HUNGRY, HUNGRY SABERTOOTHS!
EPILOGUE (SIDE B): "Let's Live Our Lives Net.Heroically, Let's Live Them With
Style"
By Jeanne Morningstar (with editing and input from Drew Nilium (more so than
usual))

====

THE WORLD

It was the 30th of April, 2020, and things had stabilized, at least a little
bit. The cure was still being put together, but with no more net.villain teams
or cosmic beings trying to destabilize things, and the LNH on the case, it
looked like it'd all be over pretty soon.

There were a whole slew of looming potential problems the Legion would have to
deal with at some point, from the Brotherhood's new leadership to Manga Girl's
unstable and potentially destructive new super form to Captain Continuity's
unstable and potentially destructive new super form. Now, though, was the time
to rest.

True, there were still dinosaurs about in Net.ropolis thanks to the temporal
bleedthrough of the various tangled hypertext-timelines that had gotten mixed
up in all this. They'd moved into C.net.ral park and they'd probably be a
permanent part of the setting from here on out, but it was hard to complain too
much about that--everyone loved dinosaurs, even when they tried to eat them.

Doctor Stomper was still working away. He had some intriguing ideas for that
biodata storage device for Mashup Laq based on watching recent Ultraman series.
He was also studying the inevitable Deep Omnilooniverse Earth where they hadn't
been able to stop the virus and everyone on Earth had been turned into
sabertooths. (It turned out they did not make a very good army.) There seemed
to be a new one of these Earths every time he looked, but at least now he knew--
after a good bit of encouragement from Sister State-the-Obvious--to take breaks.

WikiBoy was still busy updating the wiki with all the themes, characters and
facts from the cascade. All the former roster-keepers (List Lad, wReamhack and
Master Roster Man) were helping him out.

"That was fun," said WikiBoy, "but there sure was a lot of it. I hope we never
have another cascade like that for a while."

Just then, Enthusiasm popped into existence. "Hey everyone! I just got this
really cool idea..."

"Get out of here!" said Master Roster Man, pulling out a giant flyswatter and
swatting at them.

====

THE MAGICIAN

Kid Occultism Kid wasn't sleeping well. You wouldn't either, if your mentor had
passed on in some complicated way that wasn't death but also effectively was.

Occultism Kid's quarters were still abandoned and locked. They knew they should
go there at some point--the gods and principalities knew the Door Warden needed
company--but they were still worried about stirring up old ghosts, both literal
and figurative. The pain was still too fresh--and, in a line of work where
metaphor and emotion easily slid into reality, that could hurt them on far more
than an emotional level. No, they'd have to build themself up more--get more of
a sense of what their own magic truly was, before they could confront their
mentor's.

Their parents had been among the vanishingly small number of Tibetan converts
to Evangelical Christianity. Their father, a prestigious doctor, had converted
after narrowly surviving a car accident. This, along with being queer, left
them in a deeply complicated position, unsure of what it was they actually
believed. They'd been intrigued by New Age and occultist spirituality, but the
appropriativeness and superficiality of a lot of it gave them hives. But
Occultism Kid had helped them figure out how to navigate the deeply flawed
religious and magical traditions of which they were a part... and now they'd
have to do that themself.

Kid Occultism Kid--no, just Occultism Kid now, they'd have to get used to that--
tossed and turned in their bed. After far too long, they finally went to sleep
and started dreaming.

Mages often had significant dreams, though they were just as likely to dream
about getting lost in their workplace just like everyone else. In this dream,
though, they saw once more their mentor's dance of transformation. The play
ended, the lights of the theater dimmed, and when they and the others had
vanished, Occultism Kid and Obscure Trivia Lad were led through a side door and
into... somewhere else. Somewhere outside.

A place that seemed wider than the sky and deeper than the ocean, an infinite
night sky lit by silver lights. The Astral Plane.

++So, what happens next?++ said the Occultism Kid who was.

"Many things," said VAMMO Woman. "A time of change is coming. And you too will
have a part to play in the war to come."

