AN ELDEREPI

                       BY: Jo and Ando

(Note: There were times when writing an epi with co-authors became more of a duel of wills. This short storyline

is an example of such. One author wants one thing, the other wants something entirely...well...other.)

part 1...by Jo

To recap from the end of Starless Trek:

Maximus immediately caught sight of the huge white arch by the river and walked swiftly towards it...

just as Sid had known he would. "What is THIS?" he snarled. "Has Commodus reared yet another

monument to his depravity? What so-called 'triumph' of his does this commemorate?"
 

Just as Jo was planning how to explain to him about wagon trains and such, he Aubrey, Egan and

Zack walked under the arch...and disappeared. Jo, Juditha, Diz and Susan Guildford exchanged

meaningful looks. SID! It HAD to be! Without hesitation the four women charged after the men,

also disappearing right in front of the startled eyes of the rest of the Peeps and characters.

"Well," explained Audrey helpfully. "It IS the Gateway Arch, is it not?"

"Yes," added Lucilla, "but gateway to WHERE... to WHAT?"

"I suppose we shall have to wait until after the Chicago concert to find the answer to that, " Lusty Susan

added, her pockets full of newly- gathered apples and her eyes glowing with 'Bounty-ous' memories.

Gathering up their backpacks, the Peeps and characters swam the Missouri and headed north towards

Chicago. Lucilla wiped a tear from one cheek. Was it there because Jo and Juditha were not going to

make the concert or because Jack and Maximus were gone? Perhaps it was a bit of both. Perhaps. The

newly rising sun shone upon her cheek, though, and in her heart the sounds of Other Ways of Speaking

began to reverberate. She squared her chin and smiled determinedly. She and the surviving Peeps would

just jolly well enjoy the concert enough for ALL of Peepdom, even those who had been carried off to

Oz and those who had gone...well...wherever it was that Sid had set as the far side of the Arch. She knew

they would want it that way. Peeps are like that, you know. They are glad when sisterPeeps are happy...

are on the last leg of the long journey to Chicago. Yes...they are.
************

 
But Chicago came and went, as Chicago has been known to do for some years now. Whether it went

with the wind or was carried off piece by piece by Peeps as souvenirs will never be accurately known. 

A month after the concerts, Lucilla found herself standing once again in front of the enormous white

Gateway Arch.  She missed Jo, Juditha, Diz and Susan Guildford, though she was not sure quite why.

Her eyes followed the long curve of one leg down to the ground. She was good at that from her long

ears of following the curves of Russell's legs....and other things.

Attracted by something fluttering on the grass, she bent and picked up a withered blue poppy petal...all

that was left of poor Susan.  She was joined by another woman who was obviously curious about what

Lucilla was doing.  This would be Max, obviously out of her coat closet and being thrust forthwith into

an epi probably very against her will. Oh, well. What have wills ever mattered in an epi anyway?  A

well-built young man stood beside Max. He was still remarkably handsome in spite of having been

attacked some years earlier by a crazed maniac with an ink pen and a razor. Lucilla, never having seen

him except in photographs, nonetheless knew instantly who he was.
   

"HANDO!" she exclaimed. "Why are you not with Andrea?"
   

Hando merely grinned and wiggled his tongue at her. The Melbourne lad was not well-known for his

predilection towards etiquette books.
    

Max looked concerned. She had not known he had followed her on her afternoon's stroll from Vermont.

Quickly she looked around. Was anyone from North London in the vicinity? Exhaling in a long, relieved

breath, she started to speak to Lucilla when a sharp finger poked her left shoulder blade. Spinning around,

she was greeted by the sight of an attractive woman dressed all in black leather... very, very form-fitting

black leather. But it was not so much the attire of the woman as the whip coiled at her hip and the wide

black leather wings making soft, flapping sounds in the St. Louis air that caught her attention.
   

"Pssst!" the leathered one hissed, a wicked grin smirked across her scarlet lips. "The Ando woman....she's

going away for a full two weeks."
    

"Wh...what...does that have to do with ME?" Max stammered.
    

