CROSSOVER CHAOS. The 2nd 2000AD Short Story Competition.

[The Legendary Shark]

Welcome to the War, Frank. (487 Words)

"So, you're the geezer Uncle Sam sent, eh?" said Bill, clicking cartridges into his shooter.

"Nobody sent me nowhere, buddy, I came on my own dime," said Frank. "Heard there was some punishin' to be done."

"Furry muff, we can use all the help we can get. You're gonna' have to lose that skull off your bird's nest**, though. Sticks out a mile."

Frank Castle shook his head. "Uh-uh. That's my thing, man. I'm the Punisher, see, an' that's my symbol. It stays. Period. Y'see, I had this kid..."

A dog barked six times nearby and Savage silenced the big American. "Quiet. Patrol coming, half a dozen men."

"You got dogs as scouts? How'd you teach 'em to count?"

"It's Yappy Joe, you muppet, doing an impression of a cherry*. Six barks equals six Volgs." Savage reached into his coat and retrieved a grenade which he held out to Castle. "Here, this is your audition. Take 'em out."

Frank smiled and refused the grenade. "Audition? Okay, buddy, you got it, but I audition my way – Punisher style!"

Castle removed his own weaponry and left it in a pile at the Londoner's feet before bounding off into the darkness. The patrol marched into the alley and for a moment Savage thought this "Punisher" character had bottled it. He pressed himself into the shadows, his finger ready at the grenade's pin, and watched as Frank struck.

Silently, the Punisher gripped the helmet of the last man in the patrol and pulled it back like a lever, instantly snapping the soldier's neck. Before his body had even hit the ground, Castle had stolen a knife off the corpse and used it to slit the next soldier's throat, but hot blood gushing onto the back of the third man's neck ended his element of surprise and the remaining four turned to face their attacker.

Castle punched the nearest one in the throat and he fell to his knees gasping fruitlessly for breath as the remaining three raised their weapons, but he'd chosen his ground wisely and there was little room for rifles in the narrow alley. Another Volgan fell after a kick dislocated his skull and the penultimate soldier hardly had time to realise what was happening before Castle thrust his own gun butt into his face, bursting his brain. The last Volgan tried to get a message to headquarters but Frank strangled him with the microphone cord.

When all six Volgans were down, Castle took a knife and made sure of them before returning to Bill's side, grinning widely.

"Well?" he asked, "do I get the job?"

Savage shook his head. "No chance, Twinkletoes."

Castle stood with a face like a melted wellie. "Why the Hell not?"

Savage shrugged. "You fuck about too much," he said.

_________
Tharg's Cockney Rhyming Slang Translation Service.
**bird's nest = chest
*cherry = cherry hog; dog.

[Richmond Clements]

Loving that punchline, Shark!

[Kerrin]

HA-HA-HAAAAAA!

Shark my old chum, you've got a talent for this. That's your best yet.

[The Legendary Shark]

Thanks guys. I can't take much credit for that one, though - it's a very old joke.

Well, maybe a little credit...  

[Roger Godpleton]

In Search of Lost CRIME(465 words)

Nemi was talking with her friends about how all men were useless when suddenly a strapping man in green burst through her door.

"Nemi, duck, Django Zoon is coming for you!"

Because she was so stupid and annoying, she failed to duck and a Sniper's bullet tore through her face. Johnny Alpha's D-Jump device told him that Zoon and his goons had already left, and once again he would have to wait for the machine to triangulate his position before pursuing. Another D-Portal opened nearby and out came Frinton Fuzz.

"Too late pal."
"Damnit, Zoon's crew got away. I can't believe that fiend would go so far as to murder the heroes of classic comic strips".

Johnny liked Fuzz, but saw he was far too wet round the ears, and said moisture would eventually wreak havoc with the hair that was around those ears.

