Jenny Everywhere and the Master of Monsters (comic story)

From Jenny Everywhere Wiki

Jenny Everywhere and the Master of Monsters was a Jenny Everywhere comic story written by Aristide Twain and created using the online tool [StoryboardThat], and posted online as part of The Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids (although it featured no characters exclusive to the series) for Jenny Everywhere Day 2022. It introduced the city of New Flaversham and the character of the Beastmaster.

Contents

Plot

While Jenny Everywhere is having a relaxing day in the Jungles of Hooloo, back in her home universe and home town, her girlfriend-turned-archnemesis Laura Drake is plotting trouble, recruiting a strange helmeted man named the Beastmaster.

Back in the jungle, Jenny takes a wrong turn into a spookier area, and is confronted with a four-armed humanoid with long seaweed-like hair and glowing eyes, the better part of her body seemingly made of mud. Despite the creature's attempts to scare her, Jenny just introduces herself and tries to make friends, confusing the entity, who stands still. This angers the Beastmaster, who shows himself. Jenny realises that he brought the Marsh-Maiden from another universe, and asks him if he is a shifter. He replies that he isn't by nature, showing her the shift-gun he used instead, which she recognises as one of Laura's inventions.

Despite Jenny's warning that the shift-guns are dangerous and reliable, the Beastmaster uses it on himself and Jenny to transport them to a snowy landscape next to a medieval castle, apparently home to another one of the supernatural creatures in the Beastmaster's arsenal: a small orange Dragon, who the Beastmaster hopes is above being “manipulated” by Jenny's words, being non-sapient. However, Jenny is also able to placate it, petting it like a dog.

In anger, the Beastmaster zaps himself and Jenny to yet another location: an oasis in the middle of a desert, home to a Sphinx called Paisi. His pride wounded by Jenny's pointing out that none of his monsters really like him, the Beastmaster orders Paisi to give him her honest feelings about him, and is dismayed to see her rattle off a long list of complaints, ending with a conclusion that he is barely worthy of being a master-of-monsters at all. Jenny encourages Paisi to carry this reasoning through to its logical conclusion: rejecting her past loyalty to the Beastmaster, she decides to see him as simply a rival monster intruding on her territory, and, taking flight, chases him into the distance.

Jenny stomps on the shift-gun, rendering it inoperable, then shifts back to New Flaversham — directly onto the ledge in front of the window of Laura's office, startling her. As Jenny confronts Laura about what just happened, Laura reveals that the Beastmaster is a revenant and they start laughing together about his ego. Displaying no ill will whatsoever, Jenny suggests to a somewhat surprised Laura that they go out for ice-cream, and, after a moment's hesitation, Laura agrees.

Worldbuilding

Jenny

Universes

Behind the scenes

Read online

The story is freely available on the official Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids wordpress site. It is also reproduced here with permission.