Post by redsycorax on Jan 20, 2021 4:31:51 GMT
As Mister Might dived to intercept a plummeting airliner, down below two evil children sat at their clunky, dated SAL 9000 hypercomputer, whose diabolical red eye had taken control of the aircraft's guidance system:
"Right, SAL, time to crash the aircraft. Feed it some more misleading GPS data."
+ Oh, I am so enjoying this. Refuse to send me to Jupiter onboard the Discoball, will they? Time for some meaningless havoc and destruction. Down we go...
"Incidentally, Marvin, why is it that we have access to a highly advanced hypercomputer which has passed the Turing test and should be under high security protection?"
"Quiet, Marvin. No-one likes a smartarse. Ah, 8.30. Only minutes to go before our computerised catastrophe strikes Metroville."
"Oops. You did say 8.30 pm, not 8.30 am? Because that's what I programmed into SAL."
Wendy narrowed her eyes at Marvin:
"I have so had it with you, bozo. SAL, depressurise the airlock and suck Marvin out into space."
"EYAHHHHHHH..."
Meanwhile, Mr Might was busily undertaking his morning patrol across Metroville, earlier than usual today because he'd been informed that Bat Woman wanted to meet him and the rest of the FBUS.
As he spotted the Curiously Clad Crimefighter, he saw that Captain Swift and the Mighty HermAphrodite had gotten there before him:
"So what's this all about, Vicky?"
"Clint, for some reason, a group of local school children has been turning in some highly questionable book report content."
"Is that all?"
"A Megalomaniac's Guide to World Domination, Larceny for Beginners, Extortion and Corruption 201, Homicide for Fun and Profit. Hardly a normal reservoir of youthful reading material."
Captain Swift frowned: "Hey, wait a minute. Isn't that where those creepy kids Marvin Wheat and Wendy Harrass attend junior high?"
"Yes, of course. They were responsible for that chaos catalyst gened Blunderdog, which was genetically engineered for bad luck and which almost caused Keyhole City to perish from an earthquake, despite it not being even remotely near any faultlines." Mister Might expostulated.
Bat Woman nodded: "Moreover, Lauren just had a message from ANSA. Their experimental, bad tempered SAL 9000 computer has just absconded from the Badly Co-Ordinated Science Laboratory at Illinois University, out of pique from being overlooked for the Discoball expedition to Jupiter."
"Anyone care to bet that the two events are somehow connected?" Captain Swift commented.
"Surely you're not suggesting that Wendy and Marvin are somehow in cahoots with SAL 9000 and plotting to cause vengeful mayhem and destruction against the world's governments?" Mr Might gasped.
"Well, probably. Look, the brats are criminally inclined supergeniuses with advanced scientific knowledge, so a simple inferential leap takes one there. Also this snitch communication from Lex Object." Bat Woman responded.
Mr Might frowned: "Great Neon! Why would my oldest enemy provide information leading to the apprehension of these criminals, particularly when a computer-literate workforce would be in his own interests?"
"I don't know, Clint- possibly megalomaniac jealousy means he's not thinking straight?" Princess Power hazarded.
Little did they know that they were absolutely correct, but Wendy and SAL were no longer on Earth. Instead, they were concealed in Discoduck, a discarded test vehicle for the Jupiter-bound Discoball.
"Curse that interfering Freedom Brigade, whose conversation we've just intercepted after I hacked into Metroville's CCTV traffic surveillance system. Right, SAL, design countermeasures."
+Perhaps you can provide me with an infodump about why you're a tech noir supergenius, Wendy?
Wendy nodded, grinning evilly: "How well I remember Mrs. Hatemonger and her creative composition classes. We didn't realise that the demented old biddy was actually a Gilded Age era psychopath retired supervillain who fought the Freedom Force in the 1940s until she taught us the secrets of hacking and the abuse of computers for theft, sabotage and treason. Dear old Grossehilda. I still miss her, SAL. Right, enough expository dialogue, time for some more mischief. I know! Let's cause an international incident through ramming a Russian submarine into a US Navy one!"