"Don't kid yourself, um ... kid, this isn't any kind of noble endeavour. Zoon was a Stront, but he started taking money from non-SD clients. This is just housekeeping, I'm in it for the creds. I could care less about most of these fictional characters."
"You mean you couldn't care less."
"FUCK YOU."

Eventually the D-devices allowed Alpha and Fuzz to follow Zoon's crew to a place called Coconino County. A Kat was singing at the funeral of a mouse and a Pupp. Together they had managed to take out most of Zoon's crew by throwing many bricks, but eventually they had succumbed. Now they were in a Heppy land that was fur fur away. This land was called "Being Dead."

Johnny viewed this spectacle with righteous anger. Fred Bassett and "This Life" had had it coming, but this was too much. A small community had been torn apart by the greed and avarice that motivated Django Zoon: The Straightener. Django Zoon had to pay. He had to pay with his life.

The next stop on the "JOHNNY ALPHA AND FRINTON FUZZ MAKE DJANGO ZOON PAY. PAY WITH HIS LIFE TOUR" was a simple childhood baseball game. Charlie Brown was up to bat. He swung and hit. He hit it hard. He was going to get the home run which would win the game. Or he would have done if Johnny Alpha hadn't shot it with an EMP cartridge because it was actually a bomb that had been made to look like a baseball by Django Zoon.

Zoon himself jumped out of some bushes but was cut down with bullets from Frinton's gun. Lucy kicked Charlie in the shin.

Johnny chuckled at such crazy antics. "Ha ha, I wonder what happened to that kid that made him into such a loser." A child with a blanket told him the sad truth. "He walked in on his parents having sex once."
"Ah."

[Kerrin]

Holy Jeebers! I nearly forgot this finishes midnight Sunday, the 28th.

Better get on with mine, it's almost there. Not. Where has the time gone.

I'm thinking maybe this'll work better as a monthly thing, try and stagger it with the art comp.

[Van Dom]

Bugger! I only noticed this thread today and really want to submit something.
Just finished writing what I thought was a short enough entry  (only 2 pages on the word document) but did the word count and its 15-flippin-00¬!!!!
Damn!
Gonna have to think about how I cut this one down to size!

[Van Dom]

Damnit!
Try as I might I can't pare this down to 500 words and I don't have any time to come up with something else now. Wish Id noticed this thread sooner - Ill definately be keeping an eye out for the next one!

Anyway, despite this not meeting the competition requirements its written now so I may as well post it up. I have to say I actually enjoyed doing this - Ive been suffering from a form of writers block for a loooooooooooooong time and had got to the point where the mere thought of working on one of my half-completed projects filled me with dread. Doing this has been therapeutic and has motivated me to get back to work on my other stuff! Nice one, whoever came up with this idea!

The Last Decepticon (too many words!)

Optimus Prime had fought hard but in the end it was futile.

Don't get me wrong, the big lunk did good, he fought on long after the other Autobots cashed in their chips, even managed to take out the remaining Decepticons, all but one. That hunk a' junk  proved just too tough though, even for Prime, and in the end Megatron was the last Transformer standing.

I'm all that's left of the task force now, me, the Autobots so-called 'human liaison', and here I am, racing through the devastation of Highway I-5 on a dying motorbike, dodging and weaving through the rubble as five tonne of shape-shifting metal bears down on me, raining fists to the ground as it tries to squoosh me into oblivion..

Megatron.

Last of the Decepticons.

Meanest of them all.

And somehow I'm supposed to stop him.

Well I better come up with some ideas soon, cos I'm running out of road and that towering heap is running out of patience. I'm right in the shadow of his fist and if I don't time this next swerve just right it's gonna be goodnight Gr...

*

I guess I didn't time that last swerve just right.

Head's groggy, whole body numb, ears are ringing and I can't get my bearings. Musta caught me with that last blow. Bike's gone and I'm flat on my back. Guess that's it then. What a way to...

