AN ELDEREPI
DIRECTLY CONTINUED FROM THE END OF LUCILLA'S PARTY)
BY Jo, Bert, annsmac, Lucilla, Cyd
And, so, with party clothes and backpacks, our guests begin the adventure of THE
STARLESS TREK to Chicago. ...and, of course, they had only gone a short way when....
**********************************************************************
Part 1: Bert
BertiTired yelped loudly with pain as a sharp rock in the pathway pierced the sole of
her elegant crimson evening shoe. "Wait just a dadgum minute here!! Surely you are
not seriously thinking I'm going to walk all the way to Chicago, Joey!? Austin, perhaps,
but Chicago?? Do you have any idea how hot and sweaty we're all going to be just getting
TO Texas, much less getting THROUGH Texas?"
The real, genuine, one and only Bud White immediately took his one and only dearly
beloved in his strong arms and whispered gently into her sweaty little ear, "But, Dearest,
we can't just imagine that something big will come along and transport us to Chicago in
a matter of moments, can we?"
BertiPoopedand Hurting whined, "And why NOT? It's happened before! Why I remember many times when a certain unnamed Boxkeeper just poofed in from out of nowhere and
whoofed us all to some place far, far away! Why must we even have to consider walking
all the way to Chicago from Tierra del Fuego? And, moreover, where in the world is SID?"
Joimus, who now seemed to be once again firmly attached to Maximus' left lower rib,
calmly spoke to the group. "Now, ladies, and BertiBud and Sue the Vile and characters
all, remember that it's the adventure that is so wonderfully epi-ish. It's NOT the
destination, but the journey that makes it all worthwhile."
BertiWretched grumbled, "Well, we at least need to get something to eat as I, for one,
was expecting a delicious dinner and dessert at the hacienda."
Lucilla, looking very sneaky indeed, grasped her backpack closer to her leather-garbed
chest as she did NOT want anyone to sneak a peek and spoke not a word while Joimus cast
an eye hungrily in
her direction.
part 2...by Jo
It was, you know, quite some problem as to how to feed the 1531 CroweWomen, not
to
mention the characters, as they headed northward through the inlets and fjords of
southernmost South America , straight into the Andes, whose reaches were not famous
for great pasta. Thank goodness Lucilla's dinner had been a movable feast and many of
the protagonists had had the foresight to pop some peacock eyeballs and sawdust ravioli
into their backpacks. Why, if they limited themselves to an eighth of an eyeball a day...
they would almost have food enough to last them into the Argentine Pampas where they
could then hijack the lunches
of unwary gauchos.
Jo, being the bossiest of all the CroweWomen, was walking with the recovered Maximus
since BertiLuv had reattached her to his ribcage most bountifully in the last epi. She
was worried, though, about Juditha but soon noticed that she and the captain had been
getting along quite well and even Lucilla didn't seem, in her private thoughts, to mind all
that much if now Juditha ate the raspberry pie and Jo dined on brownies. Jo had fasted
from Maximus for 39 whole epis and found she was...er...hungry. Her pale yellow gossamer gown was not the best outfit for crossing the southern Andes, so Maximus reached out his
left arm and pulled her close to his side, his rust-colored cape wrapping about them both.
For, you see, now that he was fully himself again, the blue tunic had been replaced...one
has no idea how these things happen in epis, but they just do....by his full General of the
Armies of the North regalia. Jo beamed! HOW she loved him like that! No character
before and none after, would be quite so perfectly grand. If any barbarians lurked in
the mountain passes, they had better watch out....."the"
General was coming their way!
BertiGrumblebucket and her Bud came up beside them. "My FEET!" Berti grumbled grumblingly. "We've only been walking for one and a quarter epis and already the sole
of my elegant crimson evening shoe has been rockily pierced!!! I DEMAND the
immediate attentions of the Boxkeeper!"
"Why, BertiLame, " Jo replied sweetly, "In all 39 epis of Lucilla's Party...did you ever
see or hear of the Boxkeeper even once?"
BertiLate, who had been somewhat tardy in her arrival, had to admit that she was right.
"But where is the Boxkeeper NOW?" she moaned. "Why can't we be swooped up and
dumped out NOW like we used to be???"
Jo continued, "Well, BertiWhine, from what I was given to understand, the Boxkeeper is already in Chicago, keeping that single seat in the concert hall warm. I think that leaves
us pretty much on our own this go round."
BertiMad's eyes narrowed as she stomped off mumbling, "Came all the way from Louisiana
for
THIS??? Got up outta my sick bed for THIS???"
Jo sighed...you just couldn't please some Peeps, now could you. A perfectly decent walk
across the most difficult terrain in the world...not to mention the piranhas and water snakes
a bit further up the hike...and some women in evening shoes just hadda go and find fault!
Sheesh!
Biebe smiled as they crossed the snowline...it was so like home!!! And he did, of course, have
that large dead black bear draped over his skull to keep him warm.
Unlike, alas, poor Leah who was attempting to stand a-tiptoe in her bare feet with only a
pink bath towel to wear for the entire journey. It was, though, because she had gone and
asked to be with Steve, you know. She had only herself to blame as every Peep knew that
Steve would end up in bathtub scenes. It wouldn't be quite so bad, Leah thought, if only
the black vultures would stay a little further back and
stop with all that ridiculous smiling.
Diz was eyeing Zack with great suspicion. Either the agent was doing his Jeffrey imitation
or else he had stuffed bananas under his shirt whilst up the tree during penguin reconnaissance
( a not-easily-spelled word). The captain of the golden barge in its brief pre-transmogrification days had a sharp eye for such things. She well remembered how Hando had hoarded all the
dead rats for himself.
