Back in the present moment, Holiday Minion finishes recounting. "And that's all I know," he says, reiterating it with a downward slice of the hand.
Prosecution Minion hums as he nods. "Very good. So you entirely disregarded safety procedure, and said 'screw all' to it."
Holiday Minion squeaks to deny the accusation, but the chuckling among the jury, even from "Judge," is so great that it's clear no one really takes it seriously.
"Sure thing, man," Magic Minion says with a smile, looking over to Delivery Minion. "All right, buddy, your turn," she dictates, looming over them all like a superior sage of judgment.
Delivery Minion, ever as professional as he can be, snaps to attention and recalls his piece of the story:
Stepping back just a bit into the past, Delivery Minion zips his little scooter over to the large pile of presents and selects a nice spot next to it.
It's a large, rounded-out platform, headed up by steps, and it's entirely clean and clear to allow for an enterprising deliveryman of sorts to put down a grand number of letters from admirers, haters, and all other across The Verses. He knows well enough by this point that the High Overlord doesn't really mind hate mail. In fact, he seems to enjoy it. The fact that they're just thinking about him constantly may in fact amuse him greatly.
If he didn't know any better, Delivery Minion might think it's because Chaos is utterly full of himself, but indeed, he does know better. Nowadays, he'd assume it's because Chaos simply loves human interaction, no matter who it is with and in what form it comes – like some kind of ever-invested, always-happy grandfather that just wants to spend some time with his grandkids, no matter what kind of thing it is that the tyke wants to be doing. He cracks a smile as he opens up his messenger bag and reaches into its pocket dimension, pulling out package after letter… after package… after letter.
As the minion band selected for the occasion continues practicing, and the show-runner of the performance, Sik [sic] Riff Minion, argues with Holiday Minion for the 17th time about how cool it would be if he burst out of the cake and did a crazy guitar solo while on fire (an idea that, of course, Holiday Minion vehemently refuses), Delivery Minion takes a moment to just soak in the atmosphere. He has not been one of the High Overlord's minions for very long – only a few years so far – but across from all the days of constant business, he notices little glints and glimpses of beauty that pushes beyond regular profundity.
Putting down his fifty eighth parcel so far, he closes his eyes and just spins a moment, soaking in all the voices, all the personalities of the brimming excitement around him. He's a part of something very unique, and he likes that.
"Hey, you dropped one," says a voice next to him.
Delivery Minion winces even before he opens his eyes. He knows he has, in fact, not dropped one. He is Delivery Minion; delivering is what he does. He'll say that to anyone, including Chaos's greatest nemesis, Order. He once told her up and down that he is Delivery Minion, and delivering is what he does. He does not lose, drop, or tarnish anything in his charge, because his name is who he is, and he will not disappoint.
He looks over at last to see a very strange minion standing next to him.
"Can I… help you?" Delivery Minion asks, leaning up to his full height of about a meter.
The other minion, a little taller than him and with some of the fluffiest antenna he's ever seen, gives a slight bow as he presents one of the most excruciatingly colorful and offensively written parcels he's ever seen, and that is certainly saying something for someone whose official job is handling packages and mail for the High Overlord of the Omniverse.
Chaos gets some very strange mail. In fact, Delivery Minion had the awkward honor of handing a package from Lord Knight Harmony to Chaos just yesterday. But this package takes both the cake in dangerous-looking and strange. Strokes of magic ink spell out runes between curse words pointed at the overlord.
"Chaos is a nerd."
"Chaos is a big [REDACTED] [REDACTED]."
"Pigz Ruul!" read only a few of the enthusiastically written lines of calligraphy.
"I see," Delivery Minion says with a squint. "And… who are you, exactly?" he asks, taking the package with a hand as he inspects all of the pretty obvious trigger runes and other things indicative of what is more than likely a gigantic magic bomb compressed into the size of a box.
"Oh, I'm... I'm Cool Minion," the visitor says with a broad smile, his huge, poofy clothing barely concealing what seems to be a pair of little tusks.
Delivery Minion looks at the package for a moment longer, blinks, and then looks over at the so-called Cool Minion. "That's your name?"
"Yeah, it totally is."
"That's actually the name you were given?" Delivery Minion asks again.
Cool Minion nods. "Yep, 'cause I'm… ya' know, cool," he says with an evasive glance to the side.
Delivery Minion stays put a moment as he just works it all through his mind. The obviously dangerous nature of the package isn't so outlandish. It could be that it's from some secret hater from out of realm, someone that doesn't yet know the price of calling Chaos a [REDACTED]… but this Cool Minion should be a different story – he should know better.
