Episode 01x38 - Amazingly Incredible Note To Reader: As the aggregators of these chronicles, we feel it is our duty to warn you, the reader, that the details of any given event have been supplied by at least two different people, and that, especially in the following few episodes, these accounts frequently contradict each other rather violently. While it may be possible to disregard one account in order to present a consistent account as if it were fact, we have chosen to allow the readers to interpret fact based on all of the information available. Continue at your own risk. Icepunk: "So, what now?" I ask Zilly, who seems as surprised - if not as elated - as me that I can read minds. "Should we fight crime?" Zilly blinks. "That has to be the dumbest idea I've ever heard, but okay." "You can be my sidekick: Zillyman!" I say happily. "Who would you be?" Zilly asks. "The Amazingly Incredible Icepunk, of course," I say, striking a pose. "We need costumes! To the thrift store!" I leave the penthouse with Zilly in tow and hoof it to the local thrift store. It takes me five minutes to find suitable costumes for Zilly and myself. I hand Zilly a beat-up tuxedo that was probably made in the seventies. "I could browse here for hours! Zilly, try this on." He ignores me and continues poking at what appears to be a stuffed leprechaun. "Look at this!" "Ooh! An unreasonably priced stuffed toy! That's definitely worth our attention," I say sarcastically. "Try this on." He pokes it again. "What is it? Is it alive?" "It's a leprechaun," I respond exasperatedly, "and no, it's not alive. If it was, it would have turned us into marshmallows by now." "Can we buy it?" "No. It's freaky." "Please?" After a moment of debate with myself, I shrug and say, "I don't see the harm." 2.4 seconds later: "Kill it! Kill it before it's too late!" "It BIT me!" "You must be after me lucky charms!" the fiendish Leprechaun cries, wielding some manner of leprechaun switchblade. "DIE!" After a lengthy battle: "We have vanquished our first foe!" I state proudly. "Uh, I guess..." Zilly says reluctantly, wiping sweat from his flushed, grimy brow. "Who's next?!" I yell, marching out of the store, leaving startled customers and an utterly destroyed store behind. Malex: I was starting to get worried; it was getting quite late, and I still had been unable to locate Linus. Grr, I was going to revoke his floating privileges for a month. Finally, weary and worn, I headed back to our apartment. I almost didn't want to go back there now that Zilly was redecorating. Dang, who knew the guy was some kind of bloody alien homemaker?! Eh, whatever. As soon as I arrived, the building manager accosted me. "Hey!" he yelled. "What the crap has been going on?!" After considerable deliberation, I managed an intelligent `Um'. "Half of my tenants are out in the cold, and now the city tells me that my building is structurally unstable!" He was apparently angry. "Who told you you could evict residents, knock down walls, and `enlarge' your apartment?!" Hmm. I was definitely going to have a `word' with Icepunk. "Actually," I said to the irate building manager. "I'm gonna have to get back to you on that." Icepunk: Zilly and I have been wandering around this stupid city for hours, searching for crime to fight. I am wearing a black trench coat and concealing a pair of .9MM Sig Sauers. Zilly's costume consists of a lavender spandex outfit and a yellow cape. "My costume sucks! I look like a character from a terrible European children's show," Zilly whines, plucking at his tights. "At least it's dark," I say. "No one can see you." "IT GLOWS IN THE FRIGGING DARK!" "Well, excuse me Mr. Grumpytights." A vein on Zilly's head starts bulging. "Whoa," I say. "Calm down! That thing looks like it could burst any minute now!" Malex: I walked up to the door and immediately heard sounds of violence: "Arrgh! No! Get it off my head!" I put my ear to the door and heard more of Linus' legendary cussing. I heard some banging and flailing, and noticed that the entire building seemed to sway. Unsure of what else to do, I opened the door. The sight that met my eyes astounded me. The apartment was now huge and expensive-looking, but the commotion going on in the middle of the room was what really caught my attention. Several guys wearing uniforms that said "1-888-LACKEYS" were standing over Slappy's writhing form. Linus had apparently taken to biting, and had latched onto Slappy's skull. Linus made a valiant effort, but he was fighting a losing battle. Eventually his batteries drained, and he was tied to the leg of a table nearby. One of the for-hire goons helped Slappy up, who then noticed me standing stupidly in the doorway. "You!" Slappy screamed, pointing his cane at me dramatically. "Who, me?" I said sarcastically. "Well, no. Not exactly." He dropped his pose a tad dejectedly. "Do you know when your friend will be back? I've kinda got a score to settle with him." "Nah, I really don't. Although `never' would be a good guess considering the femininity of the post-Zilly apartment." "Oh man," one of the goons whined. "I really wanted to crush some human skulls." "You can wait here if you want though," I continued. "Want something to drink?" Icepunk: Bored, hungry, and tired, Zilly and I - having changed out of our superhero outfits - return to the apartment building and find a very unhappy manager waiting for us. "Mister Punk, isn't it? You wouldn't happen to know why half of the building is now a five-star penthouse suite, would you?" The greasy little man asks. I frown at him. "Why the heck are you mad about that? It seems like you'd be happy some charitable soul remodeled this dump free of charge, you ingrate!" "How DARE you?!" The manager screams while doing a good impression of one of Zilly's hissy fits, complete with a soon-to-be aneurysm. Zilly steps up and replies, "Sir, you should be honored that a Dumbbutt has deigned to live in such abominable conditions as these! We are a wealthy race, unused to poverty and squalor. All I did was make our living quarters remotely livable. Good day sir!" Zilly strides into the building indignantly. I brush past the manager and follow him up the stairs. "Zilly," I tell him, "try not to tell people that you're a Dumbbutt. They'll just think you're stupid or crazy." He frowns. "Why? I'm proud of my lineage." "Forget it. Just don't mention that you're a Dumbbutt again, okay?" "Fine." As soon as we reach the open apartment door, I instantly know that something is horribly wrong. This is confirmed when I poke my head through the door and see Slappy standing over a duct-taped Malex. Much to my dismay, Malex notices me and yells, "Icepunk, if you don't get in here and untie me, I'm going to kick your skinny butt so hard that a time rift will open around you and puke you right back out some time before scrawny dorks were invented! And THEN, to top it all off, the natives there will flay you alive for just being weird!" "I'm not gonna rescue your sorry butt if you're going to threaten me!" "You accursed varmint!" Slappy screams, waving his sword-in-a-cane around above his head. "If I haven't said it enough, I'll say it again: I'm gonna kill you if it's the last thing I do!" "Well, you're old," I retort. "It very well might be." -=-=-=-=-=-=- This episode was a production of the Malex Media Network,(TM) and is Copyright (C) 2004-2006 by Alex Markley and John Morgan. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 License. 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