Overlord's Orders XVIIb

[a crumb]

"Since Jasper has already demonstrated a certain, specific tendency when exposed to beverage creation, it was decided I should handle the water, and he could handle soup. I even waited twenty minutes outside the kitchen while he got a special pair of gloves or something. Once inside, I found that the faucet didn't work, so I had to quickly fix the piping. No difficulty there. What did make getting the water difficult was that Jasper had, while I was working, stolen the faucet handle so he had something to stir the soup with. He had thrown all the spoons out a window, arguing that they were untrustworthy. Anyway, I put the empty water glass down, planning to go to the stove and ask him for the faucet part back. However, Jasper was not heating the soup on the stove-top. He had placed the pot on top of the toaster, which he nicknamed Bryan, and was trying to warm it up that way. I handed him a spoon and took back the faucet handle, and asked him if the stove was broken. He said it wasn't, but he was busy using it for something else, and wouldn't go near it. When I asked what he was doing, he simply warned me to not go within two meters of the stove."

"I decided that, ridiculous as it looked, the soup was actually being warmed, so I should just leave things as they were, hoping against hope that we weren't getting sucked into another insane scheme. I soon had a filled glass of water and went to go see how Jasper was doing. Before I reached halfway to the toaster, the stove was making a lot of noise. When I reached Jasper, the stove blew up. He was screaming "MY LEMON SOUFFLE! MY LEMON SOUFFLE!" At that moment, I decided we were getting dangerously close to rehashing old territory, and not wanting to have my fellow servant hurt himself, me, or blow the whole kitchen up, I moved to salvage what there was of the souffle amidst all the smoke and wreckage of what was once a stove. Unfortunately, Jasper threw the pot and all the soup at me when I waded into the smoke. Before I could wipe it from my eyes, I heard crashing behind me. Jasper was hurling glass dishes into the smoke, shouting incantations in Greek. I was forced to retreat, at which point I once again laid eyes on Jasper. He was all wet, having ripped off the faucet handle in an attempt at trying to squirt water into the stove's ruins, even though there was no fire. Of course, glass had blocked the drain, and the sink was soon overflowing. I could not find a tool to solve anything on this front, and I now believe that is because Jasper had stuffed any available tools into the stove alongside his souffle earlier this evening."

[Jasper]

OOC : Sorry for the length of this post. I was really backed into a corner, or six.

Jasper presented a box of takeout Chinese on bended knee, before beginning his testimony.

"Oh great Overlord, it is with great sorrow that I bring you the truth of this evenings events. You see, a menace to the servitude has been hippity - hoppiting his way through all of our stories. He has tricked, manipulated and indirectly disposed of many unfortunate servant victims. The likes of Jukka, my own brother Fatch and Hickory ... we could go on... none of them are with us now because of one servant... Crumb! I didn't realize it until now. She always seemed to have such tight alibis, and the others always seemed to be so incompetent. But now I see that in a sinister plot to overthrow you, she has ensured that each of your allies are lost. It all began when she pushed Wile Coyote into the meat shredder, and continued until last round, when she cut out Hickory's tongue! I'm here to make sure it does not end with her blaming me once again for a situation that was entirely her fault!"

"You see, I began this mission with a sense of optimism. Crumb and I had tied the others to the post once. We were the two who always tried to salvage the situations. Now that the last of the trouble makers were gone, we could finally live a calm and peaceful life dedicated to coerced service. But as soon as we entered the kitchens alone, everything went haywire."

"As soon as we entered the kitchen Crumb stuck two forks into a potato for legs, and declared that she was the ultimate being with the power of creation, having now created 'POTATO MAN, BANE OF CRIME.' At first I tried to let this slide, focusing on the task at hand, but she began screaming hysterically and throwing things every time I picked up a spoon. You see, Potato Man's weakness is (apparently) spoons. After much assurance, I managed to strike a bargain: I would throw the spoons out the window to ensure her heroes safety, and she would agree to commit no further shenanigans. Unfortunately, she would not uphold these terms."