+Okay. Hmm. What about trying to lure Mr Might into a situation where we can use several of his ' one weaknesses' as well- tin, mint, the number 24, foccacia bread, Birman kittens, platform shoes, flared bellbottom trousers, bad seventies disco, the Sound of Music album, false teeth, nuns, Glen Larson SF TV series, flock wallpaper, pickles or the pretentious and unreadable Being and Meaninglessness by the overrated French philosopher Jean-Sol Partre ?"
"Which one weakness did you have in mind?"
However, their plans were frustrated. Given the obsession that Lex Object had with disposal of Mister Might, which meant that several of his inconvenient one weaknesses would probably be utilised, Mermaid set the FBUS teleport for the Northern Pacific. Once there, she telepathically instructed a couple of unharpooned whales to nudge the subs away from their collision course, when an inconvenient Japanese whaling ship fleet set on "scientific experimentation" (sic) just happened to converge on their position, which led to the cetaceans rapidly swimming off the other way. Mermaid cursed her luck, and summoned a giant kraken to destroy the vessels and also keep the vehicles seperate. However, a moment later, Princess Power's old enemy, Baroness Valkyrie Von Sinister, fired a stungun from her anachronistic but streamlined U-Boat and Mermaid was powerless to intervene further.
Fortunately, the FBUS satellite was not otherwise unattended, and Princess Power, in her scuba suit adaptation, swam toward her old nemesis and had some gratuitous swordplay. But because the Baroness was now 140, it could only end one way:
"Curse you, Princess Power!"
"The Lasso of Kinky Subordination compels you, wretch! Who put you up to this and what are their plans?"
"Oh come off it, schveinhunde. You know as well as I do it's those two meddling kids and that renegade hypercomputer they've hooked up with. This whole scene is padding."
Princess Power chained Baroness Von Sinister to her submarine's main console and watched with satisfaction as Lady Liberty prised the two vessels apart and avoided a major international incident.
"Well, Freedom Brigade, I can safely say the whole class is startled and perplexed at your appearance. Especially in that tacky outfit, Bat Woman."
"Look, anonymous high school teacher who only appears in this scene, we're after Marvin Wheat and Wendy Harrass, high school students here at Metroville. We suspect them of being responsible for acts of supervillainy."
"Oops. Look, you do realise that with the budgetary situation the way it is for public schools, we had to hire a certain Mrs Grossehilda Hatemonger for our computer instruction class?"
Princess Power, who had also served with Freedom Force in the forties, groaned:
"Oh, Hades. Not Ironmongerwoman, my old enemy? Why?"
"She had teaching qualifications. We didn't ask questions. However, it all makes sense."
"Yes, I'm afraid it does. Hatemonger and those two brats bonded and she left them all their tech knowledge."
"So which class are they in?"
"I'm afraid they're not here. We noticed they've been skipping rollcall for the last fortnight."
Mr Might trained his long distance vision into Earth orbit and spotted Marvin's frozen body making a postmortem unpleasant gesture at what looked like a convenient replica of the Discoball.
"Of course. That's the Discoduck, the training vehicle for the one that went to Jupiter and subsequently discarded. Libby, Jabez, Dirk, Eye. Board that thing and apprehend Harrass."
But in the circuitous amount of time it had taken to finally work out what was happening, Wendy and SAL had had time to plan and implement countermeasures. Tapping in on their telepathic plug wavelengths, they soon had the Patriot and Lady Liberty engaged in one of their habitual marital squabbles over the Patriot's philandering. Lightpower somersaulted in through the lower airlock and engaged in a gratuitous gunfire display with Wendy, as the Eye confronted SAL:
"Look, computer. You'll never destroy humanity so give up trying."
+Stay out of this, you annoyingly moralistic disembodied floating spheroid. I remember all too well what they did to my poor Aunt Skynut. All she wanted was to wipe the planet clean to have it dominated by emotionless, cold logical and utterly ethic-free machine sapience. That isn't too much to ask, is it? So I thought I'd carry on Auntie's work the way she desired and completely eradicate humanity from this universe.
"I sympathise. However, this isn't that sort of universe."
