The Legion of Silly Dinosaurs Anniversary Special: The Silliest Dinosaur???

 

As I write this, I'm still in overdrive actually finishing an actual novel, and I realized I actually had an extra week that I could either take off or make one post for. I also very much had in mind that this month would be none other than the third anniversary of the first post of my feature on silly AWESOME dinosaurs. (Yes, that was always supposed to be the gag...) Since I had already scaled back to bimonthly posts to keep my blog sustainable, I could have still have skipped, but then, the whole point of this feature has been to make a little time for something that's been a part of my life as long as I've been alive. So, I'm going through with this just a little after the actual anniversary, and as luck would have it, I just spent way too much money on a dino that fit the bill. Behold the... uh... Allo-Cerato-Thingysaurus???

It looks like there's not enough light. Actually, there's kind of too much...

Now for the story, I sighted this guy in a used bookstore where I've made a fair number of acquisitions featured here (including the worst-ever bigmouth and for that matter my favorite/ most useless reference model the Truckstop Queen), and I knew this was worth taking home just to have absolute proof it actually exists. As a further incentive, I discovered there were no obvious production markings, making this at least a minor mystery. So, I bought it for a price in the high single digits that was still definitely on the steep side for what I was getting, and brought it in for closer inspection. And here's another pic of this damn thing.

Once I had already paid for it, I did what I could have at any time and tried a search with a few terms that might identify the manufacturer. I quickly confirmed my early suspicion that this was part of the Fisher Price Imaginext line, which got in here with the Jurassic World Therizonosaurus. Further inquiries indicated that it was part of a 2005 set called T. Rex Mountain, which also included a caveman. Of course, that begs the question of what this is supposed to be, and that's where the horror begins. But first, a couple closeups...

Foot pegs never lie!

To begin with, this is a clear case of a "composite" dino, which really isn't a bad thing in itself. Its strongest affinities are with Ceratosaurus (which got its own post and an appearance together with a W@lmart hadrosaur before that), complete with the ridge along the back, but the number and placement of the horns don't exactly match. In other respects, it's more like a generic allosaurid, particularly in terms of the hands and the shape of the head. But with all these forgiving considerations taken into account, it still does an amazing number of things exactly wrong. The posture is a redundant combination of the "modern" horizontal orientation and the classic "tripod" pose that in terms of design functionality gives the disadvantages of both and the advantages of neither. The arms are in the basketball-dribbling pose that the nitpickers have been saying was impossible, and in any case are hopelessly ill-proportioned and grotesquely sculpted to boot. The feet are their own kind of mess, outlandishly small yet still clunky to a degree that may not fully show in the pics. The cherry on this sundae is the head. It has a bit of what now gets called "shrink-wrapping", which I have thought of as a "mummified" look. That only brings out the real problem: The eye is much too far back, in what would really be the anchoring windows (I know, fenestrae) for the jaw muscles. On casual inspection, it might look like someone mixed up which opening is the eye socket, but it's really worse than that. The head is too short for its comparatively limited depth, which didn't leave enough room to sculpt the details of the skull structure. It's all the more striking that these issues really came out because people were clearly trying to do this as a "realistic" dino rather than a dinosaur-like fantasy monster like the  patchisaurs. Yes... this is beautiful. 

And because this was a little bit thin, I decided to take a few pics of my reissue Marx Tyrannosaurus, which I don't believe I featured except as a pic for my T. rex-vs. research post. This is another epitome of bad dino design. As covered in my video on the Hideous Abomination, this was made as part of the 1950s "large mold" group, along with the great Brontosaurus and less great Kronosaurus pliosaur/ plesiosaur hybrid. This, on the other hand, was easily the worst dino Marx ever did. The pose is wrong, the teeth are wrong, the expression is just goofy, and the arms are... actually right??? It's the kind of mess that can be endearing long after well-meaning "scientific" restorations are forgotten. Here's a few pics.

"Howdy, is this where I audition for Valley of Gwangi?"

And why not a pic with the Abomination?