"Crumb wasted no time putting her pet ferret Kevin down the sink drain, and it was all I could do to keep her from turning on the garbage disposal switch. I asked her why she had done this, and she told me it was because I was not being sanitary trying to cook with bare hands. She would not stand in the kitchen for another instant until the problem was fixed. This, admittedly, was a good point, so when she stormed out of the kitchen, I put on a pair of gloves and removed the kitchen faucet to use as a spoon. (This should not have been a problem since we had a pitcher of filtered water, and faucet water is below an Overlord such as yourself."

"It was about this time, that Crumb returned to the kitchen. She seemed confused about the faucet for some time. She kept asking me why it wasn't working. Each time I showed her that I was using the faucet, and explained that it wasn't working because I was using it as a spoon. She didn't seem to be paying me much attention though, and she turned on the disposal, murdering poor Kevin in an instant. She cleverly decided that the dead ferret was blocking the drain, and began unblocking it. I poured a seperate glass of filtered water for you, muttering to myself, and continued to stir in disbelief."

"It was at this point that Crumb asked me where all the spoons had gone, and why I was stirring the soup with the faucet, the spoon incident apparently forgotten. I told her that they were untrustworthy just so she would leave me to my duties. I continued successfully for a short while, and soup was nearly ready. Then I got a phone call. The person on the other end claimed to be you Overlord, and I was told to make Lemon Souffle using black powder at all costs (with the intention to be used for an assassination attempt on the Czechoslovakian Prime Minister.) I would later be told by Wile Coyote that Crumb had asked to borrow his phone to make a call at around the same time, and disguised her voice by making the call from a wind tunnel. Naturally, I had been wondering why she took such a long bathroom break. This was, of course, the reason."

"I had no idea Crumb had ordered me to make the black powder lemon souffle, so I tried to keep it a secret, knowing how volatile she is around explosives. It never occured to me that she had made the call so that she would be able to blow up the kitchen. I even told her to stay at least two meters away. Since the stove was occupied, I used my ingenuity to warm it by rewiring a toaster. I called my creation the "Bigraphical Recalculator Yeti Amplifier Northcompressor, but just told her that it was called 'Bryan.' It was far too complex for Crumb's understanding, but she at least admitted that it was working, and left me to it."

"Crumb then taped a block of ice to the ceiling and began collecting the drips to fill a glass of water. I tried to inform her that I had already done her job for her, but she said this was the organic method. Once the glass was full, she approached me and behind her, the block of ice fell off the ceiling, onto the dishwasher. This sent a fork spiraling through the air into my souffle, which exploded. I screamed for the loss of my souffle with horror (which, you will recall, I had taken to be a part of a secret mission of utmost importance.) and Crumb turned and ran into the flames, trying to save the souffle, or pretending to. Once Crumb entered the carnage, she began chanting and dancing. The souffle bubbled and arose into the air, forming into a wispy evil shape that smelled like campfires and lemons. I recognize soup demons when I see them, and realized her plan all along was to call fallen evil to her aid to overthrow you. The demons are only weak against soup, so I used this to destroy it. Unfortunately or fortunately, some of the soup got in Crumb's eyes. She began chanting again, but I managed to stop her by yelling and throwing dishes. I was especially panicked, so I used my native Greek language. When Crumb finally came to her senses, she had the audacity to stare at me, wild from my efforts to stop soup demons from overthrowing humanity, and to say this was somehow my fault."

[a crumb]

"Have you ever heard of praying mantises? As soon as Jasper started using Bryan, a horde of the beautiful creatures arrived in the kitchen, sampled from the soup, and left with my dear fellow servant's most sincere blessings. He was dismissive over my objections, insisting he could replenish any missing soup with more, based on some promise he had from someone. I naturally demanded to know what he had in mind. He refused to answer, and it was then I had to step out of the kitchen as he insisted he needed the whole place. Praying mantises were eyeing me from all the windows, and I decided I best oblige him, but make plans to find out his agenda. I never could have imagined its true extent. You see, Jasper was part of a scheme to create an infinite soup loop."

"At this point, I will have to forgo narration and make some broader clarifying points. Despite the imagination of Jasper and his wild allegations of some grand narrative about me being evil, things were quite a bit different from that. Simply put, there is no grand narrative regarding me. And besides, I am confused from my dear fellow servant's narrative whether I am incompetent or a genius, so let's just get to talking about the story of Jasper, three psychokinetic demons, praying mantises, and Bryan."