Ute, too, was thinking the same thing. She knew her Jeffrey's torso well and had no recall
of noting such well-defined ridges where his abs would have been had he actually had them.
She lay in wait for the unwary agent behind a large rock, and sprang upon him suddenly, ripping his shirt open, sending buttons flying hither and yon into the snow. Yellow fruit
fell out...lots of yellow fruit. Jeffrey grabbed a banana hungrily, shook soy sauce all over it, eating it peeling and all.
Zack had the grace to blush...which redness, of course, could not be seen beneath his fur.
Susan was appalled!! "Ute!" she cried furiously, "You have debuttoned my character!!!"
(And you thought the appallation was concerning the bananas, didn't you! Peeps, you see,
tend toward possessiveness. Just ask the Bert woman.)
Bud stepped between the two women. "Enough!" he shouted. "No in-fighting amongst the
Peeps!!"
Andrea's eyes narrowed. The cop thought only the male characters got to fight, now did
he?? She formed a large snowball, taking an extra moment to decide whether or not to
encase a rock within it and deciding not as, after all, the cop DID have a certain appeal to
her more brutish nature...that nature that seemed more evident after certain vile Peeps
had imposed unsought their musical tastes upon her...and taking careful aim, popped the
copper one right on his left ear.
He roared as he turned, looking for a chair back to dismember, but finding, alas, none there
at the base of the giant glacier that, strangely, seemed to be chugging right along in a rather disturbing manner quite contrary to the general behavior of glaciers.
"Look out for the calves!" screamed Egan.
Calves? thought Shannon, immediately thinking of her missing, flanneled one and his love for
all things bovine. Calves? Here on this snowplain with the large chunks of glacierface breaking off and crumbling down like that. Calves?
"RUN!!!" Egan shouted again.. "The glacier is calving!!! RUN!"
Now that was just too silly. However could a river of ice give birth to a baby cow...even in
an epi??
Egan tackled her about the knees and slid several thousand yards across the ice with her just
as a giant ice chunk crashed where she had been standing.
"Wow! What a great move!" Biebe said admiringly.
Egan helped Shannon to her feet. Her blue and white checked flannel gown had numerous
new rips and tears. She smiled. Rusty would be SO pleased next he saw her! Why, they
matched even better now! Her reverie was interrupted by...
Part 3...Jo
Juditha, shielding her eyes, and remarking, "It has become suddenly very bright, don't
you think?" Indeed, all the Peeps narrowed their eyes, not for any demonstration of plot emotion, but because they had trekked to the border of the SunGoddess' domain where
the golden orb itself was chained to the big Stone of Doom atop the Temple of the Sun.
"This looks like a nice place to stop and rest," ventured BertiDim not terribly brightly. We
have come to know this about fair Berti, who, once having become the possessor of the Bud character, was now casting sidelong longing glances at Captain Jack, which personage she
seems to have forgotten has been the stalwart comforter of lovely Juditha ever since this
very same BertiChange reattached Jo to Maximus' side. BertiLust, you see, was quite fond
of ALL the characters... being more of a smorgasbord, salad bar, shish kebab sorta lass than
a sit-down dinner gal. She had even been known to prance about Crowedom using the nom
de Bert of "Bertimus" from time to time...an appellation given to her in Bud -defense by a
wary
liberrian in years gone by.
This digression was interrupted by the arrival at the border of the SunGoddess herself,
reclining within a golden litter carried by 896 male meerkats, each with his own helmet, breastplate, and tiny golden codpiece. Jack, being the most golden of all the characters, approached and gave the lady a sweeping bow, his ponytail making a slight swishing sound
as it flipped over his left shoulder.
The SunGoddess studied his golden epaulettes and many golden buttons with approval. The golden orb glinted on the long strands of his golden mane, encircling his head with a warm
glow. In the kingdom there was no SunKing and the SunGoddess had awaited a worthy mate
for many years. She sat there in her golden litter, thinking consortial thoughts...not to
mention conjugal ones.
Maximus narrowed his eyes in a demonstration of plot emotion. This was not good. His
second-in-command was in danger of a captain-napping of the most nefarious sort. He
scanned his troops...er...the Peeps as they stood there in mass shock. Not only had they
not gotten their buffet feast at the hacienda, not gotten their Fuegan TOFOG concert and
were having to trek for several thousands of miles in evening shoes to get to Chicago, but
NOW the very survival of the November 14th opening of Master and Commander was in
grave danger...and all because Jack was standing there in his TWPs looking so darned GOLDEN to the SunGoddess!!
Stepping out of her litter, the SunGoddess, mistress of all she surveyed and she was currently surveying Jack, strode towards the still-bowing Captain. A strange smile curved her lips, revealing her two rows of golden teeth, as she said,
part 7...by Jo
...."Lift up your head, O GoldenMan, that I might behold your countenance."
Jack straightened from his bow, raising his eyelashes of doom and revealing seagreen eyes
with depths deeper than the Mariana Trench. The SunGoddess gasped in delight and awe
and that overwhelming feeling of a moment well-spent as when you are standing at your
screen door and actually let a buzzing fly OUT rather than in.
Brushing back a wandering strand of long golden hair that had loosened from his ponytail,
he made the grave error in judgment of then smiling at the lady encased in flowing golden
veils. Jo saw the narrowing of the eyes of the goddess and knew Jack was a gonner...that he
had without doubt been found perfect for SunKinghood.
"Maximus!" she cried, the memories of pink sponge not all that far behind her, "DO
SOMETHING!"
Maximus whipped off his deep brown leather backpack, withdrew a 4-in-one scanner,
copier, printer, fax machine from its depths, plugged it into a conveniently-placed outlet
that just happened to be in the grass beside his left boot, grabbed Jack, swooped him face-
first into the scanning flap, then stood the somewhat discombulated captain back on his feet.