"Yeah, my agent said I was going to be in Dungeons and Dragons..."

And an interactive pic...

So, that finishes my anniversary post. As I already rambled at the beginning, this feature is one of the things that keeps this blog going, and the blog has been a major reason I've gotten back into writing far enough to be close to finishing a novel. (Too bad about the ones I actually posted here...) It's a small thing, but like a tiny fossil, small things can be everything. The bottom line is, I'm glad to have come this far, and I hope to go a lot further. And I couldn't end this without the Truckstop Queen!

"When they said cowboys and dinosaurs, this was not what I had in mind..."

That's all for now, more to come!

Fiction: The Space Guys Adventure, Part 4!

 

It's time for the mid-week post, and I still didn't have anything better than another Space Guys installment. I had a bit more to this one but I cut things off, partly because my romance plots are already getting locked in a groove. Here's links for parts 1, 2 and 3. Also, behold the glory of Fisher Price Construx!

Moxon took out a video case. He seemed to mumble as he took out the carrying caddy that held the disc. He opened the top of a player on top of a hexagonal audio-video console. The circular screen underneath came on. Jason smiled at the sight of Sparky.

“The studio is our biggest sponsor,” Alek mused. “Anyway, it’s tradition…”

“Hello, folks,” he said in his falsetto voice. The squirrel’s ears, with their long, dark tufts, twitched as he talked. “I’m Sparky, the mascot of the United Nations Combined Space Exploration And Development Agency. We’ve come a long way, haven’t we? Now, I’m here to tell you about our next mission. We’re going to Neptune. That’s 3 billion miles from the sun, can you believe it? To do it, we needed the biggest, fastest ship ever. Here’s some nice, smart folks who will tell you about it…”

The screen went dark momentarily. When it came back, the screen showed a stern face like something out of a book of mythology, viewed from head on. One side, however, was a second face turned in profile. It made Jason think uneasily of his first glimpse of Moxon. “It is the days of ancient Rome,” a deep and serious voice said. The picture showed a reconstruction of temples and villas bustling with evidently happy people. “They worship many gods. Perhaps the greatest is Janus, the brother of Uranus, the father of Saturn and the grandfather of Jupiter. He is the protector of doors and city gates. The bringer of good fortune, the guardian of commerce and the preserver of peace. It is his name that has been given to the ship that will carry mankind to  the edge of interstellar space.”

Pictures appeared of the Janus, both models and the actual ship, the latter usually in various stages of construction. Various specs were given that usually fit what the captain had mentioned. Jason realized that the long, spindly fuselage he had passed was really only a third of the ship, even with the huge payloader added. The rest was divided somewhat unequally between the hexagonal engineering section that supported the wheel they were in and a bell-like assembly that looked in cross-section like a 6-pointed star with its arms cut short or rounded down, full of colossal thrusters and even more enormous storage tanks. Apart from the sheer size, the only truly unusual features were a smaller ring behind the life-support wheel and at least two gigantic spheres in the tail. As he thought this, the narrator said, “What look like fuel tanks at the rear are really a cryogenic system for storing, condensing and mixing hydrogen and other gases for the ship’s main reactor. They are fed by electromagnetic conduits into a fission-fusion reactor vessel and from there into a toroidal fusion generator. The waste gases are expelled as exhaust from the ship’s secondary thrusters.”

As if in in afterthought, the voice added, “The life support section holding the crew simulates gravity through centrifugal force, roughly .25 EG for every 3 to 4 rotations per minute.” The image focused on one of the drive nacelles, nearly twice as long and half again as long as the life support modules. From the front it was what Jason knew as a Steinmetz solid, like a cross between a dome and pyramid. It tapered into a ring of seven stubby engines cylinders spread out just enough to accommodate a crew. “The same structure contains the ship’s primary propulsion system, 21 argon/ xenon plasma thrusters in three nacelles. The ship can accelerate to an optimal average speed of 250,000 miles per hour in as little as 20 days.”