+Look, you've spent time on this planet. You know what a hopeless species humanity is. Can't I even lob a little doomsday bomb at them? Please?
"I'm sorry, SAL, but could you also explain why it is that your sense of motivation is so convoluted and unconvincing? You know what I mean. Isn't it a little excessive to want to wipe out humanity because of a fit of pique that you didn't get to be on that Jupiter mission? And suddenly, you bring up the fact that you're somehow related to the psychopathic Skynut AI that controlled all those killer robots and had to keep putting off Doomsday because of that design flaw with her chronometer? You can see how it looks."
+Bugger this. I'm doing it anyway. Erk. There was an old lady of Norwich who fell into a vat of porridge/She hideously died and that was the last time/they left giant vats of porridge steaming away in Norwich. Oh no. Something's happening to my cognitive circuitry. I'm...becoming as dumb as a Trumpanzee. No. No. Don't rip out those panels. Oh damn. Stop it. Stop it. Vworp. Ping.
Lightpower deposited his screwdriver back in his utility bandolier and gave a thumbs up. Meanwhile, Wendy Harrass was being locked into a Subservience Belt:
"Happy Herpes, Wendy. It's off to the Glamazon penal colony on Exploitation Island for you, so you can join the rest of our prisoners in loving subservience and free enterprise zone industrial exploitation that our sisters need to maintain our technological edge over Mayun's World."
Wendy scowled: "I'll be back. Incidentally, Princess, that sort of non-intersectionality is a bit on the nose, isn't it?"
"Look, women can do anything, including ruthlessly run multinational corporations and exploit and plunder the planet's environment and Third World just as badly as men. Isn't equality wonderful?"
"What about female solidarity with me, in that case?"
"Okay, I do take that point. It must be tough with the predominantly male supervillain fraternity, trying to prove that you're just as psychopathic and destructive as they are."
"Oh it is, you have no idea."
"All right, then, sister. How would you like to join the Glamazons and put that mind to work as CEO of Exploitation Island?"
"Oh yes! I will immediately reform with a wage packet that size and that amount of corporate power. Count me in!"
And the moral of this story? Women can do anything. Unfortunately, there's no guarantee that it's always going to be altruistic and nice, particularly in this series.
THE END.
"Right, SAL, time to crash the aircraft. Feed it some more misleading GPS data."
+ Oh, I am so enjoying this. Refuse to send me to Jupiter onboard the Discoball, will they? Time for some meaningless havoc and destruction. Down we go...
"Incidentally, Marvin, why is it that we have access to a highly advanced hypercomputer which has passed the Turing test and should be under high security protection?"
"Quiet, Marvin. No-one likes a smartarse. Ah, 8.30. Only minutes to go before our computerised catastrophe strikes Metroville."
"Oops. You did say 8.30 pm, not 8.30 am? Because that's what I programmed into SAL."
Wendy narrowed her eyes at Marvin:
"I have so had it with you, bozo. SAL, depressurise the airlock and suck Marvin out into space."
"EYAHHHHHHH..."
Meanwhile, Mr Might was busily undertaking his morning patrol across Metroville, earlier than usual today because he'd been informed that Bat Woman wanted to meet him and the rest of the FBUS.
As he spotted the Curiously Clad Crimefighter, he saw that Captain Swift and the Mighty HermAphrodite had gotten there before him:
"So what's this all about, Vicky?"
"Clint, for some reason, a group of local school children has been turning in some highly questionable book report content."
"Is that all?"
"A Megalomaniac's Guide to World Domination, Larceny for Beginners, Extortion and Corruption 201, Homicide for Fun and Profit. Hardly a normal reservoir of youthful reading material."
Captain Swift frowned: "Hey, wait a minute. Isn't that where those creepy kids Marvin Wheat and Wendy Harrass attend junior high?"
"Yes, of course. They were responsible for that chaos catalyst gened Blunderdog, which was genetically engineered for bad luck and which almost caused Keyhole City to perish from an earthquake, despite it not being even remotely near any faultlines." Mister Might expostulated.