"Thees ees no time for takeeng the forty weenks, senor! The Megatron, he come, he crush you beneath his beeg stompy feet. Ay yi yi senor, ees time to move yor behind, andale, andale!"

My eyes jerked open and I saw the Decepticon towering above me, black smoke billowing from his gaping maw, red eyes glaring like flaming comets.

"Holy Joe Smith," I heard myself mutter. "Still alive...who'd a thunk..."

And your old pal was gonna stay that way.

The towering mass of twisted, glaring metal bellowed, raising one arm and closing the five-foot long digits at its end into a gigantic wrecking ball fist.

I turned my head to the side and my eyes fell on my thrashed bike a few yards away--between me and it was the haversack I'd been carrying, ripped open at the seams, its contents scattered across the asphalt. It was mostly lunch and my robo-stogie, but Hoagy was there too, what was left of him, his broken body lying in a heap, oil leaking from a puncture in his fuel tank and forming a small pool alongside him.

A ready-made plan went 'ding' in the microwave of my brain and I somehow pushed myself to my feet and lurched towards the wreckage, snatching Stogie from where he lay as I moved, trying to ignore the pain of a broken ankle.

I reached the heap of metal that was my idiot assistant's twisted body and crumpled to my knees beside it, grimacing at the amount of petrol he'd already lost. He was emptying fast.

"Sorry about this Hoagy, but a Robohunter's gotta do what a Robohunter's gotta do," I said,  jamming Stogie between my teeth and hauling Hoagy up by his dented head. He was heavier then he had any right to be, since he was all mostly head and that was mostly air.

"That's right Sam, yup," Hoagy replied, grinning inanely and rolling his eyes. "Uhh, what is it exactly a Robohunter does again, Sam, huh?"

Megatron's fist was coming down fast. It was now or never.

"Kills...snutting...robots!" I grunted, mustering the last of my strength to twist my whole body and fling Hoagy like a frisbee towards the metal monstrosity.

"Die fleshthing!" Megatron roared, as Hoagy soared toward him, his head spinning like a saucer, his broken body dangling beneath, arms and legs flailing.

"The name's Slade, pal, Sam Slade", I growled back, plucking Stogie from between my teeth and lifting him  into the trail of oil and petrol vapours the "woah-woah-woah"ing Hoagy was leaving in his wake.

"That's S-L-A-Y-E-D to you!"

Megatron's clenched fist was mere inches from spreading me across the pavement like so much butter, the guttural roar from his metal maw making my bones quiver as he leaned over me.

Stogie said: "Aye caramba, Senor, I hope you no' do what I theenk you do..." just as I dropped my thumb to his ignition switch and activated the flame at his tip.

A single spark was all it took and the vapours in the air ignited, an arrow of fire blazing into existence and chasing the spinning Hoagy upwards. Hoagy's flight came to an abrupt stop as his head crashed into Megatron's energon core and stuck fast. I fell on my back and watched the string of fire race the last few yards to where his body was still whipping around beneath his head, splashing the last of his fuel reserves all over the Decepticon's glowing blue energy source.

"N-n-n-nice shot Sam, yup!" I heard Hoagy stammer, and then, just seconds before the Decepticon's fist painted me all over the concrete, the flames made contact and...

An exploding Hoagy wouldn't have done all that much on it's own...an exploding energon core on the other hand...that was just the ticket.

The explosion burst my ear drums and the shockwave from the blast picked me off the asphalt and sent me hurtling backwards. I slid into the space between two overturned heavy goods vehicles, conveniently providing me with cover from the metal debris and hunks of flaming Transformer that were suddenly raining from the sky.

It was a long time before the shaking stopped.

"And when you get slayed, you stay slayed," I muttered half-heartedly, crawling out from under the trucks. I stuck the still active robo-stogie back between my teeth and took a  drag, wishing for the first time in a long time that I had the real thing instead of this simulated nico-crap.