This was followed by a couple of minutes of furious button-pushing.
"Ah!" sighed Maximus in satisfaction (a sound heretofore heard only by the Jo, of course!!!)
as he turned back, at last, to the captain, folding him in half and sticking him behind Juditha.
He unfurled before the eyes of the SunGoddess the new M&C poster, first having flipped
Jack's image and darkened it considerably, making the eyes themselves appear almost black,
not seagreen at all. The goddess studied it intently. Where had all the goldenness gone? It was
a fine poster, she would give it that, but it seemed strangely flipped and dark. Was this the
real Jack, she wondered? He was far too dark to be a SunKing!!! (Note: Aubrey's face IS
flipped on the official M&C poster.)
Her eyes cast around over the various assembled characters just as a beam from the golden
orb glinted off the hairless dome of Hando's head. The sparkle returned to her eyes. Perhaps
her consort might yet be found amongst this motley crew. She needed more time to check out
the possibilities.
Addressing Maximus, she asked slyly, "And where might this mighty herd of females and characters be headed?"
Bertothy piped up brightly, "We are off to the Emerald City to rescue the PrinceWizard
before mid...."
She was interrupted by Jo's elbow stabbing her in the ribs and the low hiss, "BertiLost!
That was the LAST epi-plot!"
Lucilla then spoke up. "If I may be so bold, Your Goddessship. We are but poor refugees
from a blue nanogoo eruption in Fuego and are on our way in our evening shoes to Chicago
to see TOFOG in concert."
Now THAT made sense to the goddess!!! She smiled as her brain whirled with various plot devices. Finally she said, "Might I join you on your trek? I, too, would like to stand before
this TOFOG group and, perhaps, I will give myself something I've never seen before."
And....thusly it was that the SunPerson herself came to join
in the Starless Trek.
Keeping the rising sun always on his right cheek mole, Maximus led them ever northward.
Not all that many weeks later, they arrived at the vast expanse of the Pampas just as scattered clumps of weary gauchos lit their campfires and settled down for the night. Amandamus licked her lips. She was hungry. She had eaten the last 1/8 of her last mustard-glazed peacock eyeball
3 days earlier. Bud's tummy growled...a deep, low rumbly growl. The liberrian wouldn't let
him break the backs off chairs any more, so he held a milking stool leg gripped tightly in his
fist.
Hando slipped a knife out of its sheath inside his boot. Rose's knuckles were white from how tightly she held her hockey stick. Sally was fashioning a slingshot for her puck. annsmac was tending and tending and tending to Terry's equipment. Nash's fingers were flipping the push-
pins in his pocket over and
over. What a truly violent group this was!!! Juditha, who had spent the first
week of their journey after the SunGoddess had joined them in unfolding Jack in
easy stages, was appalled. Surely there had to be some other way of getting food
from the gauchos than viciously attacking them with pushpins! But what WAS it?
Her eyes widened in the moonlight as she thought of a plan. She....
part 8...by
annsmac
"What IS she
doing?" annsmac whispered to Terry.
He shook his head
sadly. "Afraid she's up to the old Nemothian Adrovus Maneuver. Mate,
you'd think
she's have learned something from the last time that was tried."
Shaking her head
in agreement, annsmac asked, "Maybe we should warn her? I mean the
last time
someone tried that little trick to get enough food to feed the masses, it really
backfired."
Ah, yes. Who
could forget that occasion? A young, overly ambitious
Sergeant of the Cadre
of the South Seas had faced just such a situation as our intrepid Peeps/Characters. He was
in charge of a flock of 10,000 seagulls and had forgotten the old saying that Maximus knew
too well:
an army travels on its … hmmm. What was that saying?
"A navy sails
upon its fleetest whispers," Lucky Jack said, trying to be helpful.
Jo shook her
head. "No. I don't think that's it at all. Maximus, what's that saying?"
Lucky Jack,
looking embarrassed, cleared his throat and said, "No, that is not just the
thing,
is it? No, what I meant to say is that a piece of bread, a jug of wine
and the foot soldiers of the world are like pools of ambrosia."
He smiled his sunny
smile and the Peeps tried not to laugh. However, a few of the characters were
not so kind to our sweet and brave and beautiful Captain.
Terry said, "You
sure that's the saying, mate? Wasn't it something more like this: a trip of a
thousand miles begins with a song in your heart?"
"Actually, I
believe he might have been meaning to say something more like this: the Lord
provides for those who lead the blind," Cort said. VileSue had her hands over
her mouth,
trying hard not to laugh that vile bawdy laugh of hers.
All would be lost
if VileSue laughed that laugh. For BertiGiggly would not be able to contain
herself. She always laughed when VileSue laughed that certain laugh. And from
there, we all knew the same thing would happen: first Andrea, then annsmac, then
Juditha, then Lucilla,
then … on down the line until Jo would find herself
laughing as well. It was just that contagious of a laugh.
Ah, but Maximus
knew what would happen and he stepped forward, shoved one of his big hands over
VileSue's mouth, and quickly tried to establish order. "The saying, my friends,
is one I do know well. It is … an army travels …"
But Lucky Jack
suddenly snapped his fingers and roared out, "I have got it! Ah, yes, just the
thing. Where is Dr. Maturin? He will be so impressed with my wit. Here is what
it is: an army travels once if by land and twice if by sea. There!
"An army travels
on its stomach, Jack, my sweet but adage-mangling Captain," said Juditha.
A large gasp
raced through the Peeps and the Characters. Juditha had done it! She had
procured a meal of rare rabuttonajola for the entire horde! Such a delicacy! No
one had dared hope for it. But fair Juditha was turning out to be such a jewel.
