Mid-Sized Marx: Star Wars scale Japanese soldiers!!!

 

It's Monday and I still haven't done a weekend post. Fortunately, I have something I've been using the time to examine. It's a new acquisition that I wasn't sure existed before I actually got it, and now I'm still not completely satisfied it is what it's supposed to be. The one thing that is sure is that it's not like anything else I've got, including the set they are literally identical to. Here are my new 3.75 inch Marx Japanese soldiers, a scaled-down version of the figures I wrote about in my very first Marx post! And how about a comparison shot with one of the originals?

Now for the backstory, I first encountered Marx figures in "action figure" 3-4 inch scale when I picked up my first pair of the evil Space Guys. I followed that up with more acquisitions, including a whole bag, but in all that time, I never found compelling evidence that Marx had manufactured any more in that scale. If anything, it appeared to be a one-off experiment, left behind by the ludicrously huge nominal 6-inch figures that proliferated in the 1960s and '70s. Still, there were passing mentions here and there of Marx figures larger than the 70mm Space Guys but still under 5-6 inches. From what information was at hand, they could have been any number of things if they existed at all. Maybe they were "real" Marx figures that never got to full commercial circulation. Maybe they were a vintage experiment from the Mexican Plastimarx or a foreign outlier like the one that made the Ukrainian figures. Or, they could have been just scaled-down copies or loose tributes from long after Marx bit the dust. Once I saw a batch on sale, clearly based on excellent figures I already had, I decided it was worth the money to get a look at them firsthand. Here's pics of most of the lot.

It was immediately clear from inspection that these were not simple imitations. These are virtually identical to the Marx 6-inch sculpts, with a fully comparable level of detail. If these weren't from Marx molds, which I never doubted after getting a good look at them, they were made by someone with direct access to them. Here's more detail shots.

If anything, the real Japanese pistol looked less effective than this.

And here's one that's... different. Well, presumably, some Japanese officers had glasses. I don't recall anyone suggesting they had machetes, though.

The one further question was whether they came before or after the 6-inch figures. I can't easily rule out that these were a prototype of the larger figures, but the law of economy (aka Occam's Razor) dictated that the far more prolific 6-inch line came first. A non-trivial piece of evidence is the bayonet, which I covered in detail the first time around. I don't recall if I mentioned that I had to repair my original infantryman about a year ago, which might or might not have had something to do with bending the bayonet into a horseshoe shape. (Just in case, if it comes up, don't do that.) At any rate, the bayonet on this guy is a lot bigger that the shiv on the Mexican copy, but it still looks proportionately smaller than the 6-inch figure. Since Marx already had trouble with bayonets (more on that in a moment), it's very safe to say the biggest one is the oldest. Here's a lineup of all 3 versions.

And here's the officer, with a 4-inch Space Guy (aka Jason) for comparison. It will be evident from this photo that, alas, these don't "scale" well enough to be easily integrated with the Space Guys adventure.

One more loose end was how many other Marx figures got this treatment. In the inquiries that led to this purchase, I considered a comparably sized set clearly based on the German/ Nazi 6-inch figures (which would have been more relevant to the current and planned Space Guys adventure arc). I declined to buy them partly because I would have nothing to compare them to, and partly because I have found that set far less interesting and attractive than other Marx figures, an opinion that did not improve on seeing them in a smaller scale. It's safe to assume that Marx also at least planned to release similarly sized US troops for them to fight, and perhaps a version of the Soviet set as well. One further datum is that the set had already replaced a discontinued figure shown making a semi-graphic downward thrust with a bayonet, offering the most conclusive proof that the 6-inch line came first.

A further loose end I considered was whether these were in any way part of the evolution of the "standard" 3.75 inch action figure. These definitely are of the same size. Here's a few further comparison shots with Bossk and Sidekick Carl. (I know, Carl's adventure has been postponed a long time...)

As can be seen, these can be considered among the precursors of the 1970s-'80s action figures, assuming they weren't made in the late '70s as a bid to make Marx figures semi-compatible with Star Wars and Adventure People. However, they certainly would not have been the first figures to settle on this size. Here's a lineup with the Archer Space Woman, Ajax Space Guys (plus non-binary person) and the Marx Onion Head alien.

With that, I'm bringing this post to an end. It's another Marx lineage I just might pursue further, if I can do so at a good  price. It may be shrouded in mystery that we probably wouldn't care about if we actually knew, but it's what makes this fun. And to wrap this up, here's an oldie with the Truckstop Queen.

Yeah, this guy didn't even get to the "friend zone"...

And that's all for now, more to come!

Fiction: The Adventures of Sidekick Carl, Part 24!

 It's the middle of the week, and more than 2 months without an installment of Sidekick Carl, so I barely got one together. As usual, here's links for first, second and previous installments.

The facility looked like a truncated pyramid, 3 stories tall and 100 feet on a side. There was no sign to identify its purpose, only a 7-digit number and an emphatic sign that said: UN CAAPEP MAXIMUM SECURITY FACILITY TOP SECURITY CLEARANCE ONLY. The car that approached paused briefly outside the cyclone fence. At the wave of a badge, the gate opened.

An armored figure advanced to meet the new arrival. Lauren Carter smiled from the driver’s seat. “Greetings, Agent Carter,” the guard said with a deep but neutral voice. “How may we assist you?”

“I’m here to see a person of interest being detained at this location,” she answered. “I will be evaluating the subject for transfer to an alternate facility.”

“Ms. Carter,” the guard replied, “your clearance gives access to the grounds. But surely you are aware, I cannot admit you. We certainly cannot confirm the details of who, if anyone, is here.”