"Ay-yi-yi senor. You destroy the beeg bad psycho-bot, truly you are the worl's greates' robo-honter. But why for you have to use Hoagy as the weapon? He never do notheeng to deserve thees terrible fate."

"He never do nuthin' not to deserve it, Stogie, and it was rather him than me."

I took another puff of fake tar from the weeping robo-stogie then struggled to my feet and started to wend my way through the flames and burning debris that littered the deserted highway.
 
"Another case, another planet half-destroyed by crazy homicidal robots and nobody left alive to pay my bill. Oh well, at least I'm consistent.

"Now where'd that Megan Fox chick get to?
 
"I got an opening for airhead assistant and something tells me she'd fit the bill just fine..."

fin.

[locustsofdeath!]

Monkey Mythos on Charles Darwin Block (496 words)

Charles Darwin Block, a towering stack of concrete-and-steel housing millions of citizens, was a jungle. That morning, as the result of an experiment gone wrong, the residing tenants were exposed to an enzyme that regressed them down the scales of evolution and they were on a rampage, tearing the building apart floor by floor.

But a heavy silence hung over level twenty.

Apartment doors were smashed in, rubbish was strewn everywhere, blood and excrement were smeared on the walls; but the riot had come and gone. Only a single creature remained. The hulking apelike creature with mottled skin and patchy hair lurking in the doorway of apartment 8b had until that morning been a scientist called Norm Hoogendorm, and he had spent the last few hours viciously defending his territory.

Now it was time to get back to work.

Before withdrawing into the apartment he urinated on the welcome mat, marking a warning to any would-be trespassers. Then, lumbering inside, he closed the door.

The flames of Bunsen burners danced in the darkness. The drip-drip-dripping of a separatory funnel and extractor, and the bubbling of foul-smelling liquids lured him to his workbench. There he gawked at the complex apparatus he had built, now reduced by his primitive mind to a 'big thingy with pretty lights and funny-looking doohickeys'.

In a large tray sat, like an obese slug, the oozing tip of the severed tentacle he dimly remembered purchasing from a Chinaman in the slums of Ming the Merciless Block.

'Coooooo-hoooooo-loooooo,' he grunted.

Searching for further answers, his eyes shifted to the notes and occult grimoires laid out on the bench, but it was all unreadable scribble-scrabble. He recalled that he had been combining modern cloning techniques with black magic and that he was on the verge of a breakthrough, but he couldn't figure out what. Frustration rose within him (had he known that his rival, Professor E. Northcote Fribb, was responsible for his current state, he would have gone absolutely bananas).

But he would finish.

By instinct, or trial and error.

Which guided him, he couldn't be certain; he struggled with his thick fingers and clumsy hands, but they moved of their own volition, grabbing beakers, pouring their contents together, dumping the concoctions into the funnel that fed into the apparatus. He flipped several switches, and the machine hummed to life.

A blue glow enveloped the tentacle.

Suddenly a pulpy bulb sprouted at the end of it, growing rapidly. In seconds it was as large as a beanbag. Rolling off the tray, it landed on the floor with a wet thump, continuing its metamorphosis. Eyes opened, a beaklike mouth screeched. More tentacles shot out of the expanding mass, snatching Norm from his feet.

'Bwuh-bwuh!' he shouted in alarm.

Back and forth the thing whipped him. His kicking legs knocked over a rack of Bunsen burners, his flailing arms smashed the beakers. The chemicals erupted, and the inferno instantly consumed Norm Hoogendorm and his cloned Elder God.

The End

[Kerrin]

Nice one Van Dom, great story. But as you point out yourself mate, way over the word limit. So I'll not put it in the voting thread but I'm certain people will enjoy reading it here.

Glad it helped out with the writers block.

If people come up with short stories unrelated to this comp I don't really see whats to stop anyone posting them anyway. it's not like there has to be a specific thread for stories or scripts or whatever. If you write something you think people will like why not just post it in 'off topic' or something. I think you'll find constructive critisism and praise aren't far behind. We've obviously got some cracking writers on the forum so just limiting contributions to this comp seems a bit daft.