"After leaving the kitchen, I did make a phone call from a wind tunnel. I did instruct Jasper to make a souffle that was a small bomb. I made the call to create some insurance, given my worry over Jasper's plans. A nice bomb on the side in case of trouble. I did not, however, instruct Jasper in the fine art of complex toaster construction. Upon returning to the kitchen, I knew perfectly well what Bryan was when I saw him, even if Jasper's specific rewiring escaped me. Bryan was the latest in a long line of toaster-gods that sucker poor mortals into constructing them."

"A fork caused the destruction of the souffle-bomb, yes, but only because it came into contact with all the hardware tools Jasper had stuffed around the souffle, in an effort to disallow me the use of the tools. The chaos of the explosion fazed me for only a split second. I was at first merely concerned with preventing damage to the kitchen. Then I noticed Bryan chanting. The toaster-god was summoning a demon, and I had to stop it. I would quickly note that the demon was emerging from decimated souffle was irrelevant -it could have been summoned from any given material. Anyway, I began chanting to counter the emanations. Jasper's disruptions delayed me greatly, and since the counter-chanting would only work against the summoning act itself, and not the demon, I failed at this attempt. However, I tossed a clove of garlic into the soup at the last moment, and the garlic-infused soup Jasper splashed at it traumatized the demon into disillusion. Unfortunately, our problems did not end with that demon's destruction."

"I would note that the demon-summoning confused me for a minute. Then I understood what I faced. This quaint, white-washed kitchen was the point that a joint toastergod-mantis-Jasper axis was conspiring to turn into a time loop that could produce infinite soup. The key to this scheme was the use of psychokinetic demons, which can hand things to each other through time, while not moving themselves, and can maintain effects across time travel without letting paradoxes collapse everything. With that in mind, you see, Bryan's demon was the second of two. The mantises had produced their own demon earlier, in the pot, while eating half the soup. Bryan's later demon would hand soup in its enormous hands to the mantises' demon. This time loop would allow ever more soup to be thrown backwards in time to the mantises' demon. And the psychokinesis would neutralize the threat of a paradox arriving. With these two demons summoned, the infinite supply of soup would pour out from the kitchen, in exponentially increasing quantities, until the whole universe was a universe of nothing but soup. And Jasper played the enabling role for the other two parties: Bryan and the mantises."

"The weird thing about all of this was that Bryan was modified by Jasper into a two-slot toaster. This wasn't even a part of the toaster-god's schematic. Not even Bryan himself intended this bonus for himself, since he never would have predicted needing it. But Jasper spent ten minutes going on about the most brilliant part of his modification of the existing toaster. He said he was going to burn four pieces of bread all at once and there was nothing I could do about it."

"As you might have guessed, it is the second slot that allowed Bryan to conjure his second demon, for a total of three overall. Bryan was screaming this time. Jasper's brilliant idea in response to this scream-summoning was to bow down in an effort to placate the toaster-god. Operating on a slightly more sophisticated level, I used my advanced knowledge of quantum psychokinetics to quickly construct a three-ton biomechanical chamber that could generate nuclear power. I powered my handy phaser with its energy, and fired at the demon, destroying it, and rendering Bryan powerless. Praying mantises came and carried him off. Revolution eats its own, and all that, I guess. Thus, the threat was defeated. And yes, in conclusion, I think my staring at Jasper for his incompetence was merited."

[James Gryphon]

"Absolutely incorrigible."

"What do you suppose 'not ever again' means? Not a week from now or a month from now or a year from now. Not "at some point in the future, near or far". It means NEVER. As in, don't. Both of you completely blew it! You're magical enough at getting into trouble on your own; you don't need to summon supernatural help."

"Jasper: Getting the takeout was a thoughtful gesture. You even got it from my preferred restaurant. It's too bad it isn't my favorite meal from there, and that the box looks like it's been half-eaten, but it's the thought that counts, eh? Unfortunately that's about the only thought you had that counted, but I suppose half points for trying. It might have saved your job, this time."

"Crumb: All of your fantastic claims about magic toasters and pulling soup from other worlds are all well and good, but what I can't get over is that you killed a ferret. They say ferrets are like perpetual kittens. I like kittens. So, that's a big strike against you in my graces. Consider yourself demerited."