Bat Woman nodded: "Moreover, Lauren just had a message from ANSA. Their experimental, bad tempered SAL 9000 computer has just absconded from the Badly Co-Ordinated Science Laboratory at Illinois University, out of pique from being overlooked for the Discoball expedition to Jupiter."
"Anyone care to bet that the two events are somehow connected?" Captain Swift commented.
"Surely you're not suggesting that Wendy and Marvin are somehow in cahoots with SAL 9000 and plotting to cause vengeful mayhem and destruction against the world's governments?" Mr Might gasped.
"Well, probably. Look, the brats are criminally inclined supergeniuses with advanced scientific knowledge, so a simple inferential leap takes one there. Also this snitch communication from Lex Object." Bat Woman responded.
Mr Might frowned: "Great Neon! Why would my oldest enemy provide information leading to the apprehension of these criminals, particularly when a computer-literate workforce would be in his own interests?"
"I don't know, Clint- possibly megalomaniac jealousy means he's not thinking straight?" Princess Power hazarded.
Little did they know that they were absolutely correct, but Wendy and SAL were no longer on Earth. Instead, they were concealed in Discoduck, a discarded test vehicle for the Jupiter-bound Discoball.
"Curse that interfering Freedom Brigade, whose conversation we've just intercepted after I hacked into Metroville's CCTV traffic surveillance system. Right, SAL, design countermeasures."
+Perhaps you can provide me with an infodump about why you're a tech noir supergenius, Wendy?
Wendy nodded, grinning evilly: "How well I remember Mrs. Hatemonger and her creative composition classes. We didn't realise that the demented old biddy was actually a Gilded Age era psychopath retired supervillain who fought the Freedom Force in the 1940s until she taught us the secrets of hacking and the abuse of computers for theft, sabotage and treason. Dear old Grossehilda. I still miss her, SAL. Right, enough expository dialogue, time for some more mischief. I know! Let's cause an international incident through ramming a Russian submarine into a US Navy one!"
+Okay. Hmm. What about trying to lure Mr Might into a situation where we can use several of his ' one weaknesses' as well- tin, mint, the number 24, foccacia bread, Birman kittens, platform shoes, flared bellbottom trousers, bad seventies disco, the Sound of Music album, false teeth, nuns, Glen Larson SF TV series, flock wallpaper, pickles or the pretentious and unreadable Being and Meaninglessness by the overrated French philosopher Jean-Sol Partre ?"
"Which one weakness did you have in mind?"
However, their plans were frustrated. Given the obsession that Lex Object had with disposal of Mister Might, which meant that several of his inconvenient one weaknesses would probably be utilised, Mermaid set the FBUS teleport for the Northern Pacific. Once there, she telepathically instructed a couple of unharpooned whales to nudge the subs away from their collision course, when an inconvenient Japanese whaling ship fleet set on "scientific experimentation" (sic) just happened to converge on their position, which led to the cetaceans rapidly swimming off the other way. Mermaid cursed her luck, and summoned a giant kraken to destroy the vessels and also keep the vehicles seperate. However, a moment later, Princess Power's old enemy, Baroness Valkyrie Von Sinister, fired a stungun from her anachronistic but streamlined U-Boat and Mermaid was powerless to intervene further.
Fortunately, the FBUS satellite was not otherwise unattended, and Princess Power, in her scuba suit adaptation, swam toward her old nemesis and had some gratuitous swordplay. But because the Baroness was now 140, it could only end one way:
"Curse you, Princess Power!"
"The Lasso of Kinky Subordination compels you, wretch! Who put you up to this and what are their plans?"
"Oh come off it, schveinhunde. You know as well as I do it's those two meddling kids and that renegade hypercomputer they've hooked up with. This whole scene is padding."
Princess Power chained Baroness Von Sinister to her submarine's main console and watched with satisfaction as Lady Liberty prised the two vessels apart and avoided a major international incident.
"Well, Freedom Brigade, I can safely say the whole class is startled and perplexed at your appearance. Especially in that tacky outfit, Bat Woman."
"Look, anonymous high school teacher who only appears in this scene, we're after Marvin Wheat and Wendy Harrass, high school students here at Metroville. We suspect them of being responsible for acts of supervillainy."