A huntress! "There is nothing
to beat roast rabuttonajola meat," Juditha said,
smiling shyly at the impressed group. "And, Terry, for your information, I did
not use the Nemothian Adrovus Maneuver. No. Instead, I simply relied on my
feminine wiles. Well, that and Lucilla's MasterCard. It's accepted everywhere.
The gauchos were happy to accept it as payment. Now, let's get dinner cooked."
At that, all the
Peeps and Characters jumped into action to get the necessary fires started to
roast the succulent, rare meat. They scattered hither and yon to gather wood and
kindling
and …
Actually? This
was not such a good thing as it turned out. Why? Because you just know that
scattered Peeps and Characters often get … um … distracted and forget to return
in a timely fashion.
One such couple
was none other than … annsmac and Terry. It was, after all, time for more
equipment tending. annsmac was very dedicated to Terry's … equipment. So
dedicated, in
fact, that there was not need for any other tenders. She dismissed the capital "A's" from
Terry-tending duty. They had the fake Terry they could tend to; all they had to do was go
back about six episodes and grab him up. Then they could bring him
forward to any future episode they wished.
"Well, now I
think that's rather heartless of you, luv," Terry whispered in her ear as she
lovingly tended his … equipment.
"Perhaps it is.
But BertiBad challenged me to dispatch with them several episodes ago and I
felt this was the easiest way. No muss, no fuss," annsmac said bravely. She looked around at
the gathering darkness and said a little epi-writer prayer. "I just
hope it works. Maybe they won't notice?"
"Not notice
they're no longer on my team?" Terry mused. "Dunno, annsmac. But it's worth a
try."
And it's a really
good thing they tried it when they did. Because the next thing the Peeps and
Characters knew, something else was happening elsewhere! Yes! I kid you not! And
what was
it? Well, obviously, it was …
part 9...by Jo
....the deafening roar of the multitudinous sections of the mighty Iguaçu Falls.
Buggie's
eyes narrowed as she stood in the billowing white mist, gazing up and up and up at the
wet boulders in her path...and nary a swan-feather basket within a thousand miles or so.
This being in an epi business was getting rather...er... trying... to say the least!!!
The large net full of Spanish armor on her back didn't really help matters along, either!
She sighed. *SIGH* The current epi writer had obviously veered off into the script of The Mission or somesuch which had nothing at all to do with Russell except that Liam Neeson
meets his doom going over these very falls in a teensy boat and our very own Peep, Ute, has
a "thing" for Mr. Neeson and that may well be how this ended up in a Russell epi but one
can't really be actually positive now can one?
"Ahem!" It was Jo, clearing her throat, cleverly dodging the orange and
yellow-quilled
arrows as she played haunting melodies on her flute all the while preparing to deliver a somewhat unwelcome, albeit necessary, speech to the effect that said wide, many-partitioned waterfall happened to lay rather directly in their path...er...line of march...towards Chicago
and that Mr. Neeson's demise aside, it must be scaled, and scaled up the misty, wet, slippery, pathless rocks at that!!!
Buggie's eyes narrowed to near slits as she studied the perfectly perpendicular height. Not
even a wobbly rope ladder dangled limply down! It had been hard enough, she mused,
stumbling in her 4" pink satin heels through the trackless forests of northeastern Argentina
with the 982 pounds of armor on her back...but THIS...how could a sweet Peep like herself
be expected to attain so high a brink?
"Rink? Did I hear someone think 'rink'?"
Biebe chortled as he came up beside her.
"BRINK! John, brink!!! As in top edge of the waterfall?"
Biebe was crestfallen in his disappointment. Buggie sighed again. She had been counting on
his help in the difficult climb, but with his crest all fallen like that, she didn't see HOW
either one of them could manage.
Biebe frowned. If only his Peep had not come home early and found him helping
Sally
repaint her puck. Buggie had been furious and had ripped the corner off Sally's TOFOG ticket...a sin so heinous that she had been forced to carry the netted burden of the armor
until she could transfer the plot into some sort of semblance of a Russell movie which would
be a whole LOT easier once they had arrived in Mexico, let me tell you!!!
"Are you SURE Russell never played a gaucho or a waterfall tour guide or a missionary
Jesuit in one of his early Australian films?" she asked the Sun- Goddess desperately.
The SunGoddess knew all there was to be known about Russell movies... knowledge gotten
from her research into possible future SunKings, you see. The SunGoddess nodded
negatively, saying, "Well, he did play a Welsh Baptist virgin once and he was in that Brides
of Christ miniseries for almost 20 minutes. Do those count?"
The SunGoddess had not noticed how Diz stepped quickly in front of Egan and Beck did
likewise with East. They were both rather gaucho-like, were they not, and neither Peep
wanted her character to be waylaid by heavily-burdened plot-nappers. But, alas...or
maybe 'alas' may prove not to be the right word...it was too late and a small herd of horses
in terrible need of bathing and wrangling suddenly appeared in the waters at the base of
the waterfall...and all was lost. Well, clothing was, at least.
As was Buggie's netted armor since she had successfully transferred the epiplot back to a
Russell movie...after a
fashion...well, with no fashions, now, were there?
The 3 white angels exchanged happy glances as they thought thoughts of a good
Cort-wetting. Sue, the SometimesButNotAlwaysVile, however, liked her cowboy dry
with his hair all fluffed and swingy. And that was just in his armpits. So
she...
Starless Trek 9.5 by Cyd (Every once in a while, the epis would be ruthlessly hijacked...
usually
by evilCyd. This is another such incident.)