Lauren continued to smile as she lifted the badge to reveal a card beneath it. “I’m sorry,” she said. “We aren’t supposed to show these unless needed.”

“Of course,” the guard said. “That changes things. Of course, any change in arrangements would require further review. But we can admit you.”

Soon enough, Lauren approached a cell a number of stories under ground. It was lined with bullet-proof glass. Within was a woman whose dark hair had grown long enough for an attractive short-length cut. She wore yellow fatigues with some semblance of styling, which Lauren recognized as a uniform for aerospace technicians. “Dr. Hartnell,” she said succinctly. The other looked up with interest.

“Sidekick Carl just found the Toxo Warriors’ lab,” Lauren continued. “The one outside Audrey’s colony. My husband is on the way with a Tactical Team. But I don’t think they’re going to find anything. Are they?”

And the woman who had become a supervillain smiled…

* * *

 

Audrey’s mutant tackled Dana, or tried to, just as the explosion went off. His efforts were just enough to push her out of the way before the door she was about to kick down became a spray of splinters. The metal loading door, by comparison, rippled and bowed without giving way. The real question was whether the walls would hold, and if they did not, whether they would fall inward or outward. In fact, they did hold, mostly, well enough that Dana quickly flattened herself against it to avoid the rain of pieces of the roof. She shrieked when something that was clearly not debris came hurtling down, a smoking shape with limbs that seemed to flail in every direction except the way they were meant to move. The form hit hard enough to throw up a secondary cloud of dust on impact. The mutant held her in place when she tried to rush out. It took a little longer for the last of the roof to fall.

Dana finally reached her husband as Audrey came around the corner. The towering mutant accompanying her was beating out flames in its fur. Bare moments passed before Audrey was at her side. “Well, you’re looking worse than usual,” she said.

Carl looked like a rag doll, his limbs and joints turned in a dozen incompatible directions. His white suit was now black, either charred or covered in soot, dust and chemicals. For a moment, he was ominously still. Then his head raised and turned, facing almost directly backwards. “Yeah,” he said. “Well, you’re getting old.” One at a time, his limbs twisted back into their natural shape, until he was finally able to sit up.”

“Oh, Carl,” Dana said. She could not hide a shudder as his right leg rearranged itself. “Are you… still you?”

“You bet,” he said. He rose to his feet, wobbling like a scarecrow in a windstorm. “That’s not even the worst I’ve been through. Ah, not quite.”

“Sure,” Audrey said. “There was one time I dropped a freight elevator on him…” Dana covered her eyes and screeched.

As they spoke, four armored figures swooped overhead. A moment later, the leader circled back and touched down. The armor was not much bulkier than a knight’s mail, colored deep blue. The figure raised a visor, revealing the irritated face of Agent John Carter. “Dammit, Carl,” he said. “We both know you’d hold onto the best lead for yourself, bur you could at least try not to get the building blown down.”

“The place was already wired to blow,” Carl said. “One of your teams wouldn’t have found any more than I did, and they would have died for real. Oh, and one of the Toxo Warriors was still there. He got out through a trapdoor. It’s probably a tunnel to the mall. If you hurry, you might still catch him.”

John Carter spoke gruffly into his mouthpiece, “Have you found any human signatures, or any traces of a vehicle?”

“If someone made a getaway, we should have seen it,” came the reply. “The only operable vehicles we’ve found are a bike and an open-topped scooter, I’m guessing the ones Carl and his companions used to get here.”

Carl shook his head. “That doesn’t make sense,” he said. “The man I met was one of the original Toxo Warriors. We talked, long enough; he knew things I knew that nobody else would. He pretty much admitted, he was the one who made their biggest mistakes. But he still had plans and backup plans. He wouldn’t have bolted without anywhere to go.” He turned to Carter and said, so curtly it could have been an order, “Get Dana back to her RV. Now.”

The agent paused, only a moment. “Lopez, I need you to transport the Nine-Foot Woman back to her primary transport,” he said. In bare moments, one of his subordinates came back, a woman. She literally picked up Dana, rising just a little more slowly than she might have unencumbered. Dana gave a cry that might have been a whoop as they departed.

“All right,” John Carter said. “What’s really going on?”

“I don’t know,” Carl said. “I just wanted Dana out of here. I didn’t like the idea of her RV just sitting there either. I suppose, maybe, we actually came out ahead. The Toxo Warrior needed a diversion that might take out at least one or a few of us. The bomb would have done that well enough, if you hadn’t come after.”

“But you said yourself, he would have a getaway vehicle waiting, somewhere,” Carter countered. “There has to be something we’re missing…” As he spoke, he looked over his shoulder at the lesser storage buildings.

 

And as he looked, the walls of the building fell outward as an enormous metal shape rose up, topped by glowing eyes and teeth at the end of a long neck. There was a sound that could only be laughter, as loud as thunder from the metal dragon's throat.

Fiction: The adventures of Sidekick Carl, Part 23!

 To round out the month, I kind of had to get in Sidekick Carl. Nothing to say, beyond the acknowledgement that this could be the first chapter when Carl has done something. As usual, here's links for the first and previous chapters.

Again, John Carter flew into the night. This time, however, three other agents flew with him, all in the same powered armor. “We’re within 50 kliks of the installation,” he said. They followed a series of ridges that blocked their target from view. Still, a display inside his helmet highlighted the mall and the warehouse. He could see signs of the neomorph colony in the near distance. “Damn it, Audrey must have known there was something here all along,” he said to nobody in particular. “We’re making our final approach from the north. Get your weapons powered up...”

That was when the warehouse exploded, in a brilliant column of white. In the midst of the flame smoke and debris, he made out a twisted rag doll form pinwheeling through the air. “Carl,” he said. He added, “You idiot.”