The ether-black paint dowsing this person in front of him gives him some pause. It's true that High Overlord Chaos does not always infest someone with his ether in order to make them into one of his minions. In fact, if someone just comes up loyal, fit, and ready to go, perhaps he'll just point his finger somewhere and say, "Hey, go do that thing." But that tends to go only for specific creatures – less intelligent things that are ready to serve and will happily do so for a scratch behind the ears, a belly rub, or a mountain of tasty cat food. This Cool Minion, however, seems to have all the hallmarks of an intelligent, thinking thing and is just trying to appear as though he is a minion, poorly, to boot. After all, Delivery Minion can see right through him, into his internal organs and all that gross stuff. He's not covered in ether at all. In fact, he doesn't have even a speck of ether to him – it's a pig person of some kind.
"Interesting," Delivery Minion says, producing his free hand for a shake. "Delivery Minion," he introduces.
"Yeah. Good to meet you, man. I've heard a lot about you. So today's the day, huh?" Cool Minion says, turning up to look at the massive, rising statue of Chaos, built on by a team of hundreds of different minions scrambling along the scaffolding as they apply more and more colored paper to the statue's mighty wooden frame.
"Yeah so... I haven't seen you around before," Delivery Minion says.
Cool Minion's antennae twitch – much more like the slant ears of some bipedal mammal creature than a true minion of the High Overlord's.
"Yep, today's the day. Looking pretty good… prettygood," he says, surveying it all with a few steady nods.
"Right. I said I haven't seen you around before," Delivery Minion reiterates.
Cool Minion shrugs. "Ah, I don't get out much. You know, I live in… ya' know, Cool Tower," he says after a slight pause. "Where all the coolest minions hang out. Ya' know what I mean?"
Delivery Minion blinks at him a couple of times. He tries to work the concept through his mind – that there is, in fact, some kind of select tower where only super chill and radical minions hang out, or perhaps more likely this intruder is so unbelievably stupid to expect him to actually fall for something like this. "Huh," is all he puts out at first, before thinking it over again and then continuing, "I've never heard of that tower."
Cool Minion immediately clears his throat as if something had suddenly crawled into it. "Oh yeah. Well, well, actually it's... it's pretty, pretty, you know, vague. You know, it's kind of exclusive. Know how it is? I'm just gonna put this here, alright?" Cool Minion gently places the package next to the gigantic stack and begins backing away, still watching for Delivery Minion's expression, which is growing in concern.
"Who's it from?" Delivery Minion asks.
"I don't know. It was unlabeled. I just found it nearby the uh, skatepark while doing uh, kickflips. That's all," the suspicious minion says, scooting more and more quickly to the side until he's out of view, racing down the steps and disappearing behind the mountain of presents.
Delivery Minion pauses a moment. He thought Cool Minion said that he had dropped it.
He looks it over with a slant expression. Even if it's one singular bomb, it's not like it could trigger other bombs. And even if it's a gigantic, "beyond nuclear" bomb-type of bomb, it couldn't really stop them, could it? After all, the only kind of danger posed in this sort of situation is when Chaos is unaware of something like this, and he is always aware… And of course, it wouldn't go off before he tries to open it. In fact, it should make for a good show when he figures it out and teleports it back to the sender just a semi-second before detonation. A bit of a karmic reversal, if you will.
He shrugs. "Well, I guess that'll do. Can't fix stupid," Delivery Minion says, picking up the parcel and scooting it a little bit to the side. It doesn't look very handsome, so he's not going to put it as one of the centerpiece letters. Maybe somewhere in the back, actually.
Some time passes, and he's laid just about everything out, creating an impressive two-story structure of various packages and letters from the High Overlord's many, many admirers and haters across the universes. Delivery Minion steps back to survey his work with a satisfied smirk. "That does look pretty nice," he says to himself in a self-congratulatory tone. "All right. I guess now it's time to..."
He stops himself right away as he hears a slight, bending hiss. Not like a fuse for a bomb. No, magical explosives are much more sophisticated. It's more like the burning of a symbol on a slip. He immediately starts back to look at it, and he sees... the box. The mysterious box left behind by Cool Minion is reaching out to the other suspicious-looking packages that are probably also explosives. It simply knows which ones will blow up and which ones won't. The irony here is that Delivery Minion has never seen the magic of Overlord Delirium before – her enchanted malady, as an extension of herself, can stroke key runes to trigger magical effects, no caster required in the vicinity – she's got quite the reach when one gives her an opening.
Translucent disease, shining with greenish-black streaks of galactic microfauna, stretch out like long, wavering paws, abruptly scratching through at least two dozen of the other suspicious-looking packages.
"Mmm," is all Delivery Minion, his eyes slant with acceptance, can emit before the detonation.