Sidekicks (Original Draft) Front

INTRODUCTION: The complete text of the original Sidekicks, third novel in the D Is For Damien series; this is from the same five-subject notebook as D Is For Damien 2: The Night Of The Goat and various other items, which is odd, seeing as in that notebook it FOLLOWS the text of The Night Of The Goat, which I believe is FIFTH in the series! In this novel, Damien was to help a pregnant woman named Leslie Laws before the cult Scorpio could sacrifice her baby, due on Halloween. Turns out that the pregnancy appears to be spontaneous, as Leslie has no memory of how the baby was conceived! (Ask me if you want to know the answer, or take a peep at Luther, which gives this answer away.) To spoil the ending (seeing as even the second version of the novel was never completed), the baby survives and Scorpio's plans are thwarted, but bad guy Derrick Grant ends up in the hospital, critically injured, and from the looks of it, high priest Luther Broderick's car goes off the Lincoln Bridge and he's drowned. Take note that I said FROM THE LOOKS OF IT. Luther DOES continue to show up in following stories...such as the novel which was to come right after this, aptly titled The Return Of Luther.

Interesting note on how I got the idea for this story--it was based on an article in the tabloid Weekly World News, which spoke of a British woman named--you guessed it, Leslie Laws--whose baby was being threatened by a cult named--you guessed it, Scorpio. Hence, I owe the entire creation of my cult to a cheesy tabloid newspaper. These two details have made me permanently anxious about my fictional usage of these names, seeing as I did not originate them. Well, it's not like any of this will ever be published. (Another kind of eerie factoid--I more recently learned while browsing a book about criminal Satanism in England that Scorpio is real! So even if the WWN article is made up, the cult itself is not. Color me surprised--and kind of freaked out!!)

Notice also the name of the investigative service--"3-D's Detective Agency." Apparently the name of this, following this story, was changed to "Sidekicks Detective Agency," before I dropped the idea altogether. The "3-D's" reference is, of course, to the necklaces which are so pivotal to the plot of the preceding story, D Is For Damien. Be aware that there are stereotypical references to Romany (Gypsies) in here; this stereotype persisted into the most recent version of D Is For Damien, but it clears up in later (sadly, unwritten) novels.

Story started in 1991, though the events in it were supposed to have taken place in 1990, immediately following D Is For Damien.

Front, Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9

---

Sidekicks

by Rachel H. [last name omitted]

When the going gets tough, the tough goes and gets Damien!
[Note--lamest tagline ever.]

---

Copyright ©1991 by Rachel H. [last name omitted]