Nawrocki is kind of like my Mickey Mouse, in the sense that I can put him in any situation and he has the potential to work. Just like Mickey can be a ghost-hunter, mountain climber, conductor, fireman, or sailor just as long as he's friendly, happy, and nice, so too can Nawrocki cause trouble just as long as he's altogether unpleasant. I can just see myself in the future, at the top of my entertainment empire looking down and making a speech, "I only hope we never loose sight of one thing... that this was all started by a dimension-hopping alien plannimal."

Or maybe not. In other news, I now own an iPod. I'm still not sure how I feel about this. Details at 11.

"The Green Thunder will take care of this!" Mr. L jumped on top of his bed struck an awesome pose, the kind that just needs a starburst to happen behind it to do the pose justice.

He looked around his empty room proudly, imagining applause and cheering for him. He nodded in approval, and then stepped down onto the floor. "Almost perfect," he said. "But I don't think it's got enough pizzaz..."

Earlier Count Bleck had said to him, "You may put the mask on, Mr. L, but you're still the same Luigi underneath."

Oh, yeah? Would the same Luigi be risking life and limb on a daring mission to overthrow Nawrocki and bring Castle Bleck back to the status quo. No, but that's just what Mr. L was planning on doing. He would save everyone. Then praise! Oh, the adoration he'd receive when everyone finds out that it was he, Mr. L, the Green Thunder, who saved the day! Hurray and huzzah!

Except when he opened the door, he decided he wasn't quite ready to go out into the spooky forboding hallway. It was probably because his poses weren't perfect. So he was in his room practicing them until he was confident enough to go out into the hallway.

Nawrocki was sitting on the windowsill of the lab, resting. He'd been sleeping a lot lately. Even so, he always felt tired and a little listless. Probably he wasn't setting enough time to photosynthisize properly. Humans can digest as they do other things and they take it for granted (there's no reason not to); lots of animals (and plannimals for that matter) have to expend time and effort on it. Nighttime was a good time to rest and digest, both the nutrition and the wealth of information he'd acquired that day.

Soon enough, though, he would need all the energy he could get. If the production numbers stayed up, he would be ready to ship by the end of the week. "Ship," meaning, of course, "take over the world." Thousands of weapons would be descending upon the unsuspecting populace like so much...

Hm. Nawrocki made a mental note to ask Dimentio to come up with a good similie for the occasion. They weren't really his forte.

He got an excited little shiver thinking about it. First Castle Bleck, then the worlds!

Meanwhile, outside, Mimi returned with the small flat box that Dimentio had stored his swag in. Nastasia was waiting a far distance from Castle Bleck, on the very edge of the dimension.

"I'm back!" she chirped. "I have all the stuff I could get."

"Is that so?" Nastasia took the box from her. "Yeah, you weren't gone for a very long time. Did you really give it 100%?"

"I hit the jackpot." Mimi opened the dimensional box the same way Dimentio had. "See?"

Nastasia looked in and her eyes bugged out under her glasses. "Yeah, this is satisfactory." Her face didn't quite match up to her tone, but she quickly brushed off the surprise. "Let's get it back to Flipside as soon as our surveillance unit returns, 'K?"

As if on cue, Tippi fluttered down to the meeting. "I'm back," she said. "I checked out on what they'd been doing. There's, maybe 1,000 of those Yaridoviches that caught us that I can see from the lab window. I couldn't stay because Nawrocki was sleeping there and I didn't want him to wake up and find us."

"Did you see anything else?"

"Blumiere is fine," said Tippi.

"I mean, were the only robots Yaridoviches?"

"Oh. Um, yes... That I saw, I mean. They all looked the same." Pixls don't blush, but she more than made up for it in her tone.

"Then we'll go back to Merlon now," said Nastasia. "Yeah, so we'll go back to Merlon and get the next step in our plan."

Redemption.

Count Bleck thumed through the Dark Prognosticus. There was nothing in that book about hope, let alone redemption. He was desperate now to stop Nawrocki and save his friends and by proxy the world. But he had no ideas. Nawrocki had a platoon before they even knew he was evil. Now Count Bleck was in so far over his top hat that he felt he was drowning in hopelessness. Then he would die, and have no chance at redemption.

