Adventures In Parodyverse: Bad Timing, Part 1 (repost)

Adventures in Parodyverse - Bad Timing Part 1

    Lara Night was in civilian clothing carrying an umbrella when she entered the Bean & Donut. Behind the counter stood a very worried looking cat-girl waitress named Violet. Lara shook rain off the umbrella before speaking to her.

    "Find anything out?" Violet asked in a quiet yet high-pitched worried voice.

    "No," Lara replied sadly.

    "Oh, no," Violet whined. "The new boss is going to kill me!"

    "It's not your fault someone cleaned out the register," Lara noted, "There are lots of criminals in this city."

    Violet leaned over the counter gingerly and whispered to Lara, "But I left the drawer open and then answered the phone!"

    Lara glanced over at a nearby table where two odd customers she recognized were waving. "I think a couple of customers want your attention," she said.

    Violet looked past Lara at the two. One of them had a red afro that seemed to fill up the entire booth, or at least it was crushed against the back wall and threatening to tangle with the lamp hanging above the table, and was wearing day-glow clothing. The other sat next to an accordion while some sort of gerbil ate a jellybean next to him. "I think they're waving at you," she said.

    "Oh no." Lara recognized them and she wasn't happy. She turned around slowly and looked at them, and they both began waving more frantically. "How do you deal with those two?"

    "They tip well." Violet smiled at that thought as she headed back out from behind the counter to check on customers.

    The one with the red afro was named Ronnie. His afro was much bigger than Lara last remembered. And he insisted on calling her...

    "Hey, it's L.A.R.A. Night!" Ronnie called out.

    Lara sighed. "You can just call me Lara," she told him as she finally decided running wasn't an option and approached the table. "It really grates on the nerves when you spell the letters in my name, especially when you say 'period' after every one."

    Ronnie looked at his partner and friend, Chad and whispered loudly, "Oh right. She's undercover. We can't use her superhero name."

    She shook her head and began walking away, hoping that was the end of it.

    "I heard you're helping Violin get her stolen money back?" Ronnie asked.

    "It's Violet, and yes."

    Ronnie suddenly reached across the dozen or so plates piled high with waffles on the table and gave Chad a high-five. The waffles appeared to be untouched. "That means we can help L.A.R....oh, sorry. I mean Undercover Lara find Violin's money!"

    Lara was still staring at the table. "Why did you order all these waffles and not eat any?"

    "We ate them." Ronnie patted his stomach. "And we're stuffed."

    Violet approached the table by then and placed another plate of waffles in a tiny empty space. Lara simply stared at her until she explained. "They told me to keep them coming until they say to stop."

    "That will be enough waffles for today, Violin. We have hero work to do, helping Undercover Lara!" Ronnie neatly folded his napkin and then placed it on his seat. "Chad, pay the good woman," he said as he stood.

    Chad reached into a bag beside him and spilled hundreds upon hundreds of pennies on the able.

    Lara stared at the stack of collapsing pennies. "Ever hear of paper currency?" she asked. The pennies added up to a lot of money, though it was obviously quite messy.

    "Yes, but paper currency is so passe', the age of the coin is now upon us!" Ronnie announced. He then whispered loudly, "We're paying in copper partly because of Chad's admiration of our 16th president. I've always been more of a Grover Cleveland man myself, but he doesn't come on legal tender."

    Lara sighed and picked up her umbrella and headed toward the door.

    "Is that some type of secret weapon?" Ronnie asked.

    "No, it's just an umbrella. It's raining out," Lara replied.

    "Ohhhh, I get it," Ronnie said in an exaggerated manner, sounding like he didn't really believe her.

    As she headed to the door she heard an annoying rustling plastic noise. As it turned out, Ronnie and Chad were unfolding a huge blue plastic tarp to protect themselves from the rain. She shook her head but didn't say a word.

    "Wait for me, guys!" Violet called after them. "I want to go too. I'm off my shift now!" She dusted herself off and reached behind the counter to grab her rain coat just as the robotic waitress, Tandi, came out of the back to see her off.

    "What have I gotten myself into?" Lara mumbled as she stepped outside and opened the umbrella. She ignored when Chad and Ronnie ducked and and seemed excited as the umbrella opened.

---

    "I guess we should start with more clues?" Lara asked Violet as they walked outside. She held her umbrella, next to her violet wore a hooded raincoat, and behind the two of them Chad and Ronnie shuffled along holding a blue tarp over their heads. People were staring. A taxi driver nearly slammed into a bus while watching them.

    "Do you remember the person you think did it? Or which way he went?"

    Chad was whispering in Ronnie's ear while Lara spoke. "You're right," Ronnie said, "We should ask people." He and Chad ran up to the largest, most muscle-bound man on the entire street and shoved him.

    "It's amazing," Lara whispered just within Violet's earshot, "I shouldn't watch but I can't look away."

    "What the hell...?" the muscle-bound man asked.

    "Do you know who took Violin's money?" Ronnie asked him pointedly. "And you really shouldn't curse. It hurts Little Cat's feelings."

    The muscle-bound man was turning red with rage by that point. "I'm gonna turn you into mulch!"