Evil Captain
Cydrup (See: Where No Character Has Gone Before, to which Cyd has returned)
activated the cloaking device as the ship warped out
of orbit, leaving the
planet Puck and it's multitudinous Welsh Baptist virgins far behind. With a
full load of freshly painted pucks in
its
cargo hold, the
Federation would turn a nice profit at the next Ferengi trading post.
Little did the
crew know what was lurking in the evil captain's quarters as she turned over
the bridge to the first Lieutenant DataPug and her evil Klingon cohort, the vicious
Commander SunGoddess, and called a meeting in the captain's ready-room. Lt. Sal,
Ensign Buggie, and the Romulan defector Lt. Ute gathered closely as the door whooshed
shut. Then a shout of jubilation engulfed the sealed room at their full realization of their
success in their ploy to capture the great Captain
Jack and his surgeon, Bones Maturin! "Where are they?" they shouted in
unison.
"They are safe,"
the Klingon commander Cydrup spoke quietly, bat'leth in hand. It would
not do for them to know the full truth, she thought as she kept the weapon visible and ready. The sharp steel glistened as Cydrup quietly issued individual orders. "When we arrive at
the Ferengi station, the traders must not suspect our real
cargo. Ute will handle trade negotiations. You will accept nothing less that
four strips of gold-plated platinum for each painted puck."
"Aye captain!"
the striking Romulan woman spoke emphatically, "but I want my chance
with
Maturin!"
"Be patient,
young one," Cydrup laughed. "He is not yet ready for a Romulan female. He
needs stamina. We must rehabilitate him slowly after years of combing long,
fluffy armpit
hair."
The captain spoke
quietly, "Lt. Sal and Ensign Buggie, we will need all your experience in covert
operations to distract the evil android Joimus and her clones. They will be
disguised
as Ferengi, and our tricorders will not register their presence since they have no biosigns."
The captain swung the gleaming bat'leth and brought it
down hard on the conference table, splitting it cleanly in half. "I must have
my revenge!" she shouted. "When you find the evil Joimus, the kill will be
MINE!!!"
"To your posts!
And remember," she whispered, "the crew must suspect nothing." The
group departed the ready-room and returned to their postsas the captain left the bridge.
As Capt. Cydrup entered her quarters, her usual spartan furnishings had been replaced with
leg irons, chains, and leather straps. Capt. Aubrey and Bones Maturin mumbled muffled protests through their leather gagging, to no avail. Arms tied above their heads, their long
fluffy armpit hairs stood at attention as the captain stroked them softly.... "Remember, I am
but one strike away from de-fluffing you both if you do not submit to me." She whispered
closely into Aubrey's ear as she plucked the steely edge of the bat'leth. "I must know the location of the evil Joimus' cloning operation, and you will tell me...eventually.... but, first... "
*********
(Why, Cydrup, I didn't know ya was even reading 'em!!! Now I shall be all inspired to put
YOU in the midst of some terrible, horrible, no good, very bad plot device. Chortle! Chortle!!!
I needed some fresh meat!!!
Jo)
part 10...by Jo
(see end of 9) spread her leathery black wings above him as a canopy and
together they
ascended the wet boulders, watched by 3 sets of very, very narrowed eyes, I might add.
Sue would have smiled at Cort were it not for the fact that she had the exposed portion of a
root clutched between her teeth. She would have been better able to use her hands to aid
the climb if she had only removed them from the person of the parson. But she was all too
aware of the 3 pairs of eyes and not about to let him slip and fall onto the trampoline they
were so hopefully holding at the base of the falls.
She was about halfway up and had only lost 5 of her upper and 3 of her lower teeth when
she came upon a wide crevice with blue steam wisping out of its depths. Peering into it with
her one eye that was still able to open after that slight avalanche she had only been able to
divert with her lids, she saw a strange form crouched over a small cauldron...a form she had
not encountered since she and the Cydlothian Cydrup had plotted evil plots in that long ago Trek that DID have a Star.
This time the Cydrup was dressed entirely in blue. Her hair and lashes were also blued. She
was concentrating intently on the contents of the cauldron. Sue's curiosity was piqued.
"Wait here," she admonished Cort, plopping him astride a protruding boulder, and entering
the crevice.
Approaching Cyd, she noted the woman's eyes reflected the irridescent blueishness of
whatever was burbling in the cauldron. "Cyd!" she called out, startling the Cydrup, who dropped the cauldron. It rolled out the crevice, dumping its contents into the waterfall
which carried them down to the base of the falls where the other Peeps and characters
were engaged in bathing and wrangling activities.
In some fascination, the two Peeps watched as the nanogoo spread itself in concentric rings
upon the surface of the waters, coating all the bathers in blue streaks until they all looked
quite a part of William Wallace's army of underwearless Scots.
"Uh-oh!" remarked Cyd sagely. "I think we just took away their freedom."
Sue was so interested in the sight that it took a while for her to query, "Whatever do you
mean, Cyd 6.7?"
Cyd, you see, had been taking Sid lessons for many years and had graduated long ago to full
6.7 status on the evility charts. This, in itself, did not bode well for the hapless Peeps and characters even now attempting to wipe off the blue goo but only succeeding in spreading
it more thoroughly about their personages. Cyd grinned. "Wait...and you will see," she
replied with great satisfaction. "This is even better than I'd planned for them!!"
Cyd was especially interested in watching Jo, who seemed to have gotten in the thick of the
goo. "Oh, THIS will be FUN!" Cyd chortled.
Jo's eyes, already blue, were steadily becoming bluer. Her happy, open smile of Maximus-appreciation was transforming itself into something much more accurately described as..as...
a leer!!!
Sue's eyes widened. Wow! she thought. Jo...leering...this WOULD be different!!! Her eyes scanned the entire scene in delight. What WAS that Pat and Alex were doing with that
fedora??