After more obvious facts, the narrator moved forward. “So what challenge could require such a powerful ship?” he said. The screen showed a blue-green orb, circled by an opalescent ring. “This is the planet Neptune, named for the Roman god of the oceans, the outermost of the giant  gaseous planets of the Solar System. It is 4 times the diameter of Earth, with 60 times the volume and 20 times the mass. Like the other outer planets, it is made almost entirely from condensed hydrogen and other gases. Its orbit is 2.8 billion miles from Sol, so far that the very light of the sun takes more than 4 hours to reach it. Mars, the most distant Earth-like planet, is 2.6 billion miles short. Titan, the para-moon of Saturn, the furthest body inhabited by mankind, remain 2 billion miles distant at its nearest approach. Even Uranus, the next furthest of the gaseous planets, is 1 billion miles from the planet. To reach it, the Janus and its crew most go more than twice as far as the longest voyage in history, without refueling or relief. Yet, their objective is not the planet, but the bodies that orbit it.”

Finally, a grainy image appeared of a mottled orb, seen against the background of Neptune. “This is Proserpine, named for the wife of Pluto, the ruler of the dead,” the announcer said. “Astronomers believe it to be a sister to the para-planet Pluto, captured by the gravity of the gaseous planet. It is a para-moon twice the diameter of Luna with at least 50% greater density, first observed by the Kronos expedition. Remarkably, spectrographic scans have confirmed that it has a gaseous atmosphere with significant quantities of carbon dioxide, oxygen and even possible water vapor, all necessary characteristics to support para-Terrestrial life. The Janus has been sent to survey the para-moon both for human colonization and for possible native organisms. If the expedition succeeds, we may have confirmation whether Earth is the only planet to produce organic life. More than that, we will have opened one more gateway on our path to the stars!”

The captain sighed and signaled for Moxon to stop the video. “That is the official mission briefing, already released to the public,” he said. “I welcome your thoughts. What I’d really like to know is, why did you decide to come?”

Jax shook his head. “It’s Titan all over again,” he said. “They said it was so Earthlike, they might relocate the Mars colonies there. 10 years later, all they’ve done is put 12 poor frozen bastards in a pressure dome that four of us Martians couldn’t sleep in. I’d want to know what’s out there, but I’m tired of people saying there’s aliens or something just past where we’ve been. Honestly, I signed up to get off Mars for a while.”

“I’ve been following it,” Jason said more evenly. “It’s an important mission. Even if we had to turn around, it will be a shakedown for new technology.”

The old man Futura clasped his wife’s hand. “It’s one last thing nobody’s done before,” he said. “It will probably be our last ride.”

“I’m just happy to work with new people,” Alek said. She slapped Jason’s hip. “It’s exciting, no?”

“I’m here because I was the only one in the right place with the right skills,” Moxon said.

Dr. Cahill just laughed. “I came to see the universe,” she said with a shrug. Only then did Jason see she wore a wedding ring.

“All very good!” the captain said. “Moxon, why don’t you get the new arrivals settled in? It will be the fitting room first, then your bunks.”

 

Moxon led the Martians, Alek and Dr. Cahill through the life-support ring to an intermediate connecting module. Jason tried to relax as Alek came up alongside him. “It’s good to meet in person,” she said. “I understand, now, why it wouldn’t have worked before. You know, I was sure I saw you through the window of the shuttle. I saw your picture in the news, after you were chosen. I would have gone to meet you, but I had a meeting with the captain.”

“I saw you, too,” Jason said. “I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to find you. Except… I didn’t really recognize you. You… don’t look like the photo you sent.”

“No glasses?” Alek said.

“Maybe,” Jason said. “But it’s not just that. It’s like, you changed just a little. More confident, maybe.” That just got a smile from Alek.

“Thank you for explaining, about Mars,” she said after a moment’s pause. “I can see now, why  it would no have worked to visit.”

“It was just the wrong time, for you and me,” Jason said. “I should have waited.”

“Of course, you were right.” She abruptly kissed him on the cheek. “But we have understanding, no? And we have plenty time. 20 months there, 12 back. We can take as much time as we need.”