    "Ah, he recycles!" Ronnie beamed. Chad smiled and nodded too. "I knew you were a decent guy! Let's play something for him, Chad!"

    "Guys! Guys!" Lara forced her way between the large man and Chad & Ronnie before the two of them found themselves pummeled. "Leave the innocent bystanders alone, okay?"

    "Doesn't he like accordion music?" Ronnie asked.

    The large man compared the accordion to a part of human anatomy in a particularly vulgar way. He then compared Ronnie to something similar in an equally vulgar way.

    "That's no way to speak in front of a lady!" Ronnie protested. "Someone should wash your mouth with soap!"

    Lara quickly threw the blue tarp back over Chad & Ronnie and began pushing them down the street with Violet's help. She felt motivated to do so after Chad produced an actual bar of soap.

    When she stopped Ronnie pushed aside the tarp and looked around. "Wow, did we just travel forward in time? What day is this?"

    "Wednesday," Violet replied un-helpfully.

    "Wow, a whole week went by!" Ronnie looked at Chad and said, "You know what this means. We have a whole week of dancing to catch up on!"

    "Oh cripes..." Violet grumbled as Chad began playing the accordion.

    The two of them were dancing and playing music while still beneath the blue tarp, causing even more people to stare.

    "It's still the same Wednesday," Lara told them. "All I did was shove you down the street and around the corner."

    But the music and dancing didn't stop.

    "Did you hear me?" Lara asked.

    "Yes, but that's no reason to stop dancing!" Ronnie replied enthusiastically. But then he stopped suddenly and put his hand on the accordion to stop it too. "Do you hear that, Chad?"

    Chad didn't seem to reply, but that didn't stop Ronnie.

    "I hear pennies!" Without any further explanation he and Chad quickly handed the tarp to Violet and started running off in some direction.

    "Eeww!" Violet screeched, dropping the tarp.

    "Should we follow or leave them?" Lara asked Violet.

    "Pennies!" Violet suddenly caught on to what they meant. "Chad gave me lots of pennies when they placed their first order! Whoever has them emptied the register!" Violet raced after them.

    "Oh, great." Lara didn't sound enthusiastic but she followed anyway. She was also disturbed that Violet seemed to know what Chad & Ronnie were up to.

    Around the corner was a large armored truck with two armed security guards loading in bags of change from a vending machine company. Chad & Ronnie were standing in the street watching them. Somehow the two of them had another blue tarp and were holding it up to keep themselves relatively dry.

    "Congratulations, you two." Lara told them sarcastically as she caught up with them, carefully remembering not to ask them how many tarps they were carrying.

    Chad & Ronnie and Violet were staring at the truck. Chad was whispering to Ronnie, and Violet looked embarassed and dejected at having met another dead end.

    "Undercover Lara, may I ask a question?" Ronnie asked annoyingly politely.

    Lara sighed but nodded anyway.

    "Chad informs me that the currency bearing the likeness of his favorite President has been banned from all vending machines. Is he correct?"

    That thought gave Lara pause. She looked at the sign advertising the vending machine company, and at the armored car again. Why would a vending machine company have pennies? "Is Chad sure that he heard pennies?"

    "I heard them too," Violet noted with a shrug. "I can hear pretty good. Being a cat-girl has its advantages. They have kind of a copper-y sound to them."

    Lara nodded. She was both annoyed and impressed at how Violet managed to become sucked into Chad & Ronnie's world. No wonder she could handle waitressing for them at the Bean & Donut. "I'll go talk to them. You guys wait here."

    "But we want to help!" Ronnie called out enthusiastically.

    "Me too!" Violet squeaked.

    "I need you to listen for more pennies," Lara cleverly suggested. "Stay here and listen carefully."

    "Rock on, we're helping Undercover Lara!" Ronnie gave Chad a high-five.

    Ignoring them, Lara approached the two security guards feeding bags into the armored truck. "Good evening," she said. That's all she managed to get out before they both threw heavy bags at her, knocking her down, and they dove into the back of the truck before it sped away.

    "I told you there were pennies!" Violet said as she pointed at the pile of wayward pennies scattered into the street after one of the thrown bags had split open. "Now how are we going to catch them?"

    "Undercover Lara can teleport us there!" Ronnie said, waving his fist in the air enthusiastically.

    "Don't be stupid!" Violet scolded him rudely.

    "No, actually he's right this time. I can." Lara shrugged.

    "Rock on!" Ronnie cheered along with Chad, and the two of them celebrated with another dance. Violet looked like she was about to cry.

TO BE CONTINUED?

-- Story written and copyrighted (C) 2007 by Jason Froikin, and may not be
-- reprinted without permission.
-- Yuki Shiro designed by Jason Froikin, based on designs by Masamune Shirow
-- Liu Xi Xian and the Psychic Samurai are original design by Jason Froikin
-- Lara Night is an original creation by Jason Froikin

Post By Anime Jason Fri Jun 01, 2007 at 04:43:21 pm EDT	Subject Adventures In Parodyverse: Bad Timing, Part 1 (repost)

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