"Look!" Cyd cried, pointing to where annsmac was heaping handfuls of blue goo atop
Terry's equipment...and, by golly, he was letting her, too! Sue had the good sense to
shudder. What, she wondered, effect would that have on the famous equipment?
Hando, however, was sitting on the bank, his feet soaking in the blue, as he wove daisy
chains for Andrea's hair. "What?" Sue exclaimed. "Why is he doing THAT??"
"It's simple, really," Cyd explained happily. "The goo has changed them all into the opposite
of their own natures." She continued, "And if you need further proof...just look at that!" She pointed to where Susan Guildford had tossed aside her poppy chalice and was holding Zack's head underwater to see how long he could live.
Charles, coated in blue, was plainly visible to everyone but Nash. Eryn was shaving off
Colin's sideburns with a blunt rock. Jeffrey was puffing on a cigar, Steve was making a
lifetime commitment to Leah, why...all of Peepdom had been turned on its ear!
It was horrible...unless you were Cyd or Sue, that is.
Juditha had been, however, late arriving at the falls, occupied as she had been with getting
the last of the wrinkles out of poor folded Jack. She came upon the scene just as Maximus
was backing away from Jo, genuine fear in his seagreen eyes. It was too much...far, FAR
too much!!! Maximus afraid??
Being the wise and perspicacious woman she is, stout of heart and all that, she instantly discerned the cause of the personality switch. She reached into her pocket. Would it still
be there among the emeralds? Ah, yes, it was! Her fingers curled in deadly determination around Maximus' signal arrow lighter. She had carried it ever since discovering it
abandoned on the ground of the faux emerald mine atop the tallest of the now-melted
Towers of Pain. Swiftly she knelt, touching its flame to the surface of the goowaters.
Flickering blue flames spread instantly across the river, incinerating all traces of blue goo
and leaving only the clear, pure waters at the base of the falls once again.
annsmac shook her head. What had happened? Where was she and why were there ashes
on Terry's hot equipment? She had never seen it so in need of immediate tending! Why
was Hando stomping on those daisies like that? Why was Zack gasping for breath while
Susan dripped tears on her poppy as she scooped it tenderly back into the chalice? It was
all too confusing!
Up in the crevice, Cyd shrugged. "Well, it may have been short...but it was still good, eh!"
Sue just smiled with what teeth she still possessed, turned back to Cort and continued with
him up to the top of the falls. Yes, it had been good...but she would always wonder what her
dry parson would have been like with a coating of goo.
Dressed in full evening attire again and all atop the falls, our intrepid trekkers veered
northwest toward Bolivia and Lake Titicaca. Maximus could not help but smile. The thought
of building boats of straw to cross the famous lake brought memories of wheat fields flooding back to him.
Lucilla, however, knew that the food supply was completely gone and that now the...er... doctored pies and brownies would be all there was to eat. She daydreamed of Juditha and
Jo munching away, completely, alas, forgetting Cort's stated passion for raspberry pie...a passion that would obviously lead to unforeseen disaster.
"Hungry?" she said brightly, looking at Jo.
Jo replied....."
part 11...by Jo
The evil Cydrup, hijacking our tremulous trekkers from their route to Bolivia
via the Neutral Zone in a valiant, tho vain, effort to force Joimus to reveal
the secret location of various plot devices which shall remain nameless, had the
bal...er... temerity actually to put fingers to keyboard and type thusly her
epiending:
"As Capt. Cydrup entered her quarters, her usual Spartan furnishings had been
replaced
with leg irons, chains, and leather straps. Capt. Aubrey and Bones Maturin mumbled muffled protests through their leather gagging, to no avail. Arms tied above their heads, their long
fluffy armpit hairs stood at attention as the captain stroked them softly.... "Remember, I am
but one strike away from de-fluffing you both if you do not submit to me." She whispered
closely into
Aubrey's ear as she plucked the steely edge of the bat'leth. "I must know
the location of the evil Joimus' cloning operation, and you will tell
me...eventually.... but, first... "
****************
....we must ascertain the good and kind and faithful Jo's response to Lucilla's
question
regarding the state of her appetite. "Hungry?" Lucilla asked brightly.
Jo replied in that tender, gentle, ladylike manner of hers that bore absolutely NO resemblance to any evil Joimus of outerspace doings, that she was, for the moment, quite full from the bark she had been nibbling off twigs as they crossed Paraguay diagonally.
Lucilla frowned. Were they not supposed to be totally devoid of all edibles at this point,
making the raspberry pies and brownies the only choice? Had not even Jo herveryself typed
as much in the epi she was obviously blissfully writing even as the Cydrup was threatening
de-fluffication of important crew members?
Cyd WOULD have to be dealt with, of course...but there was that matter of the pies needing immediate attention. It required attention, you see, fair reader.... and Cyd, because Cort's bellybutton had been rubbing for some days against his spinal column and he was, in fact,
drawn like a veritable moth to the flame of the raspberryness within Lucilla's golden
backpack.
Sue was sitting on a cactus stump, polishing her left wing (Sue always was a bit of a left-
winger, you know), and she failed to notice that Cort had wandered away in the gathering twilight and was even now stealthily unvelcroing Lucilla's backpack. There were several
pies in there, but he just quickly grabbed the top one...the one with
the crust replica of the captain's bunk, which, you may recall, Lucilla had made
specially for Jo in the days of pink sponge compactation.
He tiptoed behind a nearby alpaca which was squatting on a hummock and, using his bare hands, devoured the entire pie. Lucilla, looking for alpaca dung for the fire, happened by
just as he was licking the empty pie plate. She was aghast!! Dropping her armload of dung,
she leapt upon the cowboy, beating his stomach with both fists in an effort to create a need
for upchuckiness within him.