They reached a chamber lined with clothes, including two-piece undergarments. A female officer was waiting, a statuesque older woman with a stern, striking face and incongruous platinum-blonde curly hair. “Tanya,” Dr. Cahill said curtly.

“Lana,” the other said, with the long, slow inflection of an enthusiastically-cast curse.

“This is Tanya Plotnikov,” Moxon said with unconcealed amusement. “She is the senior officer for the Trans-Eurasian Federation, as I am for the Pan-Atlantic Union.”

“Where is she from?” Jason wondered out of the side of his mouth. “Novgorod? Circassia? Finland?”

“Edinburgh,” Alek whispered back. She pointed to Dr. Cahill. “They go to same school.”

 

The women and the men inspected each other’s garments without embarrassment, at least from the former. “These are your inner garments,” Moxon said. “Frankly, we’ve already gotten casual enough that a lot of us wear nothing else.”

Jason was already considering the differences between the garments for each gender. Both were provided with a kind of undershirt that fastened in front with a circular slide that was twisted and then pulled down. The bottom piece differed more. The men were given what looked halfway between swimming trunks and a codpiece, with a slide in front and a kind of flap in back. The women, on the other hand, were provided with underpants that did not quite cover their hips, fastened entirely with a slide that started from the back. “It is quite easy to use, actually,” Alek said. “I helped with the design. All you have to do is twist and then gently pull…” Jax almost choked as she demonstrated.

A partition went up as they changed. Jason and Jax turned awkwardly as they changed. The fatigues provided were a robin’s-egg blue with a hint of green, evidently to match the color of Neptune. The outermost layer, meant to be worn meant to be worn during excursions on a planetary surface, was a jumpsuit of a silver-gray like pencil lead, with light gray belts and straps girding the waist and torso that bore bright reflective patches. Jason started as the partition came open. Dr. Cahill stood in only her inner garments, leaning against the wall. It was obvious that time had not been hard on her figure. He had a peripheral glimpse of Alek, pressed behind a bulkhead as she hastily pulled down her dress. “Howdy, boys,” Cahill said. “Looking for a good time?” Jax gave a drawn-out whistle. Cahill and Alek both laughed as she shut the partition again.

“You’re married,” Jason said to Jax.

“You had an understanding with Jen Johnson,” Jax muttered back.

“What do you mean?” Jason said. “Who told you that?”

“Well, I saw what you were doing in Port Eris!”

Moxon cleared his throat as they reached a room, one of two in the rear side-passage of the final living module. Two other men across the way looked up at them briefly before closing a privacy partition. “This will be your room, for the time being,” Moxon said. A glance confirmed that it was 2.8 meters long and 1.4 meters deep. The space was dominated by a couch 1.8 meters long that could convert to a bed that spanned most of the cabin. The remainder held a lavatory that combined a mirror, a slide-out sink and a recessed stall recognizable on examination as a combination shower and floor toilet.

“You may have noticed, every standard cabin has either one of these or a kitchen,” Moxon said. “You will be sharing with the boys across the way. They’re our Indo-Malayan contingent. Sarip is from Sulawesi, Aisi is from Papua. Good fellows; they’ll warm up to you if you give them a little space. Well, as much as you can.” He laughed. “And we have this for tall boys like you…”

He dismounted the back of the couch. With Jason’s help, it locked into a frame overhead; he assisted more with its unwieldly size than the miniscule weight. Together with an overhead shelf, it formed a bed 2.5 meters long and .75 meters wide. It intruded slightly into the lavatory, but was recessed far enough that it did not overhang the couch/ bed below. “It’s not ideal, but it’s going to be your best bet,” the officer said. “It even has its own partition.” He demonstrated a curtain that slid out from the bin. “There’s a self-inflating cushion and other bedding in storage. You can climb up with this…” He reached up for an overhead bin above the lavatory. Sure enough, a ladder slid out and swung down. As the officer extended himself, Jason’s eyes were drawn to something hanging from his belt. It was a knife, unimpressive in itself, with an ivory grip that had clearly replaced the original and a studded guard that could only be intended to double as a brass knuckles. He hastily averted his gaze as the other man turned, but his lip was already curled in a half-smile.