++I supposed as much... Where are we going?++

"To the Deep Omnilooniverse. To the worlds you made..."

They began to move into a place that felt somehow distant. The quality of it
was indescribably different--the lights seemed to flicker feverishly; the
darkness felt deeper yet, in some sense, *brighter*.

--How are you feeling?-- mindspoke Obscure Trivia Lad. --Obscure Trivia Lad
imagines it must be strange being a symbiote.--

++Well, I suppose you must feel some of it. It's odd...++ said Occultism Kid,
++I feel strangely hopeful now. Ever since we went into that dead universe
[Legion of Occult Heroes #4], so much of my life and my magic has been defined
by tragedy and loss. Now I feel I've taken that as far as I can go, and have
moved into something else. My body, my mind, they're... different. Maybe I can
move on now. Who knows?++

--Obscure Trivia Lad knows many things,-- said OTL, --but most of them aren't
very useful for this. That's usually how it goes...--

His head sharply turned and he looked off into the distance, where Occultism
Kid, the new one, was looking at him. And with that the dream ended.

They woke up and rubbed their eyes, glancing at the dream journal by their bed.
They were sure what they'd dreamed about was something terribly important, but
they couldn't remember a word of it.

====

THE FOOL

Masterplan Lad woke up. This was an unusual sensation. He had maintained
continuous consciousness throughout his life until now, even during the long
hiatus between Ultimate Mercenary v1 #5 and 6. Now he would feel it fade in and
out again. Just like a person.

He felt subtly different, in some way he couldn't define. He also wasn't sure
he'd keep using these pronouns, but felt it would be better for dramatic
reasons to hold that off until he was back in his own series.

He realized he wasn't quite awake, but in that frustrating half-asleep-half-
awake state that sometimes afflicted mortals. They could still send out their
senses from their body, scoping out the room their body lay in. They could
catch glimpses of the various ghosts, antimemetic LNHers, and metaphysical
beings that haunted the LNHQ. One of these beings was very familiar.

Chaos Theory hovered over the hospital medbay where Masterplan Lad lay
recovering. Evidently, while their newly-mortal-ish status afflicted them with
sleep and dreams, they could still speak while asleep with a fellow cosmic
being.

"Well, this is a fine mess you've gotten me into," said Masterplan Lad.

"Oh, you had a lot to do with getting yourself into that mess, believe me,"
said Chaos Theory.

"Yes, I suppose so... Well, it seems that at any moment I'll wake up and see my
friends and go through all the character development and gender-related
feelings I've been putting off... there's just one thing I'd like to check on
first."

A vague astral form stepped out of their body and touched the nearest computer.
The LNH Timeline flashed on the screen.

"My god," he said, "what a mess. We kept a more or less coherent continuity,
but at what cost... at what cost..."

"Look, it's fine." Chaos Theory kissed him goodbye and sparkled away into the
cosmos.

====

DEATH

The Hall of Lost Heroes.

A strangely peaceful place in an LNHQ full of chaos, but not one where many
people went. They didn't like to be reminded of their own mortality, even when
they'd come back as likely as not.

Captain Continuity looked at the statue of the Ultimate Ninja clone who'd died
in the Killfile Wars, which also served as a memorial for the true Ninja for
those in the know. (Which Captain Continuity was, as he'd figured it out
independently of his continuity powers a while back. Before being a net.hero,
he'd really wanted to be a reporter.)

And there was the newest statue, sculpted by Makes-Statues-Incredibly-Quickly
Laq: Marvel Zombie Lad. Before his statue lay his keepsake, a vintage Marvel
No-Prize envelope.

"Captain Continuity? Are you well?" came a deep, rich voice from behind him. He
turned around and saw Betamax--now without her helmet, her long hair flowing
over her armor. It was a good look.

"Oh, hi. Thanks for saving my life out there, Betamax."

Betamax nodded. "I was simply doing my duty as a member of the Legion. ...ah,
that wasn't the right thing to say, was it?"

"That's OK."

"What brings you here?"