* * *

Carl tumbled and rolled as he landed, though there would have been little risk of harm. He stayed in a crouch as he surveyed the warehouse. It was as empty as he had thought on arrival. However, there were offices that looked less certain. He found a door locked. At a touch, one of his wholly artificial fingers shaped itself into a perfect facsimile of a key. As he stepped inside, he called out, “I know someone’s in here.”

He advanced into another room, where a light shimmered just out of sight. It proved to be a small bank of monitors showing the feeds from the security cameras. Before he could turn his head, a voice said, “Yeah, you found me.”

He turned is head and beheld a rather slight man in the yellow suit and incongruous hat of the Toxo Warriors. Of course, he already wore a gas mask. “I know you,” he said after a moment. Already, the nanites had brought up a precisely recorded memory. “Back at the construction site, I saw one of you, alone, looking around. We figured we were spotted. Then we saw two of you, only they came out of that silly shed. I thought that was odd, but then I hadn’t seen anyone else, yet.”

“Like I said, you got me,” the Toxo Warrior said. “And I’m sure you can figure out, if I was supposed to kill you, I would have tried already. I just want to talk.”

“About what?” Carl said. “Old times?”

“No,” he said. “The past is in the past. Even back then, it was nothing personal. Not to me.”

“Maybe I do want to talk,” Carl countered. “Like the time you gassed all those people to get at a chemical that wasn’t any good. We knew you were cold, but it never made sense that you would make that kind of mistake. Except, we never thought about there being someone else.”

“Maybe I did the research, but I never did anything like that,” the Toxo Warrior said. “That was the other guys; you wouldn’t be here if you didn’t know about them.”

“What about the lab?” Carl said. “That never made sense, either. Whatever the Hell the experiment was, somebody should have been watching it. And if it had been watched properly, there definitely wouldn’t have been a bucket left out.”

“So I bailed,” the Toxo Warrior said. “They could have done the same thing. They were the ones who got off on the supervillain schtick.”

“Then what about the other other guy?” Carl mused. He peered at the figure. The bright suit made him very visible, but also made it harder to discern details. Even so, it was clear there was a small chemical tank slung over his back. He could just make out a hose and a sort of pistol grip. “We know there’s two of you, again, and I can already tell you’re not the type who would just pop out of retirement. So did he find you, or was he in it all along?”

“Maybe, maybe, a little of both,” the Toxo Warrior equivocated. “We had help from a lot of people back then. Some knew more than others.”

“Listen to me,” Carl said firmly. “You know what you did then was wrong.  You know what you’re doing now is wrong, and dangerous, too. You can still put a stop to it all, if you surrender and come with us. We might even be able to help you stay out of prison.”

“To be honest?” the Toxo Warrior said. “I only do this because I’m a follower, not a leader.  What I am is curious. There’s big things happening, really, just wow. I’m giving you a heads up, just stay out of it. We won’t even try to kill you any more. Well, maybe not.”

“I can’t do that,” Carl said.

“No,” the Toxo Warrior said. “I suppose not.” He was already reaching over his shoulder. He came up with a long, thin nozzle. Carl had barely a second to weigh his options, which he knew was still far too long. He pivoted in a kick, narrowing his profile. A spray of liquid shot past him, close enough for perhaps a few dozen droplets to hit him. The chemical, which could only be acid, burned a line of tiny pinholes through the outer layers of his suit, which the nanites rushed to seal. The bulk of the spray hit the wall, melting plaster and brick into a uniform brown mass. Then his foot caught the Toxo Warrior’s hand, knocking the nozzle from his grip.

The Toxo Warrior cast the tank aside. A trail of drips followed its arc, ending in a small puddle that sizzled beneath the damaged nozzle. Carl sidestepped again, then he lunged forward. Already, the Toxo Warrior had another weapon in hand, a rusty but clearly effective axe. It crossed Carl’s mind that in the old days, he would have taken the blow just to entangle the the weapon; that, of course, was so Constructor or one of their allies could go for the real target. Now, he dodged a devastating blow that could have dismembered an ordinary man, so quickly that the villain gaped in surprise as the blade scraped the concrete. Carl countered with a second kick that caught his opponent in the abdomen, knocking him back with an audible groan. He closed for a punch that staggered the Toxo Warrior. There was a crack, and one glance confirmed that an eyepiece of the gas mask had broken.

But time was already against him. The pool of acid was still spreading, in fact doing so faster. Carl recognized that the floor beneath the tank must have already been reduced to an inert crust that the acid ran over without being absorbed. On examination, there were signs that the tank itself was taking damage. The Toxo Warrior had clearly made the same calculations even faster; he was darting for the door. Carl hopped over a long, thin rivulet of acid to continue the pursuit… and stepped in a bear trap.

“Seriously?” he said.

“It was what we could come up with,” the Toxo Warrior said. He had already opened a trapdoor. “For what it’s worth, I told them you’ll probably live.” The door slammed.

 

The blast came 10 seconds later.

Fiction: The Adventures of Sidekick Carl, part 22!

 It's the start of what I planned as an off-week, and I finally have a new installment of Sidekick Carl, padded out with some material I already had. As usual, here's links for the first and previous installments, also the chapter that introduced most of the characters, and one more that would have had a good part of this if I hadn't cut it down.

As the train came to a stop, John Carter put on his blue uniform. He then broke out a case that held his weapons and armor. “I’d say we gave Carl enough time to break into the site,” he said. “I’m going to go see if he’s found out anything. Want to come along?” He turned to his wife Lauren.

 Lauren just gazed back pensively. “I don’t think so, John,” she said.

John looked back intently. “What is it?” he said. “You know you can talk to me.”