"Lots! Lots 'n lots!" the leathered one laughed as she crooked a finger, signaling another woman to let

go of the reins of her horse and come over. "When we get Diz back through the Arch,  Beck and I will

have quite the surprise for ole Ando!"
    

Max backed up several steps. She wanted no part of THIS! This sounded dangerous to life and even limb

...and limbs were things she had grown very fond of... not to mention life.  She looked at Beck, who seemed,

at least, to be dressed somewhat more normally than this apparition of leatherness, though, she had to

admit, the long evening gown DID seem a tad out of place on a sunny afternoon in Gateway Park.
   

Just then a series of electric blue charges began leaping from leg to leg of the Arch itself.  Max' eyes

widened. Why, oh, why she wondered had she not remained safely home in her Vermont woodlands? 

Was her home not full of Mel clones...not to mention two of Crowe? And was this her own Hando clone

who had followed her...or was he the real one? Oh, it was all just so confusing!
   

Forms were taking shape on the far side of the world...er...arch. Sue the sometimes Vile narrowed her

eyes as she strained to catch her first view of the returning Scotswoman. It was a shame, though, that

 to get Diz back, one had to get that Jo back, too.

part 2....by Jo

The forms approaching through the Arch were getting clearer and clearer. Why, it was the General and

the Captain themselves...along with Egan and Wooki..er....Zack! Each character had a Peep by her hand. Jack's large paw was wrapped tenderly about Juditha's dainty fingers. Zack was happily with his Susan Guildford while Diz seemed to be having a few words with Egan...and not about silver merhorses...but

about bald Melbourners...oh, NO! But, then, of course came the great and glorious and perfect-in-every-

way Maximus, his tanned, strong fingers so redolent with ripe wheat holding firmly onto those of his

beloved Jo's. (Ah, the joys of writing one's own epis....sigh!)  Where HAD this group of 8 BEEN? What

HAD they been DOING while most of Peepdom was dismantling Chicago? Well, whatever it was, just

one look at Jo's face told one that it had been....er....pleasant.
   

Jo finally wrenched her eyes most unwillingly from the tanned face of her General of the Armies of the

North and looked dreamily at the small gathering before her.  But nothing else really mattered when she

and the Commander of the Felix Legions were walking hand in hand. Not even the recent dastardliness

that evil Sid fellow had attempted to perpetrate. Yes, he HAD succeeded in keeping them from Chicago,

but when she was with Maximus the music of the spheres sang in Jo's ears and she had been more than

satisfied with that.  Sid, she knew, had thought to keep them prisoner in some never never land forever

and ever. Did he so soon forget that Jo had written them successfully out of Never Never Oz already and

 that as soon as she was ready...which did take a good month....a VERY good month, she grinned to herself....she would merely whip out the keyboard she kept so handily in her gossamer backpack and

simply TYPE their way back through the Arch? Some villains just never did learn.
   

Juditha, too, was smiling, the taste of seasalt still lingering pleasantly on her soft lips. Susan's poppy was

still in its pot...well, all except for that one stray petal.  But what was going on with Diz and Egan? Why

was the Scotswoman eyeing Hando like that?  Yes, the Welshwoman who had stopped just behind Sue

the sometimes Vile was wondering the very same thing! Indeed! Why was Beck looking at Hando in the

same lustful manner? Did these women not have their own Aussie horsemen?  Was PeepGreed breaking

out like chicken pox?  Andrea's eyes narrowed. She reached into her backpack and withdrew....

part 2..by Jo

...most foolishly, one might add, her passport. Her teeth gritting down to what used to pass as her gumline, Andrea managed to grate out, "Now listen up, you criminally-minded PeepPersons. I am going away for

2 weeks to search the sewers of the known world and beyond until I find my lost Arthur. He was last seen examining the toilet paper particles adhered to the lower sections of the sewer gates under Venice...or was

that Vienna... and my heart cries out to locate my One True Love and embrace him to my beating heart

yet once more before winter sets in and the sewers freeze, locking his feet into permanent presence

somewhere in some nether world of floating...er...debris."
   

