Multiversal Mischief (short story)
Multiversal Mischief was a short story in the The Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids series, written by Lupan Evezan
It took the form of a series of related vignettes, one of which featured Jenny Everywhere.
Contents
Plot
In the Cupid Homeworld, Rosen-035 hurries to the Department of Postal Services building (where he meets Lord Thymon), with a host of letters to be delivered across the Multiverse. He explains that he has just realised that now that they've got a tachyonic sailing ship, the Faction of the Fooling Fish will no doubt attempt to prank everyone the Crew has had contact with, across all dimensions, rather than being limited to the Prime Universe and the Cupid Homeworld as before.
The pranks begin with Lainya Vantrik, grim-faced and no-nonsense interdimensional assassin, who is hired remotely by the Faction for what sounds like a suitably grandiose mission only for the coordinates she receives to take her to the deck of the Faction's own ship, where she is told that the “dark specters” she has been hired to take on are “boredom and gloom”. Lainya attempts to back out, but her code of conduct prevents it, as the Fish did pay in advance.
In the Euclidean Plane, Orbicularia Bubble and a number of other Geometrons soon receive a visit from the Fish, an experience they find eldritch and nearly maddening due to the three-dimensional, non-geometrically-regular shapes of the interlopers. Orbicularia holds on longer than others but ends up fainting at the sight of the “public art display” of a fish that the pranksters set up.
At the Interdimensional Tavern, meanwhile, Frederick and Tpxszum, taking a breather in the break room, have to deal with the fact that the Tavern's regular customers have been all but pushed out by a new and insalubrious crowd of smugglers and other shady characters. (Also in the break room is one of the Tavern's regular patrons, Alistair Neezley, inexplicably acting as though he is genuinely on the Tavern's payroll rather than simply a fixture of the place as a regular customer.)
They realise soon enough that all these new clients are the merchants of the Interdimensional Black Market, who have received a forged letter from the Queen of the Black Market — really authored by the Fish — telling them to relocate to the Tavern. Even so, they are reluctant to leave, until Neezley begins to shout self-aggrandising tall tales at them, whereupon they finally clear off. Meanwhile, in the actual Black Market, the Queen is sitting on her throne wondering where everyone has gone, speaking aloud to her pet, Wallace. A disguised Fish member walks in and attempts to convince her that the Fish have serious business proposals for the Queen, but she scares the figure off with nary a thought.
At the headquarters of the Society of the Rhyming Dove, the Doves are having a feast alongside the Ennead of the Eigengrau Easter Eggs. They receive a package from the Doves, containing a ridiculous talking, rhyming dog called Astro. They initially find him quite to their liking, but he makes the rhyming scheme and versification of the narration of their own lives go wonky, to their horror. However, they eventually do begin to get along, until finally a Cupid Fog Ship (summoned by the Doves) arrives to take Astro home.
Jenny Everywhere, returning from a thirdy-day trek through the Swamps of Cr’uuuu’uuuuu’uuuumph, materialises in a grassy field only to run into a Faction of the Fooling Fish member wearing a pair of goggles and a scarf. The Fish claims to be “the Fishter”, one of her own incarnations, coming from a universe where it is held that fish are the supreme lifeform and should be imitated in all things. “The Fishter” attempts to trick Jenny into standing in the right place for a large catapult to be used to throw a pie at ther face, but Jenny deflects the Fishter's manipulation and tells it to head with her to a “Jenny meet-up” at the Interdimensional Tavern.
At the Tavern, now largely empty, since the Black Market people have left but the regular patrons have not all returned, they indeed meet up with three more incarnations of Jenny: a tall red-haired one, a French musketeer, and an imp-like Jenny. They attempt to make conversation, with the Fishter predictably unable to come up with satisfying answers to questions such as what recent adventures it has gone through and what its world's Laura Drake is like. The Fishter briefly tries to fall back on pretending to be an incarnation of Jenny Nowhere (visualised by putting out a second, more evil-looking pair of goggles), but the four actual Jennies remain skeptical, and it finally gives up the ghost and runs away.
The first Jenny it encountered calls for Pythagoras-858, who ends up finding the Faction's sailing ship. There, he happens upon Lainya Ventrik, who explains that the Fish have hired her to defend their ship for the day — using nothing but a confetti gun and an extending boxing glove. He convinces her to let him see the Fish's leaders, however. The Fish, who remember him from “the Consistency Imperium business”, are delighted to see him, and meekly acquiesce when Pythe chews them out for having failed to consider proper health and safety standards in their rush to do something truly special for their first multiversal April's Fools' Day.
In the end, after all is said and done, Lainya reluctantly confesses to the Fish that she had some fun today, even if she isn't about to join their group. The Faction give her a parting gift — a booby-trapped gag-present, of course, which showers her in confetti when she opens the box; but she chuckles good-naturedly at it.
Worldbuilding
Jenny
- This story features the version of Jenny who has been travelling with Pythagoras-858, and cameos by three other ones: a tall red-haired one, a French one who carries a sword, and an imp-like one.
Other
- Several varieties of Geometrons are seen in the Euclidean Plane, including Spheroids, Tangulars, Triangries, Octasers and Stelloids.
- Tpxszum is seen reading the Quantum-Scientific Arisrian.
Continuity
- Tpxszum is seen reading the Quantum-Scientific Arisrian. The Arisrians were first mentioned in PROSE: Misadventures in the Interdimensional Black Market.
- The Faction of the Fooling Fish have begun travelling the Multiverse using their newly-acquired tachyonic sailing ship, as the Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids feared they would in PROSE: Rifts Crisis Officially Over!.
- The red-haired Jenny at the meeting fits the description of the one who was sold a faulty contrafibulator by Sylvester Shoebill as recounted in PROSE: The Grand Multiverse Hotel.
- The Jenny who carries a sword and speaks in a French accent is presumably the one who fought Cardinal Dracula with D'Artagnan, as seen in PROSE: Preludes and Distractions.
- An imp-like Jenny appears, based on an illustration of such a Jenny published as a bonus on the Ask Jenny Tumblr blog a few months earlier.
- Orbicularia Bubble debuted in PROSE: Magic Trick.
- The Queen of the Black Market is seen using the bone spear which she stated she intended to create in PROSE: Misadventures in the Interdimensional Black Market, and was indeed shown whittling and then testing for the first time in PROSE: The Ghosts and the Machine. The spear would appear again in PROSE: Century Smith and the Time Terror and PROSE: The Winter Quests.
Behind the scenes
Read online
This story is available online on the Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids website.