She sighed. “All right,” she said. “Yeah… we need to talk.” As she spoke, she laid a small, slim pistol on the end table.

* * *

Two small vehicles approached the abandoned town. The moon shone as bright as the few long-dead street lamps ever could have, clearly revealing the form of the vehicles and their riders. One was Audrey’s three-wheeled scooter, just large enough for Carl and one of her neomorph followers to ride in the flatbed at the rear. Dana followed in a motorcycle modified for her eight-foot height, mainly with a raised seat and greatly lengthened handlebars. Another of the mutants rode with her, a shaggy, seemingly faceless creature only a little shorter than herself. Dana waved to Carl as they pulled to a stop.

The town was really just a small cluster of buildings, half of them warehouses and more specialized storage buildings. The largest was a spindly outlet mall at the south end, extending the size of the development by almost half again. They had halted in a parking lot at the far end of the building. “My people already knew someone was here,” Audrey said. “It didn’t stand out. The development was never really abandoned, and the people who built it were shady to begin with. My second had ordered that it be left alone.”

“It wouldn’t have mattered,” Carl said. “There’s hundreds of places just like this. If you had told anyone, it would probably have bogged down in an argument over who even had jurisdiction, if they paid attention at all.”

“I know,” Audrey said. She bared her teeth. “Humans love law, as long as it means they do nothing.”

Carl unfolded a map that he could already tell had several inaccuracies. He pointed to the largest of the warehouses on the north side of the mall. “This is probably where the Toxo Warriors are, if they were ever here at all,” he said. “We could go through the mall to keep out of sight, but we can figure they will be prepared for that. It’s better to go through here.” He pointed to a small RV park on the east side of the warehouse, still not quite as large as the mall.

10 minutes later, a single Toxo Warrior looked at a monitor. He typed a command, then used a joystick to zoom in with a camera. The feed showed a woman more than eight feet tall and a man in something between motorcycle gear and a space suit approaching the east side of the warehouse. “Huh,” he said. “They’re early…”

* * *

John Carter examined the weapon before him. It amounted to a double-barreled derringer. He touched it without picking it up. At a light touch, the grip folded inward, changing the profile to a flattened rectangle the size and shape of a cell phone or a pager. “This is polymer and ceramic,” he said. “You could take it through a metal detector. It might get through a scanner, if there’s active sensor baffles.”

“There are,” Lauren said. “I had it with me, the day the Raven took over the office. Of course, I had it a long time before that.”

“I’ve never had anything like this,” John said. “I was two grades below where I am now before I saw specs for anything like this. The only people they would give it to are deep-cover intelligence or… field security auditors.”

“You’re quick, I give you that,” Lauren said. For what it’s worth, it wasn’t a fake-and-bake; you know how well that goes. I didn’t even lie about my age. I just had extra training.”

“We knew,” John said. “At least, we knew there was going to be an audit. Colby thought there was already an auditor in the office. He must have figured out it was you, or guessed. I suppose it was easier, when he was the one you were looking for. It doesn’t matter, now. But if you had a gun… why didn’t you use it?”

“I had my own orders, as soon as I reported the breach,” she said. “I wasn’t to reveal my identity, until and unless I made contact with the Raven or his infiltrator. I just needed to be good bait. Young, pretty, spunky enough to talk back without looking like a threat.”

“It wouldn’t have worked,” John said. “It’s not the right caliber. A full clip from my 10 mm barely put a dent in the Raven’s wingsuit.”

“I’d seen the schematics analysis, there were ways to get through,” Lauren said. “The situation evolved before I had my chance. By the time you got to me, the best chance was to stay behind you while you did your cowboy run and see if that was enough to draw out the real threat.” She gazed back into his eyes. “Here’s the thing, John. I wasn’t looking for Colby. I was there to watch you.”

* * *

Dana stifled a giggle as she and Carl reached the warehouse. It was 50 by 100 feet and 25 tall, including a shallow peaked roof. At a stern glance from Carl, she put on a gas mask. She turned to their only companion, a gray-skinned mutant just under 5 feet tall with gangling ape-like arms. Its nostrils promptly contracted shut with an audible snick.

Carl looked up at a set of windows about 12 feet off the ground. “I need to see inside,” he said. Dana hoisted him onto her shoulders. He climbed high enough to stand, which by then required him to stoop slightly. The visibility was better than it would have been in broad daylight; he could have seen enough even in pitch darkness.

“It’s empty,” he said with finality. He felt Dana’s shoulders sag. “The floor is, anyway. In fact… it’s really emptier than I would have expected. Usually, there’s stuff left behind, trash, unsold goods, empty cartons. Then you get homeless people, kids, animals…”

“Like if somebody cleaned up first and took everything when they were done,” Dana said.

“Right,” Carl said. “Still, there could be something. Only one way to find out…” With that, he smashed the window with his helmet and vaulted through.

* * *

 

John only stared as Lauren continued. “We knew the Raven had someone inside, though we didn’t know what he was planning,” she said. “There were people who thought it was you, others who thought you knew something you weren’t reporting. I had instructions to get close to you. I had approval to seduce you, if it got you to talk.”

 

John finally spoke, his voice coldly neutral. “Had you ever done that before?”

“No,” she said. “That’s not even how it really works, anyway, most of the time. The things that get a guy to drop his pants aren’t the things that will get him to talk about what matters. It’s a lot harder with a bad man than a good one… Well. That’s what the trainers say.”

“What about the rest?” John said. “Going to bed, getting married, having kids… was that their idea of keeping tabs on me?”

Lauren shook her head. “It happens, to a lot of us,” she said. “We call it the retirement plan. We usually only get 18, maybe 24 months in the field before our training and mission intelligence are deemed obsolete. After that, we usually get left to fend for ourselves. Our training is to go to ground before it comes to that. Accept promotions, make friends, make love, get married. Go native, pretty much. When we met, I decided you were my parachute.”

