Pessimist and the Dromedaries (short story)

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Pessimist and the Dromedaries was a Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids short story written by Lupan Evezan and illustrated by Aristide Twain. It introduced Darius.

Contents

Plot

Somewhere in the Prime Universe, in Research Laboratory 6, at night, Head Assistant Researcher Darius of the Drove of the Database-Compiling Dromedaries rants to Assistant Researcher Lila about his frustration with the fact that the Drove have little to no information on the Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids. He orders her to try and capture a Clockwork Cherub herself.

Elsewhere, Pessimist-242 is waiting in Whetstone Park for people to romanticise. Eventually, Lila sneaks up on him with a burlap sack. he sees her coming, and addresses her, explaining that he is waiting for his sentient Fog Ship (who has wandered off) to return. He listlessly allows her to capture him in the burlap sack and take him back to Research Laboratory 6. About fifteen miles away, the Fog Ship briefly considers going back to the Park for Pessimist, but decides to go check out a “combination greenhouse-theater-diner-aquarium over to the east side of the city” instead.

Lila finally brings Pessimist to Darius, who lets slip that he intends to take sole credit for the achievement, hoping to get promoted to Head Researcher. The two Dromedaries then take Pessimist down to the Laboratory proper, an underground level full of high-tech cages containing members of nonhuman Strangely-Colored Secret Societies, such as a Green Gorilla. After interrogating normally for a little while, being fascinated to learn that the Crew has its own Department of Documentation, Darius has Pessimist sit in a special chair which scans his mechanical constitution. After printing out readings and schematics, telling Lila that she “know[s] what to do with these”, he resumes interrogating Pessimist, trying to figure out what relationship if any the Crew has to the First Horde and other Strangely-Colored Secret Societies.

Meanwhile, back in Whetstone Park, Pessimist's Fog Ship is located and greeted by a cheerful android who claims to be Pessimist, but patently isn't. The Ship briefly hesitates but ultimately agrees to take the impostor “back” to the Cupid Homeworld. Back in Research Laboratory 6, the questioning continues. When Pessimist brings up the fact that other Cupids will notice his disappearance, Darius explains that he had a captive Clockmaking Capybara create a duplicate of him based on the schematics outputted by the analyzation chair. He then winds down the interrogation, promising to return tomorrow.

After Darius leaves, Pessimist gets out of his cell, hacking into the electric circuits maintaining the locks using his abilities as a Clockwork Cherub. The Green Gorilla in a nearby cell is baffled and, after getting an explanation out of Pessimist, talks him into freeing him and all the other captives. After he does so, they try to think through an escape plan to get past the five security guards and Darius himself to reach a ceiling hatch through which they hope to leave the Dromedaries' building. As the mutant animals keep bickering and insisting that their respective abilities will be central, the Azure-And-Emerald Panther tells Pessimist to step in with a plan of his own.

Meanwhile, in the Homeworld, Acquaintanceship-982 calls a meeting of the Blue Feather to discuss a new mission — finding Investigation-464's lost coat. When “Pseudo-Pessimist” does a cartwheel out of sheer enthusiasm, Acquaintanceship and the others finally realise what Dandy-432 has been trying to tell them all day — this is not the real Pessimist.

Back in Research Laboratory 6, the escapees set their plan in motion. They first lure the Head Guard down to the Laboratory and have the Green Gorilla knock him out before tying him to the analyzation chair. When the four remaining guards rush down in a panic, the animals work together to incapacitate them and lock them into four of the now-empty cells. This leaves Darius himself, whom the Camouflaged Chameleon lures down by imitating the Head Guard's voice on the intercom, allowing the animals to ambush him and allow Pessimist to romanticise him.

Meanwhile, the Blue Feather find Pessimist's Fog Ship and have it take them to Pessimist's current location using the link between its positronic brain and Pessimist's own. They materialise in Research Laboratory 6 with great fracas, partially destroying the wall, just as Pessimist has started heading up the stairs, intent on going back to Whetstone Park to wait for a ride. The Blue Feather Cupids get out of the Ship to look for him. Darius, whose romanticisation has partially worn off due to the shock of part of the wall falling on him, forces the Ship to take him back to the Homeworld at gunpoint, but the Ship selects the Cupid Post Office for a location, allowing Lord Thymon, upset at the way Darius's appearance knocks over the mail he's been sorting, to banish Darius into the Void, quickly resolving the situation. While Darius begins drifting towards the Interdimensional Tavern, the Fog Ship returns to pick up the Blue Feather Cupids, having, from their perspective, only been gone for an even briefer moment than Darius's joyride actually lasted.

The next day, at the Drove of the Database-Compiling Dromedaries' headquarters, the hierarchy deals with the chaos of the previous day by pinning the blame on the mysteriously-gone Darius. He is fired in absentia and Lila is gratifyingly informed that she is to become Head Assistant Researcher in his place.

Back in the Cupid Homeworld, the now-reunited Blue Feather properly set out on their new mission looking for Investigation's jacket, with Pessimist grudgingly granting that he prefers that to being imprisoned by the Dromedaries. They are joined on a permanent basis by the cheerful Pessimist duplicate, who is still enthusiastic about the work, despite his lack of understanding of what a “jacket” is (or indeed, of much of anything).

Worldbuilding

Universes

Other

Continuity

Behind the scenes

Read online

The story can be read for free on the Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids website.