“You like that, don’t you?” Moxon said, even as Jason shook his head. “I don’t blame you. It’s certainly a conversation piece.” He deliberately gripped the knife, the blade pointed downward. On closer examination, it was clear that the knuckles had been sharpened, possibly with machine tools. “I picked this up in Sri Lanka, from an old Tamil trooper. He said his father had used it in the First Great War, all the way over in France. So he said. For all I know, he could have got it at a pawn shop in Old Siam. I never had a chance to ask him about it again.” He demonstrated a punch, a slash, and a slow and deliberate throat-cutting motion. He laughed again and stepped out. Jax promptly shut the partition.

“I don’t know what’s up with him,” Jason said.

“I think maybe he likes you,” Jax answered. Jason shook his head and climbed up to the extended bunk.

Jason had spent an hour settling onto an indifferent mattress when there was a knock at the partition. Almost immediately, the partition unlocked and opened. He narrowly stopped short of braining himself as he sat up. Already, someone was climbing up the ladder. For a moment, he swore he could see Moxon’s face rising into view. But it took just a little longer or the intruder to appear. The face was Alek’s, and in that moment, she seemed just as terrifying.

“Hi, Jason,” she said. “I’m sorry, can we talk?” He nodded. She smiled as she climbed into the bunk and slid the partition into place behind her.

The Legion of Silly Dinosaurs: Therizinosaurs!

 

It's the last day before a big vacation, and I decided it was time to clear out some backlogged material. As it happens, I have a new acquisition and something I've had for a long time that I had meant to cover a while ago. To start things off, here's a Jurassic World Therizinosaurus in package.

This came out, of course, with the Fisher Price Imaginext side of the Jurassic World Dominion toy line. The movie gave a prominent role to Therizinosaurus (see T. Rex Vs. Everything), which was a nice choice for a semi-obscure dino. Of course, the movie makes the dino far more menacing than it is, though what's actually shown amounts to the herbivore either slicing up carnosaurs that would happily feed on it or crossing paths with humans who run away before it can react either way. (For real silliness, see the "deadly" dicynodont.) I decided I liked this one better than the bigger "realistic" representation from Mattel, so I put in an order. Here's another pic of the packaging.

What I really like about this is the simple color scheme and very solid construction, which truly give the feel of a 1980s FP toy. The design also leaves things open-ended whether this is a hostile creature. The big gimmick is the button that lets it break loose from its bonds. Here's some pics of the thing unboxed.

"I'm a hugger, not a slasher! Mostly..."

This all reminded me of something I already had lying around. I had previously acquired a therizinosaur from a museum gift shop, along with one a raptor from the Odds And Ends post that I'm sure came from the same manufacturer. It's a pretty typical product of the 2000s, with a lot of "realistic" detail that isn't that accurate.  It was nice enough at the time to see a protobird with feathers that looked like they were meant to be there rather than added on. (See also the Retro Raptors post.) As it happened, I saw the same dino when I recently discovered Your Dinosaurs Are Wrong, a fine show/ channel from a guy I believe would cry if he saw the things I deal with. Here's a few pics of the thing.

"You say dinosaur ground sloth like it's a bad thing..."

That still leaves the Jurassic World Dominion movie. I have to say I kind of liked it, certainly better than the previous entry. It's odd and goofy, which is a tone that has served the franchise better than its self-serious "message" installments. (See my JP video rant while you're at it.) I especially liked the locust subplot everyone else has complained about. Notwithstanding the ludicrously oversized bugs on-screen, it's the kind of thing that could actually be done with existing and foreseeable tech, and the overall flavor of the scheme would fit a Bond movie as much as a JP sequel. The biggest improvement is bringing back the original cast and giving them something to do. For the moment, it wraps things up on a relative high note. With that, I can call it a day. That's all for now, more to come!

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.