"I'd like to whack you both with a ruler or something but I don't have the time and without food I don't feel like I have the energy. So drive back to the takeout place and get me a large garlic beef, and some lemonade. Oh, and drop by the pharmacy on the way back. I'm having a lot of anxiety issues lately (I wonder why) and my psychiatrist prescribed something she said might help. Pick up the prescription with the credentials that're lying on the table next to the door out of here. Get back to me in an hour."


Quite some time later, after sunset...

The Overlord shook his head, as he sipped from a giant cup full of lukewarm lemonade.

"Well, you *did* get some more takeout back to me, I'll say that much. And it even looks like the right stuff. But you took so long that it's cold! And why are there all of these groceries here instead of my prescription? You got ice cream, which might have been a nice (if unexpected) treat, but it's melted! You can't even do the things I don't tell you to do right! What's your story this time?"

[Jasper]

OOC : Apologies for not getting another reply in on the last round. I wanted to, but I had almost 8 sports games in the last 6 days. Between that and homework, nothing was getting written.

BIC:

Jasper stepped forward. The faithful servant once again foiled in his heroic attempts to satisfy the simple demands of the Overlord.

"I hardly know where to begin, oh mighty Overlord. The disagreement started as soon as we stepped out of this very room, and into the garage. I started walking towards the standard unmarked white servant vans, spinning the keys on a finger, when I heard the unlocking of another vehicle behind me. I turned around to see Crumb, a large grin plastered on her face, flipping the keys to your Majesty's Lamborghini."

"'No. We're not taking that Crumb.' I said. Money has been tight due to the string of unsuccessful servitude ventures, and I knew this was one of your most prized possessions. This was an amphibious Lamborghini, after all. She shook her head to that : 'I don't think you understand the gravity of the situation Jasper. Let's not blow things' ... (She showed me the grenade palmed in her left hand) ... ' out of proportion. I've never driven the lambo, it will be very exciting. Think of all the turns we could do without signaling. And we could run from the police!' I did some calculations in my head. On one hand, if I let her blow up herself with the car, we would no longer have to deal with Crumb. On the other hand, there was always the chance that she would drop the grenade into the car and then run away. I decided it was too risky, and I slowly approached the car, making sure not to appear threatening, and stepped into the passenger's side."

"Next thing I knew, we were squealing around corners, and I was trying to tell her to slow down. She just laughed, and in a few minutes I gave up trying to convince her to slow down, and settled with analyzing several speeding tickets Crumb had picked up, which I believed I could talk my way out of. (I was known as "They-Didn't-Do-It-Jasper" back in my lawyer days.) They were all beyond 120 miles per hour of the speeding limitations, so it would be no easy task. When we reached the takeout place, the whole thing actually went off without a hitch. This likely had something to do with the fact that I swiped the handcuffs off a cop after we got pulled over for the fifth time, and used them to attach Crumb to a school bus that was parked in the parking lot. Takeout in hand, I unattached her and we got into the car together. Things were going well, and we even shared a moment as we recalled that time we effectively tied the other servants to a post."

"That was when we got pulled over again. Something was off though, Crumb was only going 2 over. I started to collect myself to fight the ticket, but Crumb put a hand on my shoulder to stop me. 'I got it this time Jasper, let me handle this,' she said. She stepped out of the car, and I nervously sat there, wondering how badly this could possibly go. I found out when the police officer opened the door, and asked me to step out. I did as he instructed, and the police officer stepped into the driver's seat and drove off in your Lamborghini. I stood in shocked silence for a time, before turning to stare at Crumb. She didn't seem concerned. 'I told him he could have the car if he gave us a break,' she said cheerfully. The reality of trading a 6 million dollar amphibious Lamborghini for a  2 mph speeding ticket was almost too much for me to bear. But there was no catching him now, he had driven off the road and into a nearby lake, where the police cruiser he left us could not follow. Shaking my head, I stepped into the driver's seat of the police cruiser, and we departed to the pharmacy."