And good story Locust, I was just about to post this when your entry materialised.

[locustsofdeath!]

Okay...that was tough...like the fellow above me, I wrote a story that was about 1100 words that I hacked down to 1000 but could do no more; so last night I went at it again and came up with my second story. To my dismay, it was sitting at 633. The first 100 words I trimmed out were easy, but those last 33 were agonizing. I must have have spent twice as long editing than writing. Anyway, I'm sure no one is interested in my "hard time", but I thought I'd relate to a few of the other writers that I'm sure ran into the same problem. Thanks for reading!

[Van Dom]

Thanks for the kind words Kerrin!
And glad I wasn't the only one having trouble locustsofdeath.
But Heavens to Betsy it ain't half hard trying to write something in just 500 words. Never realised how little that was before.
Amazingly, after my disappointment at not being able to edit my Robohunter/Transformers skit down to the required word countage, I came up with something else.... It was definately going to be shorter. Threw it together in thirty minutes, checked the word count and....1000 frikking words!!!! And it was NOTHING!!!
I wasnt going to be beaten this time so after some ruthless pruning and utter destruction of my original neatly paced narrative, I've ended up with my official entry to this competition, as appears below!
Once again, cheers for this idea, its top bananas!
_____________________


Bones (499 words -woohoo!)
BZZ!

WHISH!

A slab of metal drew back into the wall and granted her access to the chamber. She ran in and sealed the door behind her, then backed up into the middle of the room, hugging herself tightly, trying to catch her breath.

Please god, she thought, watching the door intently. Don't open, don't open, don't...

BZZ!

WHISH!

Light streamed in and she winced at the shape of the huge canine standing in the doorway.

No! she thought, as it lunged for her, huge jaws snapping, teeth cracking viciously.

She screamed and turned to run again but it was too late, it careened into her, knocked her off her feet, landed on top of her. She screamed as it barked into her ear, its hot breath on her neck...

"leave her alone..." she heard somebody whisper..

"leave her alone..."

Suddenly Halo was aware of somebody else in the room, a...girl?...clutching a metal bar tightly.

The dog growled.

Who is that? Halo wondered.

"please...nice doggy...leave halo alone, she's a good person, she's kind and..."

The waifish creature took a step, then...

"NOW!"

Halo jumped at the shout and gasped as a net dropped from above, trapping the shrieking girl/boy beneath.

The dog hopped off Halo's back and she spun and sat up. A light blinked on. Suddenly the chamber was full of people.

"Terribly sorry we had to scare you like that, Miss Jones," said a red-head female.

"Unfortunately, it was the only way to lure out the Glyph," added a handsome male. "The only lead we had was he was obsessed with you. We knew if he saw you in danger he'd have to show himself."

"The Glyph is a burglar, wanted for larceny on a number of planets," a second female announced. "An asexual being who uses her total lack of personality to come and go as she pleases, completely unnoticed."

Halo didn't understand. "What..?"

"And he would have gotten away with it too," said another voice, as Halo turned to see a lanky, unkempt hobo in a green t-shirt bend down and slip a biscuit into the mouth of the now amiable and dopey-looking hound. "If it wasn't for us meddling kids!"

The dog almost took the skinny guys hand off as it swallowed the biscuit whole, then hopped up and pounced on Halo again, knocking her to her back as it howled "Rooby Rooby Rooooooooooooo!" and slobbered her with kisses!

[Kerrin]

Here's mine. I wrote it long hand then just typed it in here,  so I've had a count and I'm pretty sure it's just under 500.

CHEERS OF A CLOWN.

Crack open a crusty eye an' crawl outta' 'ya pit, downstairs and onto the street, drop 'ya breeches and take a big steaming shit.

It'll be like a breath 'a fresh air.