“What if I had been the infiltrator?” John said.

“You weren’t, John,” she said. “I always knew that.”

“I need to leave,” John said. “I won’t say I won’t come back for you, but I need more time than we’ve had before. I suppose you were ready for that, too.”

Lauren gave him a more thoughtful look, her chin resting on her hand. “It’s not like we haven’t done it before,” she said.

John turned back to his gear. “You realize while we’ve been doing this, Carl and Dana have been getting into more trouble,” he said.

Lauren smiled. “I’ve been counting on it,” she said.

* * *

 

Dana impatiently shifted from foot to foot. She adjusted a radio receiver they carried. She heard only a growled command from Audrey, which confirmed that she was still circling around the other side of the warehouse. She almost called out, but saw the mutant shake its head. “If he found something, he would have called us, if he could,” she said. “I’m going in.” The mutant shrugged.

She looked up, then to either side. She could see no way up to the window, nor anything that would support her weight to climb up. She considered the options for entry. There was a loading door that was clearly locked and possibly rusted beyond use. She found a conventional door, also locked but made of wood rather than metal. “I can take care of that,” she said. She backed up and prepared for a kick.

That was when an explosion blew the roof off the warehouse.

Fiction: The Adventures of Sidekick Carl, part 21!

 Still only the fourth post I had planned for this week, another installment of Sidekick Carl, so of course, still more worldbuilding. Here's links for the first and previous installments as usual, plus another chapter I referenced. You can still take it as ambiguous....

Sparks shot from the towering combat exoskeleton as Constructor struck another blow. Then there was an blue-white arc of electricity as Carl pulled a handful of cables from the back of the frame that held its 9-foot-6 operator. “Goliath, stop!” the hero called out. “You know the Raven isn’t taking you with him! You’re just buying him time!” The clearly mechanical face of the giant contorted in a roar as he charged, just as Carl tore open a hydraulic line.

Dana shook her head and sighed. “He didn’t even have a temper,” she mused. She leaned around the edge of the dinette. “You doing okay, hon?”

In the darkness, Carl sat on her heavily adjusted seat, steering as he had for over 12 hours. “We’re fine,” he said.

* * *

 

The scene looked like something out of a book of fairy tales, perhaps a score of rustic yet brightly colored cottages lit be the setting sun. The sun reflected brightly on the bronze statue in the little park at the center, a familiar figure with large eyes and very pointed ears. A sign said cheerfully, WELCOME TO AUDREYVILLE. There was nothing to show the scale, until the shadow of Dana’s 14-foot-tall, 32-foot-long RV fell over a house barely a third its size. A figure covered in black fur peered out a window, and promptly ducked back inside.

“So this was just 20 miles from where we’re going?” Dana pondered. By then, she was in the seat, supporting Carl in her lap.

“Technically, it’s tribal land,” Carl said. “The natives let them in. I heard one of the shamans said they were nature spirits come to life. The rest of the tribe pretty much humored him, and it turned out they get along. Then there were mines and old towns, right past the edge of the reservation. Before Basiliskus’s uprising, a developer tried to reopen things, even built an outlet mall. The Raven’s operation bought them out, just before he bought it himself. The old Toxo Warriors’ company was doing renovations.”

“Huh,” Dana said. “The Raven didn’t really last long, did he?”

“He was the first big player to go down, after Galaxarian,” Carl said. “It was still 7 years after Constructor got his powers, and 5 years after he freed me. Long before that, he was already selling arms and branching into espionage and gray tech years before Constructor got his powers. Remember the Princess of Sumatra? That was one of the Raven’s fronts. Constructor’s wife was one of the passengers.”

“Jesus,” Dana said. “Did he know…?”

“Enough to guess,” Carl said. “It didn’t change anything, really. He wanted the Raven stopped, and he knew he was going to make a big move sooner or later. The only time anyone said it was personal was a stretch when a lot of people thought the Raven was dead or dropped out. Constructor didn’t buy it, really didn’t talk about it, he just waited. It was 2 years all told, between out last run-in and when he invaded the Agency. After that, everything else was moot.” He leaned back, which happened to put his head against Dana’s sternum.

“I’m not distracting you, am I?” she mused.

“Of course not,” he said. He shifted. “I suppose I’ve been noticing… proportions.”

“I notice you noticing,” Dana said. She tousled his hair.

“The thing is, with you, ah, things don’t look big. Well, not as big as they are.”

“It’s the same with all the Tall People,” Dana said. “We’re already about as big as a human body can get and still function. So, most things are no bigger than normal, or even smaller… proportionately. And yeah, that included Goliath.”

“Yeah,” Carl said, squirming. “Him.”

“Audrey told me you were going to worry,” Dana said. “I already told you, I never went where we have, with anybody.”

“It doesn’t bother me, really,” Carl said. “I’m just sorry we hurt him.”

Dana nuzzled the top of his head. “That’s why you’re a good man,” she said.

The RV was literally too large for the town’s narrow roads, so they circled on a dirt track until they reached a structure on the outskirts that had been built to human proportions. “Listen,” Carl said. “We’re here by invitation only, and the number of people who’ve been invited is barely into the double digits. The other thing to remember, this isn’t just Audrey’s home. It’s where she’s queen. If we do or say anything they think is disrespectful, they’re going to take it as an offense to her.”

“All right,” Dana said, looking bemused. “I’ll follow your lead. Trust me.”