The Londoner frowned. WHY was her pitiful statement of undying devotion to her WelshWonder being

met with such evil grins? Why was drool dripping down from the right-hand corner of Hando's lovely

lower lip? Or WAS that Hando? She studied the HairlessOne carefully. Hmmmmm? He DID have

those Vermont maple leaves plastered wetly across the soles of his boots. THAT was suspicious! But then,

there was that suggestion of some dizzy tartan plaid somethingorother peeking out of one pocket of his

TWP's. And was that horsehair on his thighs? Was the guy even capable of fidelity, she wondered

wonderingly? (One might ask, one truly might, just WHERE the Londoner got off even daring to think

of fidelity in another when she her very self was on the brink of departure in search of the young
character she had branded hot-crossly on his previously unmarked buns some years ago in a Welsh field

among the nodding daisies that warm spring afternoon when the quails were quailing and the robins were robbing.)

BUT leave she must...and immediately if not sooner. It would be hard, she knew, this leaving while not

really knowing if the bald one were the One True Hando or not. It would have been somewhat easier, at

least, if Sue the VeryVeryVeryVile at the moment, were not rubbing her forefinger down the curve of

one of her black leather wings and singing something softly under her breath through her scarlet lips

while the St. Louis sunlight sparkled off her not- all-that-sharpened little teeth.

But Andrea's transport had arrived and she had to leave the little grouping of suspiciously happy Peeps

there in the Gateway Park. How long would her search for Arthur take...what paths would she have to travel...well, what sewers would she have to slog through was more like it...in order to locate the missing

WBV? Only epi writers knew for sure, and they were not telling. Nope! Not at all!

Reluctantly turning her back on the HandoWhoever, Andrea hopped aboard the wheeled rhinoceros,

settled herself as comfortably as possible in the small sink that served as its saddle, gathered the fluffy boa

reins into her hands in that proper way Beck had shown her reins must be gathered, tossed down a rhino

treat of backed scrod to motivate the massive beast, and lifted off into the gathering dusk, leaving a

sparkling rainbow trail in her wake.
   

Beck, Diz, Max, and Sue sighed in satisfied unison. *SIGH* "At LAST!" Forming a tight little circle of

just themselves they murmured plans for quite a while, until Sue lifted her head and with a huge grin

announced, ".....

part 3..by Andrea

Well, the others thought it was a grin but in reality it was a grimace but with Sue the Vile it was difficult

to tell the difference. With a huge grimace she announced "That sneaky   (bleep) woman Ando has left

us with a clone... in fact a whole army of clones. " She pointed to the hill and they all swiftly put on their sunglasses as they were being blinded by the arrival of several dozen Hando clones, each with a very

shiny head.  Several H-clones broke ranks and walked towards Diz  and the others, who were all looking

more than happy although a tad pale after all those months in the closet.

The women smiled, Sue The Vile grimaced/smiled - there were plenty of Handos to fill everyone's needs.

So there and then they decided to forgive Ando for taking the One True Hando with her and not to

pursue the matter or indeed the pair themselves, who by this time had disappeared somewhere having

left no trail.

The Evil Epi Queen aka Jo was stamping her feet in frustration that her evil plans to steal The One True

Hando from Ando had failed for this fortnight.

Ando, looking back from her transport with a serene smile knowing the girls and the Vile One would be

more than satisfied with the H-clones. Sitting behind Ando on said steed, The One True Hando grinned.

Two weeks alone with Ando in ... ah Ando thought she was going to Spain, but that was just to deflect

the EEQ's attention. He smiled knowingly, he would convince her - somehow - not to look for Arthur,

as it was only the EEQ who wanted him found. Anyway only he, The One True Hando,  knew where

Arthur was and he wasn't going to be divulging that secret for the next two weeks.

Back with the H-clones almost upon them, the no longer closeted women were beginning to feel....

 part 4....by Jo

...totally satisfied that Andrea had left, actually BELIEVING that the inflatable Hando they had just filled

with hot air was the One True Hando. For a woman experienced with the underbelly of London society,

Ando was remarkably easy to fool from time to time.