"Once we got there, I pulled out the credentials, and collected the prescription. Crumb entertained herself by buying several sandwiches from the neighboring subway, and measuring them to see if they were indeed one foot long. We had lost the car, but at least the mission was going well. For this reason, I accepted her proposal that we surprise you by picking up a few of your groceries and some ice cream to make up for our last failure. I should have known that was a bad idea. Crumb requested to stay in the car, so I went in and got the groceries myself. When I returned, Crumb was red faced and mumbling about 'Bliffy Blumpers,' 'Heffalumps' and 'Woozles.' I picked up the empty prescription medication container, and buried my face in my hands. I took Crumb to the nearest hospital and got her treated for the Overdose. Unfortunately, the Police Department arrived to take back the cruiser, and we were left to walk the rest of the way back."

"Crumb refused to share the map, so she was our pathfinder. It was approximately 2 miles down the road to get back to the headquarters, but 3 months down the line and somewhere in the deserts of California, I decided it was time to call up an old buddy of mine, Ralph."

"Ralph arrived with his private jet, and picked us up. We were both exhausted, the takeout was cold, and the ice cream melted. I fell asleep on the flight back to HeadQuarters, and when I awoke, we had landed at the airport. Ralph hired a crew of janitors to clean out the jet, and told me if I ever tried to get Crumb back on one of his airplanes, I would regret it. I thanked him for his help, and found Crumb looking green and sickly in the baggage terminal. I found this fitting setting humorous enough to cheer me up, so I tried to wake her up. Unfortunately she was too sick to walk, so I carried her, the groceries and the takeout the last two miles through the hills to get back here."

"I'm sorry I could not do more, Overlord. But I tried to do what I could."

[a crumb]

a crumb had stood motionless, stoic throughout the preceding narration. Upon its completion, she immediately took up her tale.

"You see, Jasper has been concerned about the state of his life recently. Worried about not getting anywhere. Dealing with people he's convinced are inferior to him. Too nervous to let anyone get close enough to cut his hair. That sort of thing. Naturally, he developed a scheme to resolve this issue and claim favor with you at the same time. Unfortunately, greatest Overlord, I can't tell you exactly what the point of the scheme was, because I don't know. I'm not sure anyone in the universe could figure it out. Which, honestly, is probably a frequent description of Jasper's schemes. Nonetheless, it involved a seagull."

"The white van was damaged, and I think this was causing exasperation for Jasper. I thought he was acting erratically, so I decided to take the Lamborghini. I made a joke about blowing it up, with a nonfunctional grenade and everything, and Jasper acted as if he thought it was funny. After that, Jasper just told me to drive, anywhere, if not just everywhere. Jasper kept telling me to go slower, but the traffic demanded a persistent, aggressive style of navigation. Afterall, driving is safest if everyone drives the same way and everything is predictable. I merely drove as was expected of me."

"Just for old time's sake, I let Jasper tie me to a school bus as he got the take-out. The take-out procured, Jasper stole a seagull from a marmalade salesman. Jasper was convinced the marmalade salesman was either a thief, or Santa, or both, on account of his even having a seagull, and for having a long white beard. Jasper also stole the white beard. While I drove to the pharmacy, Jasper was making a phone call. He told me to keep telling jokes as he did so. He was talking on the phone about bombs and stealing camels. I filed this information away, certain it would be important. After he was finished, Jasper launched into a thirty minute spiel where he fact-checked every joke he had ever heard that had inaccuracies in them."

"The whole Lamborghini crash incident was the best possible end result given the circumstances. I knew the car was going to explode due to Jasper letting the seagull have free reign over the engine. I naturally found a policeman and told him to drive carefully off with the car. Even got a speeding ticket waived thanks to my excellent communication skills. I would note the car was doomed, but I had a plan to get back most of its value at a later time. In any case, I thought everything was still going well enough. Jasper demanded to be allowed to get the medicine himself, so I let him do that. He also told me to go buy some sandwiches and feed the Seagull. Jasper got the meds just fine. The Seagull had at this time threatened me to stay in the car, and make sure Jasper was gone for some reason. I suggested ice cream and groceries -may as well get something worthwhile out of honoring the request of a mad seagull. The absolutely crucial detail is this: at this point, we had warm take-out, the prescriptions, and were even getting extra. Everything was borderline perfect, despite what my dear fellow servant alleges were grievous mistakes on my part. However, the seagull was the only care of Jasper at this point. The seagull was going to eat the prescriptions. In the end, knowing that the risk to myself was relatively light unless the seagull got angrier, I consumed them myself. It was simply the logical course of action available."

