there.”

“Should I gas them, too?”

Elizabeth pondered for a moment, and then decided, “No. If he doesn’t know that we know that he’s here, we can have some fun. Look, he’s coming into view now.”

The gaseous cloud that had infiltrated the deepest dungeon of Schloss Schreckhausen now coalesced into the form of a young man. The monitors flashed an identity.

“Alcheman,” read Sally. “We don’t have much on him, though.”

“Well, let’s give him something to think about, right? Remember Project Clearview?”

“Clearview? But you decided it couldn’t work – oh, I see.”

“Let’s go down to the dungeon and talk it over, shall we?”

As the iron doors to Baron Otto’s deep dungeon creaked open, Alcheman hurriedly tapped the elemental symbols on his biceps and transformed back into transparent gases. Floating near the Baroness and Silicone Sally, he overheard their secret conversation.

“O.K., Sally, no one can hear us down here.”

“That’s right, Baroness, this has to be the safest place in the castle for us to talk.”

“Fine. Now this is the plan. I am going to pollute the air above every one of the national parks unless I get a payment of $500 million per park. “

“But how are you going to do that, Your Excellency?” Sally’s voice was a trifle too loud.

“I’m going to dupe the U.S. Government into doing it for me. Starting with the Office of Paranormal Security.”

“My, isn’t that an ingenious plan! No one will ever figure that out!” Sally was still a few decibels too loud.

“Thank you, Sally. Now, we will infiltrate OPS headquarters at 15 minutes after midnight tomorrow, at the south gate. Bring your climbing gear.”

“Right, Baroness,” Sally chirped. A red light began flashing.

“Some one’s detected an intrusion, Sally. Let’s get out of here,and then I’ll send the guards with metahuman detectors down here to check things out.”

The two left, with Alcheman still hanging transparently in the air. Time to get out of here, he thought. But Mother was right. Something improper is going on here. Raping the environment. How typical. Changing form again, he sped for the ground floor and escaped.

Playing the part of Baroness Elizabeth Sweetwater Dewdrop Zemo:

J. Jonah Jerkson
VOICE OF THE PEOPLE









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