Indeed, the HotAirHando was doing JUST what he was supposed to...filling Andrea's ears with hot air.

Andrea had not even noticed as an inflated Hando was ever one of her favorite things, especially when

stairs were involved. But...even aboard the back of a flying rhino...she was pleased to have such a one

with her. How long would it take before she discovered the terrible truth? Would she be half-way to

Vienna before HotAirHando began the inevitable leakage from the pinhole Sue The Vile had poked

between his eyeballs? By then it would be too late. The OneTrueHando would be long gone from

Gateway Park. 

Jo, adorable in her great innocence, smiled as she raised her General's massive hand to her lips, kissing

his knuckles softly.  The air was clear, a light breeze ruffled her long hair as well as the faux  fur of

Maximus' glorious cape. The Hando clones had been merely a carefully-arranged projection from the

hidden camera atop the Arch. Only the OneTrueHando was there in the park.  And he was even now surrounded by Beck and Diz and Max while Sue watched approvingly....though she did admit she was

beginning to feel the need for a dust exchange.  No one had really noticed Egan and East, though, as

they stood side by side...frowning...watching the same sight Sue was beholding. They were NOT smiling.

Not at all!  And soon....
 

part 4..by Andrea

the OneTrueHando started to deflate before their eyes. Dammit that Ando was good, when had she made

the switch between the hot air mimic with the real OneTrueHando? But Ando had outwitted them all and

really did have the real OneTrueHando with her and the pair of them were safely ensconced somewhere

proving that he was indeed the OneTrueHando.

 Ando, beginning to get a tad annoyed at the EEQ's attempts to undermine her holiday, sent a pack of

orcs to deal with her. Shame the EEQ had turned the H-clones into a mere illusion as they would have

been really useful in her defense.

The previously closeted women were beginning to get very miffed with the EEQ for taking away the H-

clones that Ando had graciously provided for them in lieu of the OneTrueHando .

A revolt was brewing much to the amusement of Ando and the OneTrueHando ...

 (now stop it, EEQ, the RealOneTrueHando and I are trying to pack!)

part 5...Jo

Yes, indeed. It was the former hostess, brewing revolting tea right there in the park. It HAD to be that,

as the faithful Peeps would NEVER consider revolutionary thoughts against loving, kind, generous, and

rapidly typing Jo.  That Andrea! Not only was she an extremely slow leaver, but she typed way too much

while packing.  The proof was in the pudding, so to speak, though...and no sooner had the sinkily-seated

rhino rider arrived in the skies above.... hmmmmm?.....above.....Malta...yeah, that'll do....than the Vilely

pricked pinhole began to hiss.

Ando twisted around in her sink, the better to see what was causing Hando's forehead to sag in that

 distressing manner. "EEEEK!" she screeched eekily. "Hando! What is happening to you?" 

At this point she, even she, was forced to admit that the Hando who was perched behind her sink was

doing a pretty fair imitation of the witch in Oz,  even though Berthothy and a pail of water were no

where about....well, at least not in the skies above Malta, that is. If one is old enough and has a highly-

polished memory, one might even recall that at the end of the Starless Trek, BertiBlown, annsmac,

and Amanda, along with Bud, Terry, and Biebe, had been windily removed from Kansas and

transported to the actual Oz of the red dirt and the kangaroos. How we shall ever get them back

remains to be seen...or typed.
     

Andrea, the deflating hotairHando, and the sink-saddled  rhino came spiraling down toward the coast of

Malta. Between the uplifting power of the last of Hando's hot air and the rhino's wheels, Andrea was set

 softly in the midst of a movie set. Her heart began beating faster. Could it be Gladiator? Would Jo's

General be there? Or could it possibly even be The Count of Monte Cristo? That Count fellow wasn't

too bad. But nooooooooo. Andrea, with what was left of Hando draped over her left forearm, found

herself in the midst of the filming of  Ace Ventura and the Purple Spider Woman's Revenge.

"Crap!" she opined quite loudly. 