They emerged from the RV, just as a group of furry figures came out of the house. One was clearly an adult, with somewhat patchy reddish-brown fur, wearing a dress that confirmed it was a female. Beside her was another creature with the same  black-and-white fur as Audrey’s second mate, as tall as the adult with a lingering downy look. “You can call me Henna,” the adult said. “This is my daughter Kira.” The piebald creature briefly bared her teeth.

Dana said softly, without quite whispering, “I never even kept track, what were the names of Audrey’s husbands?”

Henna turned to look her in the eye. “We call them Red and Casablanca,” she said. “I’m sure you can guess which is which.”

Dana pondered for a moment. “Sure, but why Casa…” She practically winced. “Black and white.”

“Better in black and white,” Henna amended. “If you never heard him say that, consider yourself lucky.”

They followed the creatures through a door big enough for Carl but not for Dana, who came close to bowing to get through. It opened into something like a parlor, with furniture and décor that looked copied from a murder mystery. The ceiling was just high enough for Dana to walk upright. She glanced up, and confirmed that what looked like a landing was a complete level sized for the creatures. A half-dozen more played, all smaller than the adults but considerably larger than the kits they had seen with Audrey. A seventh, only a little bigger than the kits, played with a Constructor doll in the middle of the parlor floor. Kira hissed and spoke something, but her mother countermanded her. The child scuttled away, carrying both the doll and what appeared to be a high school biology textbook.

At Dana’s glance, Carl said, “They’d be the same age as elementary school kids if they were human. The lifecycle really isn’t much different from ours. They’re born after 6 months gestation, then it’s two years to reach full mobility, and fertility between age 10 and 12. They’re probably going to start hitting old age at 40 or 50. We aren’t sure, because Basiliskus accelerated things for the first generation…”

“That’s right,” Henna said. “He got us to adulthood in half the time, and we’ll be lucky if it turns out he only took a decade off our lives.”

Dana stretched out on a couch rather than trying to sit. “So I noticed,” she said, “your daughter looks a lot like Casablanca…” If she had looked over her shoulder, she would have seen a discrete but urgent gesture. It was Kira herself who spoke.

“I do,” she said. “He’s my father. And my mother and the Mistress are his mates.”

Dana belatedly looked at Carl, who shook his head. “Okay,” she said. “I… guess that’s not a big surprise. So… is this a free love thing?” She glanced belatedly at the cubs. They showed no interest.

“No,” Henna said. “That means no commitment, no responsibilities. `Creche’ would come close. We live together and take care of each other, our mates and our children.”

Dana turned to Carl again. “Did you know?” she asked.

“I never asked, but I knew it happens,” he said. “How many of you are there?”

“Seven all told, 4 females and 3 males,” Henna said. “More than most, not exceptional.”

Carl nodded. There was an awkward silence, until Kira spoke up. “Don’t act shocked, hominid!” she said. “You think you can teach us your morals, when you made us for your dirty work? Why should we even explain ourselves to you? Our Mistress let you in, but that doesn’t mean you can pry in our business!”

“Hush, kitten,” Henna said. Kira obeyed, though she was clearly unhappy. “Carl is a good spirit. So was Constructor. Besides, he will only be here a little while.”

Carl quickly managed to shift to small talk, and learned about the colony in the process. “We were trying to settle down, even before Audrey finally surrendered,” Henna said. “We made it possible, really. It started with the tribal elders accepting mothers and kits as members, then their mates, and finally any thereomorph that agreed to obey their laws and not make war against humans. Audrey and Red surrendered on the condition that they would join us here. She accepted Casablanca as her consort after.”

“She told me a story about how they met,” Carl said. “I thought it might have been a joke…”

Henna managed a laugh. “If it was what I think, then it was true enough,” she said. As she told the tale, Kira rolled her eyes and covered her ears.  “She showed him favor while I was in seclusion with our first kits, and he spent 5 nights at her door asking to be her consort. I’m guessing she left out that I dragged him home twice. At the end of it, she sent a messenger to me. She said she would take him if I agreed to be her own Second. It had its perks. I waited two days, and then accepted.”

“Then what do you do?” Dana said, clearly cautious.

“I manage the household when she’s handling her other duties,” Henna said. “In an emergency, I have the power to give the colony orders in her place, which becomes permanent if she dies or resigns her offices. Then once we’re both gone, my kits will have the same standing as hers in the line of succession. And there was another thing… Before she chose a Second, any kits Red conceived by other mates counted as hers. Once I took my place, the kits I bore by her favored consort would be counted as both his and mine. In fact, she stipulated it as non-negotiable that we would conceive. It matters more than it sounds. There was a month after we moved in when we were still guests. At the end…” she shook in silent laughter.

The sun had just gone down when they heard the hum of an approaching vehicle. Henna escorted them out, just as Audrey pulled up in a three-wheeled scooter. “I’m glad you made it,” she said curtly. “Are you ready to go?”

“Sure,” Carl said. As he followed Dana back to their RV, he looked back at Henna. She had already turned to go back into the house.

Fiction: The Adventures of Sidekick Carl Part 20!

 It's mid-week, and I decided it was time for more Sidekick Carl, I hope one of a few I will get in before the month is up. This time around, it's just a scene with a couple characters I've been building up more than I planned. I had enough material that I held back some for later. As usual, here's the first and previous installments, and while I'm at it the chapter that introduced these two. I'm at maximum snark with the movie parody angle. Also, there is a line here I really came up with as a kid...

The woman was clearly beautiful and equally clearly in distress. She was tied to an office swivel chair, which was itself lashed to a set of double doors. The view was flattering as she looked straight up. “Nod if you can hear me,” a gruff stage whisper said. Piercing eyes peered out of a vent. “Constructor and Carl are in the building. I talked to them. When they make their move, I’m going to get you out. I just need to know, which doors are the guards at?” The woman turned her wide eyes just off-frame… just as a door opened.