Sue, of course, was done with her left wing polishing, and happened to stroll by just at that moment. The Vile One could hardly believe her eyes! How DARE Lucilla, hostess or not,
beat upon the cowboy in such a manner...especially with alpaca dung still redolent upon
her digits???
Lucilla turned at the sharp sound of Sue's leather wings snapping into battle position. Sue
was advancing toward her, whip uncoiling as she came.
NO!" shouted Lucilla, "it's not what it looks like, Sue!"
"Noooooo?" Sue replied, her scarlet lips curling into a snarl.
"He ate it!" Lucilla shrieked. "He ate ALL of it!!!"
Sue paused. So what if Cort had been a bit greedy. She had been known to demonstrate that
vice herself on more than one occasion....especially where cowboy possession was the issue.
"You don't understand!!" Lucilla moaned. "The pie...it was for Jo."
So, thought Sue, gazing across the encampment where Jo was brushing out the fauxfur tangles
in Maximus' cape (while he was wearing it, of course!), Jo could do without a bit of pie.
Lucilla was continuing her mumbling. "The pie..he ate the entire pie!" She hadn't meant to commit characteracide. She had only wanted to bump off Jo...oh, and Juditha, of course...and
a few other guests...but not a character, especially not one so lovely both wet or dry.
Cort, meanwhile, was lying there in the dust, his cheeks and lips bright raspberry red, not
to mention all the raspberry seeds lodged under his fingernails. The other Peeps and
characters were gathering around them, curious as to what was transpiring...or was that
who was expiring? Even Sue was beginning to suspect that something unusual was going
on concerning the pie devouring. Was her Cort in danger of character termination?
She dropped to her knees on the other side of the cowboy from Lucilla, gazing with concern
into his face. Where was Dr. Maturin when you really needed him? I'll TELL you where!
He was strung up beside Aubrey aboard the Cydlothian vessel in imminent danger of armpit
de-fluffication, that's where!
"JO!" shouted Sue, knowing that this was where she must, alas, turn in order to restore
ma'at to the epi. That Jo, she just loved ma'at restoration...so she trotted right over.
"Yes," she replied. "Is there some divine order that needs to be put in place?"
Sue bit her lip. It was hard for her to ask...but Cort needed medical attention. "Jo," Sue continued in her least-Vile manner, "You must board the Cydlothian vessel where the
Cydrup has kidnapped Aubrey and Maturin and bring them back to Paraguay right away...
else the DustyOne may lose his battle with the pie."
Jo understood immediately and ran quickly to her own pale yellow gossamer backpack to
pull out her laptop. She began typing furiously and within 20 seconds was aboard the vessel,
her transbeamer tucked securely in her bra.
Captain Cyd was plucking the steely edge of her bat'leth thingie as she threatened the two captives with the unspeakable horrors of de-fluffication. There was no time to lose! Jo's
fingers fairly flew across the keyboard as she raised her transbeamer and pointed it toward
the captain and the doctor.
As a golden sparkly mist formed around their forms, Cyd 6.7 turned and saw Joimus.
Juditha had saved her from the blue goo at the base of the waterfall, but Juditha was not
here now. As the two men disappeared from the Cydrup's quarters, the two women faced
one another, circling like panthers. Both wore pleased grins. This encounter had been a
long time in coming. So much had happened since those days when they had played together
as children in the gardens of the Presidential Palace in Des Moines. They had had the same fencing master, the same training in fly fishing and origami.
Once again, Jo tossed the train of her gossamer gown over her left arm then leapt to the top
of Cyd's Westinghouse Manacle Machine, typing furiously all the while. Cyd gripped her bat'leth so tightly that her knuckles whitened. Her eyes narrowed. The keyboard! Joimus
had come armed with her keyboard! She knew her bat'leth thingamabob was no match for
a fully charged keyboard.
She glanced to the side. Could she make it to the escape hatch before Joimus could finish
typing the paragraph? Alas...no...she couldn't. And, so it was, that Cyd became one of the trekkers without stars amongst the alpacas of Paraguay that evening in which the cowboy
ate the pie with the replica in crust of the captain's bunk.
She frowned. Four-inch blue satin heels! Ark! She had been put in 4" blue satin heels!!! This
was revenge in the extreme! And there were flounces and lace and netting all over her low-
cut, high-slit gown! What a come-down for a Klingon warrior woman! Well, just let them THINK they had tamed her! Heh! Heh! There was, you know, that old line about revenge
and cold.
Meanwhile, Maturin was plopping leeches all over Cort's stomach and they were sucking
out the raspberry juice then rolling off, quite dead, into the dust.
Everyone's eyes narrowed as they stared en masse at their former hostess. What HAD she wrought in her kitchen? Lucilla's eyes darted back and forth as she plotted what to say to
take suspicion off herself. "Why," she began, "I...
part 12...by Lucilla
can't believe you ate that pie all by yourself!" Then she began to look at Sue,
"This is all your fault. Look how he behaves! You two are shameless! He's a
thief...he stole it right out of my backpack. Nevermind everybody around here is
starving and him not sharing one bite."
Lucilla stomped
off to find Jo, and yelled over her shoulder, "I hope you have a belly ache for
days! That was Jo's surprise pie!"
The transformation that came over Sue as she tried to contain her anger started to brim over
as she
realized that she was in trouble yet again. Her wings spread out and....
part 13...by Jo
enfolded Cort as the color gradually came back into his face. That Lucilla!