A large man with hairy elbows and several guns asked, "What did you say?"

Batting her lids as coyly as she could manage with all the remnants of seagull digestive by-products

lodged amongst them, she said, "Ummmm....I was asking if there were a sewer entrance nearby." 

For, you see, now that Hando was deflated so very completely, she had no further use for him but had

begun to think sewerly about her missing Arthur. Such are the fickle ways of formerly Welsh Londoners.

The hairy-elbowed man, of course, knew right where the nearest sewer entrance was. For some reason,

Andrea lugged the limp lad along. One never knew when an uninflated inflatable Hando might come in

handy as one slogged through the world's sewer systems.

If only she had been good...if only she had been wise....if only she had actually MET Arthur there at

Stonehenge that night he had waited for her all those long hours on the altar stone while the strange

women dancers lay wreaths of poison ivy upon him as the moon rose. But NOOOOO!  She had not

kept their tryst. She had left Arthur trystless and he had ended up in that Turkish prison, where the

only escape had led him to the sewer gate of Vienna.

All of Peepdom narrowed their eyes as they read the words on their computers of the terrible tail of the

faithless field-fraidy cat. Right and just it was that such a one should be even now entering the dank

sewer system of Malta in a desperate attempt at redemption.
   

Oh, NO! The word "redemption" had inadvertently been typed and appeared before the eyes of Sue

the often usually Vile back in Gateway Park.  For the black angel, the word meant only one thing.....

Cort's town. Sue smiled grimly. Where WAS her cowboy? Had the 3 white angels wetted him again?

The park was, indeed, right beside  a giant river. It was possible. The distant sound of splashing and

laughter distracted her attention from Egan and East, who STILL were frowning at Diz and Beck.

Were NO Peeps capable of fidelity any more?  And just HOW revolting WAS Lucilla's tea? The Peeps

would have been in a pickle had they not been in Missouri instead.
 

part 6..by Jo

Andrea had gone no further than 17 or so miles into the ancient stone tunnel, accompanied only by the

limp uninflated inflatable Hando over her left arm and the constant dripping upon her head by some

nameless substance seeping through the vaulted ceiling (now WAIT.... goodness IS coming!!!), when

she began to hear the faint notes of some distant singing coming from a side sewer tunnel up ahead.

She smiled. Another 5 or so miles of knee-deep sludge trudging would bring her to that sound she knew. Encouraged, she draped the uninflated inflatable Hando over her head to ward off the unidentified

seeping substance. She had no idea, of course, of what this substance might or might not DO to the

uninflated inflatable Hando. Her whole being was centered on reaching the place from whence the

singing emanated so softly and sweetly.
  

She was getting tired. If only the sludge were not quite so thick with dark brown things and dismembered

lizard legs, she felt she could have progressed somewhat more rapidly. Had she not been concentrating

so hard on the wafting notes, she would perhaps have been more aware that the uninflated inflatable

Hando draped across her head was becoming heavier. But Londoners, you see, are so accustomed to

heavy head drapes because of all the protective rain gear they don between January first and December

31st, that such heaviness seemed of no consequence to her... at first.
 

When, though, after a full four miles of sludge slogging, her neck bent at a 130 degree angle to the left,

she stopped, having noticed, at last, that something was up up above her neck. She wondered briefly if

Jo were being good to her yet or if this were what actually passed for goodness in an episode. It was hard

o tell sometimes. Especially if you had been born Welsh.
 

What WAS that movement she felt atop her cranium? Had Jo sent giant bats into the Maltese sewers?

Her eyes narrowed. Jo was fully capable of such deeds, she knew all too well, as the memory of the giant Bolivian moths flitted across her brain cells. The sudden falling of a switchblade past her nose distracted

her from moth-thoughts. And what WAS that large black thing she had of late begun to feel in her left

armpit? With her head all bent like that, it was hard to get a good look, but finally she managed to twist

her eyeballs far enough down and to the side to see.

She gasped! *GASP*  It was a military BOOT! Now how did THAT get in her armpit like that??

