For June 14th, 2004
Scarlett Vaughn
EPISODE VII: Penguin Poachers In Peril
Scarlett Vaughn could sense there was trouble percolating nearby. She buckled her snowshoes and scanned the horizon for the telltale signs.
The penguin poachers crouched deviously behind their phony, paper mache iceberg, focusing on a flock of noble emperors that fished placidly in the cold, blue waters of Commonwealth Bay. Antarctica was warmer than usual this time of year, probably due to the locals and their 24-hour, bacchanalian celebrations for the two weeks surrounding most holidays. It had been a month since Mawson's Day, when five-story tinder piles stood proudly in anticipation of the bonfires they would birth, constructed of wood salvaged from nearly century-old shipwrecks and expedition remnants. Their embers were just now cooling, and it would be at least another week or so 'til the next celebration would commence. Antarcticans could never, ever be accused of throwing a half-assed party. Fletcher Antwerp, the leader of the poachers since a bottomless crevasse had swallowed his predecessor and a seventy-dog sled team last summer, clenched his penguin net and giggled in a manner most unbecoming of a villain -- among whose company he could certainly be counted.
Fletcher Antwerp was not native Antarctican. It was doubtful he was even native Earthling, but no one knew for sure. His body was swaddled in endless strands of gauze, giving him the appearance of a convalescing mummy. No one had ever seen behind the black-lensed goggles that covered the majority of his face. What was known for sure, however, was that Fletcher Antwerp and company were numbskulls. Clad in paper-thin hazmat suits camouflaged in stripes of jungle green while standing on an ice shelf -- with nothing but bright white in all directions -- was a poor way to carry out a clandestine mission (diabolical or otherwise).
"Fucking penguin poachers," Scarlett Vaughn growled through clenched teeth when she spotted the obviously fake iceberg and a number of oddly-clad forms shivering in its shadow, "Dumb as rocks but not so pretty. Will they never learn?"
She loaded her harpoon gun and sidestepped a massive sastrugi, quietly humming a Tom Waits tune (most appropriate on missions of vengeance, she'd long believed).
Fletcher Antwerp, unaware of the predator who would soon put an end to his mysterious (and totally stupid) plans, rubbed his tape-wrapped palms together with glee. Tonight, he would fill his quota! Tonight, he would dine on lutefisk in the safety of a far-off land! His unseen masters would be oh, so pleased. He raised the net and readied it for the first batch of Aptenodytes forsteri. But he never made it that far...
"I mean, sure. Penguins are mean. Dirty. Smell bad. Eat each other, sometimes. Are cruel to humans. But, but...they're soooo fucking cute!" Said Scarlett to the nonplussed wrongdoers as she sprang upon them, "And you are, decidedly, not."
Fletcher Antwerp howled in pain as his liver was pierced with Scarlett's barbed harpoon justice. His cronies shrank back into the sanctuary they mistakenly believed the inside of their false iceberg could be. A casually tossed grenade from Scarlett's bag of tricks put an end to that misconception. But one burning question remained, and Scarlett would not allow it to continue, unanswered.
"Who sent you? Who sent you?" Scarlett demanded, lifting Antwerp up by the lapels.
Antwerp gargled and choked and...laughed? Scarlett imagined him smiling defiantly through the death rattle, taking his wicked (and totally stupid) secrets to the grave. Covered in gauze now soaked in gore, his true expression was, as always, masked. Scarlett sliced away endless layers of blood-drenched fabric until revealing a visage so hideous that caused even her, veteran of a thousand battlefields on a thousand worlds, to recoil...
Scarlett Vaughn, when she's not uncovering grave Republican plots to fuck up the planet, quite likes to keep busy by working on sites like RetroKitten, fetbytes, and, of course, her very own Scarlett Vaughn. She's not down with dummies, so don't bug her if your idea of a strong world leader is this guy. Seriously. She ain't got time for your prittle-prattle, foo'.
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