"Groceries, ice cream and take-out were nonetheless still ours. Things could have been done right there, even without the police car. But the seagull had stolen the true map and replaced it with a fake one. Jasper had clearly marked this one up, too, since it had lemon stains all over it. It led us astray, and no matter how much I requested we ask for directions, Jasper and the seagull demanded I lead them onward to their destiny. Two months passed and we were going in circles around the desert. The seagull had grown larger and larger, now the size of a three-story building. Jasper, meanwhile, was no longer eating and growing gaunt. They conversed often, and this seemed to drain Jasper further. In another month, a bearded Jasper was angrily arguing with cactus and threatening to destroy global capitalism. The seagull was eating cactus and threatening to eat the take-out. For a minute, Jasper snapped out of this and called Ralph. However, he then phoned him back and requested a few months' delay. That is why it's been seven months."

"At the end of seven months,  things got interesting in this desert. That's when the marmalade salesman turned up. He was Santa, and wanted his seagull back, on account of that being the true source of flight. The three of us were promptly bundled up and brought to the north pole. Once there, the seagull gained the upper hand and freed himself from custody, and scared off the reindeer and Santa. The seagull demanded Jasper stay with him, and that they could leave the north pole together and return to the desert. Jasper could not let himself abandon the seagull and threatened to take the supplies with him, but I countered by trying to remind him of the importance of our delayed mission. My persuasion skills were truly shining at this point, and even the seagull was getting alarmed at Jasper's wavering of commitment. Eventually, all of the impulses, all the idiosyncrasies, and all the schemes came to their natural conclusion. The inevitable unfolded, as the conflicted nature of my dear fellow servant led him to tie himself, with one hand, to the north pole. That done, suddenly Jasper found himself again. The seagull, disappointed, went away. Jasper got a haircut, ordered off a few camel theft operations, and returned with me and Ralph. I ended it in the end, but if it wasn't for Jasper's obsession with that seagull, we could have succeeded."

[James Gryphon]

The Overlord looked old and tired. "Seven months without takeout makes one weak. I had to have pizza delivered that night when I figured out that you were never coming. You wouldn't believe what the rates are for delivery to an underground bunker."

He opened the takeout box, then grimaced and hastily threw it into a nearby incinerator chute. "That's disgusting. I see you didn't use the stasis shipping box."

"You're both frightful servants and getting worse all the time. I had gained some hope from the thought that I might never see you again after this long delay, the one consolation from this disastrous assignment, but we see how that turned out. Who knows what might happen next, so I've decided it's time to rid myself of you now before it's too late."

"Union law states I can only fire one of you at a time. I'm not rightly sure which of you is more dangerous so I think we're going to settle this the old fashioned way."

The Overlord opened a hidden compartment in his chair and took out a small square object. "Odds keep Jasper, evens keep Crumb." Tossing the die up into the air with a wild spin, he stared at it with feline concentration, and deftly caught it with in his left hand as it fell back down to earth.

It showed five dots on top.

Without further ado the Overlord pulled a lever. A hidden catapult thus flung the hapless Crumb up into the air and through a door that slid up to permit her flying exit to the earth outside.

The Overlord looked back at Jasper. "The one thing that you servants did do for me was to give me a convincing object lesson on the futility of materialism. Thus I've decided to sell everything I have, give all my money to the poor, and retire to charitable work in obscurity. As for you, you have a choice. Your personal contract is going to end, there's no two ways about that. The question is how you want it to go. I can buy you out and pay the agreed upon five million dollar sum. Alternatively, I have a curious object that I would be willing to give you instead, if you agree to waive the contract fee. It was rumored to have some secret benign power but I never was able to get it to work. Maybe you'd like to take a gamble on it?"

After a moment's thought, Jasper decided...

The End (of this Overlord's story)

[Jasper]

... A smile slowly spread across Jasper's face. He slowly bent down to pick up the fallen dice, still showing the lucky odd roll. He tossed it in the air and caught it deftly.

"I'm feeling lucky, Overlord." Jasper tossed the dice back to him.

"Are you?"