Struggling and straining with all her remaining strength, she guided her eyeballs upwards. This had gone

too far, it had! Something large and heavy...something that wore big black boots and had switchblades...

was obviously atop her head! What could it BE?

Well, whatever it was leapt off, landing on what until then had been white denim knees in the sludge beside

her. At this point there will be a moment of silence in the episode as those of us in Pittsburgh can in no

way shape or form type what came out of the mouth of the object at this particular juncture in the

storyline.  

 ................................................................................................................................................................

(moment of silence)

.................................................................................................................................................................

In spite of these nameless expletives, Andrea's eyes lit up with delight. She could not believe her eyes

even though she could believe her ears. It was the One True Hando!

On his knees, yes, in revolting, disgusting crap in his tight white pants, peeling disgorged camel fodder

from his hands...but it WAS Hando!! How had this bit of luck happened to Andrea... and in an epi written

by Jo, of all things!!! Her eyes narrowed again. This was probably just an illusion of some sort. But

Hando finally looked up at her and smiled. He was beautiful to her even with that piece of moldy

cardboard stuck to his lip.

She reached her hands out to him and helped him to his feet. He, too, was puzzled by the strangeness of

it all. He had thought himself back in Gateway Park and knew that, yes, he could well find himself there

again with no notice whatsoever...but for now...yes, for now, he was with Ando. True, it was in a Maltese

sewer and he was covered with various unpleasantnesses, but it was his assigned job to make poor Andrea

of the num-numless root canal by a German dentist in Spain feel better. (Andrea might find Jo's plotless

plots a bit lacking in the reality department...but even Jo would not come up with a thing so impossibly

strange as to have in real life to endure an un-numbed root canal by a German in Spain!!!)

They stood there a long while, together there in the deep sludge, gazing into one another's eyes. He took

his forefinger and ran it along her cheekline as is the wont of Russell characters no matter their guise. He

did not even mind the flakes of tar that this act caused him to gather under his fingernail. Turning and

walking side by side, hand in hand, they continued down the sewer tunnel, reaching at last that musical

side branch.

Andrea's eyes narrowed for the third time in a single epi. Had she no self control at ALL? For there, not

far down the tunnel, a shaft of light through a missing ceiling block illuminated..... Arthur! Surely the

London woman had not expected goodness to last for any great length of time? 

Hando felt in a back pocket for his favorite switchblade. It was not there! There was, though, that chain

coiled in his other pocket. Removing it, holding it tightly between both fists, he advanced upon the still-

warbling Arthur.

Andrea, though, had never heard the Welshman sing before and was entranced. Reaching out, she

grasped Hando right forearm. "Don't," she whispered softly. "At least...not yet."

Arthur, in spite of the limp bangs and smudged cardigan, looked rather adorable with all those artfully

draped sections of Viennese toilet paper hanging from his limbs. She had never in all her born days been

able to resist a well-draped section of toilet paper. Drat the man! How did he always know just how to

appeal to her finer senses??

She looked back and forth between the two men...one slim and defenseless and so well-draped...and the

other so muscular and strong and well-hu....HOW was a poor woman supposed to choose?? It was too

much! Her knees buckled from the strain of it all and she would have fallen into a passing swirl of dog

hair and gasoline had not both men jumped quickly, each one catching her by an arm.

As she sagged between them, her head continued to turn between them. Was this, after all, SOOO bad? 

She had 2 Russell characters, both of whom desired her. Perhaps if she kept them together, she WOULD survive the epi and everything would come out all right in the end of the sewer. One never knew!
 

All 6 eyeballs turned upwards as an English robin lit at the edge of the missing ceiling block and began

to sing. Standing on Arthur's shoulders, Hando lifted Andrea up through the opening, into the light.

Thank goodness the passing streetcar was a few inches to the left! Hando pulled himself through and

then, only because Andrea asked him so nicely with her eyes so full of unspoken promises, he reached

back down for Arthur.

Together, the three of them turned, not quite able to believe....

DIRECTLY CONTINUED AS "UNDER THE TUSCPEEP SUN"

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