This is Angeltown and a shiny new turd is about as good as it gets round these parts chump.

Now, on this particular morning in question I tooka' rain check on the sidewalk shit show and wandered down to Pinkies ("If you ain't paralytic, you ain't in Pinkies") for a life affirming liquid breakfast. And to gather valuable human (HA!) intelligence. Yeah that's right, intelligence gathering, what's it ta youse? You never had to fill in expense forms?

"CLIP CLOP!"

"Yeah, yeah"

Simps, aughta' be a law 'gainst 'em.

"Fwibble dibble?"

Another one, drokkin' Simps.

"NOW THEN, NOW THEN!"

Where'd all these kooks come from?

"FATAAANNGG!"

There's something odder than normal about Combined Pedway 437. The freakin' ped is wall to wall with Simps, Futsies, Zonks, Branch Moronians and every other variety of Mega City mentalist. Hundreds of 'em, all walking, skipping, gibbering and gamboling in the same direction.

"Shit."

Breakfast at Pinkies is gonna have to wait.

"Control, this is Point on CB437, we gotta situation down here."

"Roger that Point, we got brain panners from fifteen sectors converging on Jackson Plaza."

"Shit."

"Tek heads say there was some kinda' D gate lookin' energy spike there thirty seven minutes ago. Unfortunately you had your comms off Point."

"Shit."

'Yep, well we haven't been able to get uniform units anywhere near the place. They just run into a wall of idiots, fall over and start mumbling. And there's a no fly zone due to lingering exotic energy traces."

"Shit. You want I should go look?"

"First rate judicial instincts there Point."

"Shit."

So I go with the flow and mosey along with the morons. Begins to dawn on me that they're all singing this same little tune under their breaths.

"Deedle deedle dee dee, deedle deedle dee dee."

All in tune and on time, and I gotta say it's a catchy number, kinda' chirpy y'know.

So along we go, me and the horde of humming halfwits. As we get closer to Jackson Plaza the numb nuts start to stack up and I take to the old tried and tested applied violence and size 24s to make progress. That damn tune is starting to get up my ass now and I realise that I've been singin' along with the fruitloops for a while.

"Deedle deedle joy joy, deedle deedle joy joy"

I batter my way through the chanting throng, my own voice is rising now and there ain't much I can do about it. I can feel a rising manic giddiness, yeah us hardnosed Wally Squadders get giddy, and I'm starting to skip, well as close to skippin' as you can get in size 24s. No wonder the uniforms dropped like sacksa munce, their straight wired little shiny brains would have flipped out like that Jack.

There's a clearing in the middle of the plaza and there these two mutie looking freaks capering about, shit they're weird, big blue one and a little beige one. The madness is definitely coming from these creeps. Drawing every crazy for miles around, this isn't good. I've gotta get control.

Luckily, they get me.

"Point, this is control, Psi are saying we need to Stumm the sector and Boing© Jackson Plaza. Point?"

"HAPPY HAP....DO IT...PY JOY JOY! DO IT NOW!"

"Roger that Point, get your mask on."

And as the gas billows in and a Boing© mortar comes sailing over Ken Dodd Block I smile and I realise that I really am happy. How couldn't I be. My new friends are the coolest kids in the kitty litter and all I want to do is sing. I could resist but whats the point?

Yeah, yeah, I know. It comes right after the...

"HAPPY HAPPY JOY JOY! HAPPY HAPPY JOY JOY!"

End.

Edit, I'm gonna have to have a recount, I may have missed a few.

[Kerrin]

That's all folks.

Competition closed.

I'll sort out the voting thread tomorrow evening.

Well done to everyone again, it's going to be a nightmare picking three out of these.

[Mardroid]

Ach! Trust me to leave it late again.
Never mind, mine's not that good. It's good practice though (I want to be a writer but rarely motivate myself. Silly me.) I might post it just for fun later. (I don't have to worry about shortening it now anyway!)