Always trying to
shift the blame! Well, Sue would attend to that matter later... right now her cowboy needed
her tender ministrations. Sue flipped the last of the dead leeches off his belly before helping
him to his feet. Thank goodness Jo had been able to write Maturin back into Paraguay in
time. Sue had to admit the leeches he used were ever so much more medically advanced a method of treatment than the stomachectomy she had been contemplating doing with her
nail file....and much less...er...messy. Why...how would she EVER have gotten her file clean enough again for further filing? Her nails would have become rough and nicked. She could
not have gone on had that been the case!
The moon had risen and Sue could make out the forms of the 3 white angels lurking not far away. They were obviously growing restless as they had not gotten much of a storyline of
late. Sue frowned. You could never trust an epi writer. She had learned that painful lesson
well. Why, one of them was probably even now cooking up some terrible twist that would
entrust the cowboy into their care once again! She folded her leather wings even more
tightly about her character of choice. He was hers! HERS! And no one could take him.
NO ONE!
Leaving Sue to think such thoughts, hopeless as they inevitably would prove, the focus of
the story centers in on ....hmmmm?......Andrea and Hando. Hando was seated on a low, flat
rock while Andrea was inserting long, slender cactus spines here and there into his tattoos.
Lest you think the Londoner heartless, this was being done at the request of the young Melbourne lad in an effort to bestir his inner anger after the daisy-weaving earlier in the afternoon. He was finding it hard to recover from the concept that he had actually behaved so....so....terribly .....sweetly.
Arthur stood not far away in the shadows, watching this activity and remembering Andrea
on the beaches of Wales with the branding iron. Yes, he loved the Welshwoman....he truly did....but despite that, a fellow really needed to keep one eye open at all times in her
presence. He studied the smile that played about the corners of her lips as she chose a particularly long thorn. Yes, indeedy...the woman had to be carefully watched! His fingers
toyed with the piece of dried brown seaweed he had carefully pressed in the ancient copy
of the Book of Kells that he carried in his backpack. He kissed it tenderly. Had it not been
on her very
person...lodged so provocatively between her toes??? Ah...the Welsh! Strange
folk....but cute.
The sound of poetry being quoted in a deep voice came from the top of a small mound
nearby. Was it Lachlan entertaining his bonnie Sarah? No....it was Corbett, whom Phyllis
had determinedly advanced as far as Lachlanism in her training program to get him up
to Aubreyishness. She hoped to be up to BudLite by the time they swam the
Panama Canal crosswise.
A blanket had been spread in a level spot and upon it annsmac was engaged in serious equipment tending. She had been quite upset at the sight of Terry's equipment after the
flames had burnt off its coating of blue goo. Never in all the history of his equipment...not
in all its uses in helicopter hanging, plunging Peep rescuing, opening locked gateways and
so forth...never once had it been.... scorched!!!
Behind a large bolder, completely hidden in the shadows, a figure quietly opened its back-
pack. Reaching inside, fingers pulled out something that gleamed goldenly in the moonlight.
It was....yes....it was Russell's pilfered ponytail! The figure ran the strands of the ponytail
across its cheek, inhaled deeply the attendant aroma
of sweaty flannel and cattle feed, then placed the hijacked hair back into its
backpack.
Morning arrived, as mornings tend to do even in Paraguay, and our trekkers broke camp.
After two hours of hiking across an area of fist-sized rocks that were the very devil on high
heels, they crossed the border into Bolivia. Now only several mountain ranges lay between
them and Lake Titicaca, to whose shores they were traveling merely because the name it
bore was so...well....interesting, in a strange sorta way. That and the fact that ever since Maximus had been a lad back in that oddly Tuscan-looking region of Spain, he had had a
secret desire to harvest crops of straw and build a Bolivian boat. He had never shared this
desire of his with Marcus, though, fearing it could cost him his command.
He glanced at Captain Jack, carrying Juditha over the rocks in his strong arms, and
thought that, perhaps, he of all the characters might understand. And...so... Maximus strode along through Bolivia, imagining where he would be in three weeks of trekking time.... harvesting his crops of straw along the banks of Titicaca. He devoutly hoped, though, that
this time he would not be so rudely interrupted by emperoricide, execution attempts, and
slavery.
Just before dawn of the 4th morning in Bolivia, the entire encampment was awaked by a
bellow from Jack. Maximus was quickly at his side. "Juditha!" Jack was shouting.
"Where is she?" Maximus asked in great concern for the lady who had cared for him so tenderly.
Jack's nostrils flared as he rumbled, "She's been taken, Maximus!"
"Hey, now!" Jo piped in. "Remember this is an open list! Nobody gets 'taken' so blatantly
on an open list!"
"It's all right, Jo," Maximus explained patiently, "he's not talking about 'taken' in that sense
of the word....I'm sure.....ARE you, Jack?"
Jack's jaw muscles were working as he continued, "She was asleep, her lovely head resting
on my chest not more than an hour ago...but when I awoke she was GONE!"
Maximus studied the ground. A pair of footprints led off into the mountains. He frowned at Hando. "These prints exactly match the size of YOUR boots!"
Hando just stood there, thorny in the rising sun, and laughed, pointing at Maximus' own feet. "Go ahead, SkirtMan! Step into the prints....I dare you!"
Maximus did and, by golly, his boots matched exactly, too! In fact, every single male of the trekkites had feet the exact same size! "So much for your clue, FuzzLegs!" Hando spat.
Bud, then, arrived, pushing his way roughly through the gathered characters. "Bloody amateurs!" he grumped as he ordered all the characters into a line-up.
His experienced eyes scanned the row of men. They were all the exact same
height, but
some had a bit more...er...girth...than others. That was not what he was looking for, though.
He was looking for what was not there....and that was
Sid! Once again the evil chipman had captured Juditha.
Sid, Juditha slung over his purple-suited shoulder, was merrily leaping from boulder to
boulder on
his way to ....
part 14...by Jo
....the narrow box canyon he had spotted on on