Chapter Four: Deathlike Suspended Animation of a Salesman.
Erik, our dashing, masked and spankingly dead hero, rose to answer the door.
"Would you like purchase our fine Vac-o-Matic cleaning system?" asked a salesman.
"Actually, no," said Erik, and the traveling visitor plummeted through the porch and into a vat of carbonite, where the freezing process could begin.
In his own chamber in the basement, Richard III had just finished dressing for the morning. He glanced at his own reflection long enough to pull a velvet cap over his jaw-length black hair when Erik knocked on the door.
"Come in," said Richard.
Erik entered, head held aloft. Richard knew that the masked man was just trying to emphasize the fact that he himself stood just a few inches short of seven feet while the King barely scraped 5'8".
"What do you want?" Richard demanded.
"You've complained for weeks now about how this isn't like home, so I've been- ah- building something for you."
Richard looked up suspiciously. "Is this like when you tried to get me addicted to Vicodin?"
"Of course not!" said Erik. "Look- come with me."
Erik led Richard down a previously nonexistent staircase that burrowed ever deeper into the basement of Megan's house, finally arriving in a glorious underground chamber furnished with the free-standing, frozen forms of Tom Cruise and every unwanted that had shown up in the house lately. They had been painted gold, which complimented the rosy marble.
"Just like home, huh?" Erik asked with a smile.
"No," Richard said, still awed by the opulence around him.
"What?" Erik exclaimed. "Isn't this just like Florence at the height of the Renaissance?"
"How should I know? I never lived there!"
"Oh. So you're not Lorenzo de Medici?"
Richard couldn't believe Erik had been under this impression for that long.
"Erik," he explained gently, "I'm English."
"Oh! Good!" said Erik, heading toward the door. "In that case, I hope you enjoy the fully equipped potions lab. Have fun, Severus!"
Richard stared at the doorway, one eyebrow slightly raised. Severus?
"It must be the hair," he deadpanned.