What a stupid problem.

Normally he wasn't so blunt and preferred to express his displeasure with gentlemanly eloquence, but there was no sugarcoating it. This was a stupid, stupid problem.

If he was looking in the Dark Prognosticus for hope, then it really was hopeless.

Mr. L was still practicing his poses when there was a knock at the door.

"Door's open," he called. He experimented with his one hand out, peace sign, other hand in a fist on his chest. Bent knees, check. No, still not cool enough.

Dimentio opened the door and floated into the middle of the room. "It seems I'm not the only one stricken with insomnia," he said.

"You can't sleep either, huh?" Mr. L and Dimentio were on the same eye-level, so he didn't bother jumping off the bed to face him. "Come on. Make poses with me."

Dimentio shrugged and complied, and the two of them experimented with different cool, dramatic poses.

After a few tries, Dimentio said, "Tell me, then, Green Thunder, why the sudden interest in striking a pose?"

"I'm gonna save the day. I want to look awesome when I do." He turned around. "Why'd you come here?"

"Much as I detest being within the presence of other beings, I find myself hungry for companionship."

"You get lonely??"

"I suppose everyone does from time to time," said Dimentio offhandedly. "Here, put your back against mine. We'll mirror each other. Green is the opposite of purple, yes?"

"No, it's yellow," said Mr. L.

"Ah. No wonder I find my outfit so coordinated."

"Seriously, though, you get lonely?"

"Apparently. May I ask you a question?"

"Uh, yeah."

"Why do you find satisfaction here at Castle Bleck?"

Mr. L rubbed the back of his neck and grinned sheepishly. "Gee, that's a weird question. Well... I guess it's because I've never felt as useful as I have here most recently?"

"Useful?"

"Yeah. Like, other people would be inconvenienced if I weren't around, and happy if I were, you know?"

"I have never known someone to be happy when I was around if my absence was a plausable alternative."

"Why am I not surprised." Mr. L sat down on the bed. "Look, Dimentio, you goin' through something or what?"

"I do not 'go through things.' I was simply curious about the pitiful states of friendship the rest of you waste your time with. Frankly, it doesn't make sense to me."

"Makes perfect sense to me."

"Keep it if you want." Dimentio shrugged. "This has been an completely useless exchange. I am off to raid the kitchen. I'll leave you to your poses."

"'Kay. Bye." He jumped on the bed and tried one more, arms up. "How's this one?"

"I'm not looking!" Dimentio sang. He was already out of the room.

Dimentio ran into Count Bleck in the hallway. They collided with each other and staggered backwards. Count Bleck lost his footing and fell forward into a kneel.

"Is no one sleeping?" he said out loud. It was then he saw that Count Bleck was clutching something to his chest.

"What is that you have?" he asked. "You're clutching something defensively, like a mother orangutan clutches a small, defenseless kitten."

Count Bleck looked up, a wild, wicked grin pasted across his face. "Count Bleck has found something," he said smugly.

Dimentio craned his neck sideways and made a mock gasp. "Why, is that the dark book of prophecies I see you holding so protectively?"

Count Bleck nodded once. "Our problems will be over faster than you can say Miso Soup."

"What evil will you bring upon our captor?"

"Ah, but that's just it!" He was giggling now to himself, under his breath. "Bleh heh heh heh! Bleck! When evil is wrought upon evil it brings only more suffering… but when it is wrought against it's own self then it will cave in and be destroyed!"

"That doesn't make any sense."

"I have to remind Nastasia to write that in the Beige Prognosticus."

"Count, that book has brought us both nothing but frustration." He rubbed his head. "And pain. A great amount of pain, actually. If we're going to be evil again, I say we rely on our own selves."

Count Bleck didn't listen to Dimentio. He continued down the hallway, his mad laughter trailing behind him, "Bleh heh heh heh heh heh… Bleck!"

"Goodness," said Dimentio to no one in particular. "It looks like our dear Count has finally lost his mind."