Then the frame froze, as John and Lauren Carter burst out laughing.

* * *

The moon shone brightly on a small but well-furnished room, now and then interrupted by a passing tree. The two agents lay unclothed under the covers, clearly happy. “We should do this more often,” Lauren said.

“It wasn’t anything, really,” John said. “They had to move the VIP train to pick up an ambassador. If we hadn’t gotten aboard, the room would be empty.”

The screen showed a beautiful actress and a handsome, somewhat older actor racing across a rooftop. Behind them, a 7-foot bodybuilder cast as Constructor fought Goliath and his lumbering combat exoskeleton, represented with what was clearly a miniature puppet. The unseen operator alternated slashed at the superhero, then tried again to dislodge the figure of Sidekick Carl, hanging on to the back for dear life. “It’s still better than CGI,” Lauren said. She nestled closer against him. “How many VIPs do you think have done what we did?”

“Ah… more than you might think,” he said. He put an arm around her. “We can skip this if you want to.”

“No,” Lauren said. “I’m all right.”

The heroine raced down a set of stairs, which a medium-distance shot showed leading to the launchpad of a quadruple-fanned VTOL craft, while the hero fired over his shoulder. As he turned back, the lady seemed frozen in her tracks. Then another man pushed into view, in the same blue uniform he wore, with a gun pressed to her head. “Sorry, Jonny,” the villain said. “You had a good run, but I need to catch my flight. And she's coming along for the ride.”

As the actors spoke, John mouthed silently. It was mostly banter that had never happened, as the traitor justified himself, but a few lines had really happened, or replaced ones they had never told.

“This is about me, not her!”

“Anything to say to each other?” (Why don't you tell him who you really are?)

“Don’t worry about me, John…” (I love you! I’ve always loved you!)

“You can’t play hero forever, John-boy!” (You think she really means it?)

“It will be all right…” (Let her go, she’s just scared.)

“You’re not riding off into the sunset…” (Why do you think she tried to get you in bed, love at first sight?)

Then they both howled as the hero said, “If there’s an afterlife, send me a postcard!” And in the next shot, the traitor was falling to his doom.

As the credits rolled, John turned to his wife. “We… we’ve had a good life, haven’t we? 14 years together, 12 years married…”

“Three kids,” Lauren added.

John nodded. “We made it work. I know it’s been hard, but we did it. Have you wondered, though…”

Lauren drew back enough to look him in the eye. “C’mon, John,” she said, “we have this conversation at least twice a year…”

“I know, but it’s important to me,” John said. “Do you really think we would have gotten together if, well, the Raven hadn’t taken over the office?”

She smiled. “You mean, would I have married Agent John Carter, if I hadn’t seen you escape the Raven’s goons through the air ducts, free the office staff, come back in to save me, shoot it out with the dirty security chief who let them in, and hotwire a jumpjet to get out before the building self-destructed?”

“Yeah,” John said. “You know what it was really like.”

“Of course we would have been together, John,” Lauren answered. “It was going to happen. It was happening. We already had a connection. We’d gone on a date. It would have been a lot more than a date, if you hadn’t said no. Hell, there’s your what if of history. Would you have married me, if I had taken you home on our first date?”

“Yeah,” John said, shifting awkwardly. “Of course, it wouldn’t have changed how I felt. Still, it would have been… different.”

“Maybe, maybe not,” Lauren said. “Still, I suppose I’m glad we did it your way. For a while. I just want to know… did you have to tell him about it?”

“We were friends,” John answered. “He asked how our date went. Besides, he wouldn’t have told anyone. He couldn’t have told anyone, or the Raven would have tried to use you to get to me from the start.”

“Yeah?” Lauren said. “So what did he say when you told him?”

“Actually,” John said, “he told me if you asked again, I should say yes.”

“Really,” she said. “Were you going to?”

“I hadn’t decided,” he said with a grin. “You hadn’t asked again.”

“Well,” she said, “maybe I was going to if you asked me on a second date. Maybe I was ready to ask if you didn’t…”

“I thought about that,” he said. “I suppose that was why I didn’t ask.”

She straddled him then. “Let’s get one thing straight once and for all… and don’t act like you can’t listen to me while you’re staring at me,” she said. His gaze shifted enough to see real tears in her eyes. “You didn’t save me that day. You weren’t in any shape to save anybody, you were just waiting for a better way to die, until you found me. I saved you, and that made you mine.” She began to pound at his chest. “You’re mine. Mine. Mine.” She was still repeating it as she pulled up the covers and drew him on top.

A while later, they lay sprawled on the bed. She raised her head long enough to say, “By the way, you know Constructor’s girl lied to you, right?”

“Of course,” he said. “I figured we could give them a head start. They might find out something our agents wouldn’t.”

“John,” she said some time later. “Dammit, John, I had my own gun.” But of course, he was asleep.

The Adventures of Sidekick Carl Part 19!

 Have an installment of Sidekick Carl a little earlier than I have been lately. I swear I'm building up to something. As usual, here's links for first and latest chapters, and how about this week's Play People post?

The shape was pitch black, with luminous, shimmering red eyes. “You found me, and fought your way to me,” it said. “What do you want?”

Constructor’s stern face showed in heroic profile. “I want to know what you want,” he said.

It shrugged with the suggestion of arms. “My ways are not your ways, and yours are not mine,” it said. “I can see far away and far ahead, enough to see your place in the shape of what is to come. It serves my purposes to keep you on one course, and away from others. It is useless to explain more than that.”

 

“Then is it for our good, or our harm?” Constructor pressed.