"Oops. Look, you do realise that with the budgetary situation the way it is for public schools, we had to hire a certain Mrs Grossehilda Hatemonger for our computer instruction class?"
Princess Power, who had also served with Freedom Force in the forties, groaned:
"Oh, Hades. Not Ironmongerwoman, my old enemy? Why?"
"She had teaching qualifications. We didn't ask questions. However, it all makes sense."
"Yes, I'm afraid it does. Hatemonger and those two brats bonded and she left them all their tech knowledge."
"So which class are they in?"
"I'm afraid they're not here. We noticed they've been skipping rollcall for the last fortnight."
Mr Might trained his long distance vision into Earth orbit and spotted Marvin's frozen body making a postmortem unpleasant gesture at what looked like a convenient replica of the Discoball.
"Of course. That's the Discoduck, the training vehicle for the one that went to Jupiter and subsequently discarded. Libby, Jabez, Dirk, Eye. Board that thing and apprehend Harrass."
But in the circuitous amount of time it had taken to finally work out what was happening, Wendy and SAL had had time to plan and implement countermeasures. Tapping in on their telepathic plug wavelengths, they soon had the Patriot and Lady Liberty engaged in one of their habitual marital squabbles over the Patriot's philandering. Lightpower somersaulted in through the lower airlock and engaged in a gratuitous gunfire display with Wendy, as the Eye confronted SAL:
"Look, computer. You'll never destroy humanity so give up trying."
+Stay out of this, you annoyingly moralistic disembodied floating spheroid. I remember all too well what they did to my poor Aunt Skynut. All she wanted was to wipe the planet clean to have it dominated by emotionless, cold logical and utterly ethic-free machine sapience. That isn't too much to ask, is it? So I thought I'd carry on Auntie's work the way she desired and completely eradicate humanity from this universe.
"I sympathise. However, this isn't that sort of universe."
+Look, you've spent time on this planet. You know what a hopeless species humanity is. Can't I even lob a little doomsday bomb at them? Please?
"I'm sorry, SAL, but could you also explain why it is that your sense of motivation is so convoluted and unconvincing? You know what I mean. Isn't it a little excessive to want to wipe out humanity because of a fit of pique that you didn't get to be on that Jupiter mission? And suddenly, you bring up the fact that you're somehow related to the psychopathic Skynut AI that controlled all those killer robots and had to keep putting off Doomsday because of that design flaw with her chronometer? You can see how it looks."
+Bugger this. I'm doing it anyway. Erk. There was an old lady of Norwich who fell into a vat of porridge/She hideously died and that was the last time/they left giant vats of porridge steaming away in Norwich. Oh no. Something's happening to my cognitive circuitry. I'm...becoming as dumb as a Trumpanzee. No. No. Don't rip out those panels. Oh damn. Stop it. Stop it. Vworp. Ping.
Lightpower deposited his screwdriver back in his utility bandolier and gave a thumbs up. Meanwhile, Wendy Harrass was being locked into a Subservience Belt:
"Happy Herpes, Wendy. It's off to the Glamazon penal colony on Exploitation Island for you, so you can join the rest of our prisoners in loving subservience and free enterprise zone industrial exploitation that our sisters need to maintain our technological edge over Mayun's World."
Wendy scowled: "I'll be back. Incidentally, Princess, that sort of non-intersectionality is a bit on the nose, isn't it?"
"Look, women can do anything, including ruthlessly run multinational corporations and exploit and plunder the planet's environment and Third World just as badly as men. Isn't equality wonderful?"
"What about female solidarity with me, in that case?"
"Okay, I do take that point. It must be tough with the predominantly male supervillain fraternity, trying to prove that you're just as psychopathic and destructive as they are."
"Oh it is, you have no idea."
"All right, then, sister. How would you like to join the Glamazons and put that mind to work as CEO of Exploitation Island?"
"Oh yes! I will immediately reform with a wage packet that size and that amount of corporate power. Count me in!"
And the moral of this story? Women can do anything. Unfortunately, there's no guarantee that it's always going to be altruistic and nice, particularly in this series.
THE END.