It shrugged again. “Again, it is useless to explain,” it said. “Even you can see, the evil of one day can be a great good in the next, and what is good for one can be evil for many.”

“Then if you will not explain what you intend,” Constructor said, “I would rather you leave us alone.”

The voice was clearly bemused. “And what would you do to keep me from doing as I please?”

 

Constructor raised his rake. “What I can,” he said. As he spoke, Carl stepped to his side.

“Me too,” Carl said. Then there was laughter, and the eyes flared bright…

 

And Audrey’s kits chirped in approval, the smaller ones cuddling with her piebald mate on his bed. “Mama,” said one of the eldest, “do you think that’s what really happened?”

She bared her teeth. “I’ll ask him some time…”

* * *

 

Carl stepped to one side, examining the shape before him. It was like looking at a painting from an angle, distorting the shape without revealing any corresponding depth. Its form was a tapered body and a round head, with hints of brown or gold. Nothing was more prominent than the luminous red eyes. “So, you stayed after all,” Carl said.

“I could never leave,” the thing called Abl C’Doen said. Its voice was unaccented and neutral, almost but not quite nasal. “By your frame of reference, I am everywhere and nowhere. I can choose only when and where to act. You offered an agreement that I would not involve myself in your world’s affairs again. I have kept my bargain.”

“So you didn’t have anything to do with the Toxo Warriors coming back,” Carl said.

“No more than I did with their existence,” it said. “And before you ask, I do not know who they are or where they are. I could find out, of course, but if I were to share it, our agreement would be void. I will not tempt you before you would choose to ask.”

“That’s all well and good,” Carl said. “We found them before- or the first two, we know that much- and we can find them again. What I want to know is, what are they doing? And who are they working for? You wouldn’t be here if you didn’t know something.”

“Naturally, I have insights,” C’Doen answered. “There are certain things that distort what you call time and space in ways that an entity like me can detect in advance. Such a disturbance will come, if the shape of events does not change.”

“Right,” said Carl. “Like, say, if someone rebuilt or reverse-engineered Dr. Hydro’s wormhole generator.”

“It is the likeliest explanation,” C’Doen said. “There are other possibilities I have considered; all of them are even further beyond your knowledge.”

Carl’s helmet hid his face, yet his smile was clear in his voice. “If they make it work, could they threaten you?”

“It would pose a certain risk,” the creature said. “It would be enough to reach the planes where I dwell, or draw me into yours if I did not withdraw myself. Then a being of your world could challenge me, try to take my power or make me their servant. It would by no means be on equal terms, whatever they might imagine; still, it would be a contest on what you could call a level playing field.”

Carl shook his head. “That doesn’t sound like the Toxo Warriors,” he said. “At least not the ones I met. Whatever they were doing wasn’t about money, but it wasn’t about power either. It might be different, if they were working for someone else.”

“I would agree, and I admit you are a better judge of humans than I,” C’Doen said.  “I have considered further, who might think to challenge me. There are not many; some you would know, others you would not.”

“I already have my own list,” Carl said. “Dr. Hydro. Gravatar. Galaxarian. The only problem is, they’re all supposed to be dead. Or do you know something I don’t?”
“I could already tell you more than you know,” C’Doen said. “The price would be what we already discussed.”

Carl nodded warily. “How about this?” he said. “I’ll tell you what we think we know, you tell me if we’re wrong.”

The eyes flared brighter. “That is acceptable.”

“All right,” Carl said. “Gravatar got thrown into interplanetary space when his gravity chariot was damaged. The last anyone knew, he was on a trajectory for the sun at 0.01% of the speed of light. Nobody could prove he really bought it, but if he was coming back, he’d be here by now.”

“True,” C’Doen said with surprising directness.

“Dr. Hydro is pretty much the same deal,” Carl continued. “We don’t know where he went, and he’s tough enough to survive a lot of places he could have gone. But his wormhole generator was smashed, and he never had a way back.”

“True enough,” C’Doen said.

Carl’s eyes narrowed. “Then there’s Galaxarian,” he said. “He was bigger than big when Constructor was just getting started. It took two Hombres Aceros, Constructor and Captain Thunder to bring down his mobile command center. When it did, it came down hard, enough to scatter debris for 800 kilometers, after Constructor said they tore his head off. But… I never heard anything more about the head.”

“You’re on the right track,” Abl C’Doen said. As it spoke, the eyes flared bright. It paused before continuing, “You know, it was because of you that I offered the agreement. I could tell, you are more powerful than you know, and you have grown since then. You can be greater than Hydro, perhaps one day as great as me… if you choose that path.” The eyes glowed brighter, so bright he was blinded for a moment. When his vision cleared, there was only night.

It was just then that Dana leaned out the door of the RV. “Are you coming to bed?” she said.

He looked at her, She wore a basket ball jersey that came to her midriff, and a pair of shorts that just barely covered her hips.

“You bet,” he said. She took his hand and led him inside.

Later, they lay on the dinette that converted into their bed, his head at her feet. He cradled her calves, as long as his upper body. She shifted with a happy sigh, without stirring. Before he drifted to sleep, he realized why he was awake. There was a faint buzz, accompanied by a flashing light covered with duct tape. The RV’s satellite phone was activated. He managed to pick up the audio handset without engaging the viewscreen. For the first few moments, he heard only breathing. That was enough. “Audrey,” he said.

“Carl,” she said. “I talked to Dana… our Dana. She knows more than she said. I told her I could tell. She told me… she knows where the Toxo Warriors might be.”

“Okay,” he said. “What now?”

“I’m going to find them,” she said. “Then, if I can… I’m going to kill them. I need to know… if you’re in.”

He rolled over to gaze at Dana. It took only a moment to say, “Yes.”