Now it was time for the Blue Falcon to tell his story. The Doctor looked in the direction of the Sandy Blond headed man. Standing up he walked into the centre of the room.
My name is Radley Crowne, my past is a bit confusing if I am truthful. I do not have any fancy pictures to show you but I will try to tell you I I became the Blue Falcon.
Dyno - Mutt held up his paw "I have some pictures, some home Movies" he said.
"ok", said Radley, "you can help me the Dog Wonder" he continued.
"But NO Embarrassing Baby Pictures" he quickly added
"No BF, No Baby Pictures" Laughed Dyno
From out of his head Dyno- Mutt produced a movie camera which he turned on. Pictures were projected on the wall. The Doctor stood beside him. He was worried that Dyno may get too over excited and malfunction again. He nodded to Radley, and Radley continued.
I was the son of Wealthy Parents, an only child. They were born of wealth but worked hard to use it to the betterment of others. I was very intelligent as a child, so I was told. My Father owned a number of Electrical and Technology companies and encouraged me to learn and build my place in the world. I was home schooled as where we were living was not safe. I did not mind that, but I did feel lonely having no one to call a real friend. My parents gave me everything I wanted and more, but never enough of their time. My Father's business interests and my Mother's Charities kept them away from home for weeks at a time sometimes. I mean all of the time. But when they were at home they showered me with so much love.
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| JARVIS, HILDA and Radley aged 3 |
Our Butler Jarvis, and our Housekeeper Mrs Penny -Worth did the best they could teaching me things. They were like my real parents. They gave me so much, including the love I needed. He taut me how to ride my first Bicycle, The Falcon. And she help me repaint it when I fell off and scratched it. Hilda Penny - Worth was a widow, and she and Mr Jarvis had what she said was a "understanding" that one day they would marry.
We lived in Big City, well in a Mansion just outside. Big City had been a wonderful place in the 1920's but organised crime started to move in and by the 1940's the City was broken. Not as broken as some, I had gone on a trip with my parents once to Gotham City to visit a friend of his Dr Thomas Wayne. His wife Martha and my Mother were old school friends . They had a son, Bruce who I kinda liked. He was a happy boy. If I remember he became very withdrawn after his parents had died. I think it was a robbery, I overheard my parents discussing it once. Big City was as many said "A Dump", but that place, Gotham City was even worse.... It looked like Hell. It was Hell.
My Parents tried their best with financial support and charity donations to help improve matters in our City. This worked for a time but the crime rate kept going up. They refused to move away from Big City like a lot of their rich friends. My Father even stood for Mayor and my Mother became an independent Governor. They both spoke out about crime and corruption. They did some good, and they had the support of many who lived in Big City. But this upset some of Gangs, and eventually got them murdered by the time I was 21. All I had left was Jarvis, Hilda Penny-Worth and Billions in the Bank.
"What about me ?" said a voice.... it was Dyno-Mutt
"Sorry Wonder Dog, I had you too. You had been my birthday present when I was 13. Yes my Mother thought I needed a friend. I had the previous year tried to build a Robotic Pet, but had given up as artificial intelligence matrix I had built kept failing. I had named the project Mental Upload Technical Test.... or MUTT for short. So I gave up on Project Mutt, and turned by attention to Project Reggie instead. And he became my Best Friend, maybe the only real Friend I ever had" The Blue Falcon replied. Although Reggie was just a regular Mutt and could not talk until later, I found I could talk to him about anything and he would listen. He was my Best Friend indeed.
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| RADLEY & REGGIE |
With my Parents now dead , I need something to keep me busy. I still liked to invent things. I did think about going to University , but I could not find a collage or course that would teach me what I wanted to know. One of my Fathers business partners Dr Benton Quest offered to buy most of the Tech Business I had inherited, which I agreed to as again I did not want to run those companies. I agreed to let him have the patents on some of my projects also. He already had part ownership of a few anyway. Running those companies was my Father's life , I wanted to find my own way.
A year before by parents died, my Father had arranged to get me a summer job working at the Quest Lab in California. That was where Dr Quest had based himself at the time. I liked the idea of working along side him, but insisted I would only go if I could take my Mutt Reggie. Dr Quest agreed as he thought that this may be a distraction for his young Son Jonny. Dr Quest's wife had recently died and he was finding balancing his work and looking after his son hard to do.
I enjoyed this time, and Dr Quest and I collaborated on many projects. He had come up with an idea or creating a robotic or cybernetic Brain. This was in part he felt guilty that he was unable to save his wife who had died from Neurological Problems. That was when I decided to look again at Project MUTT. Dr Quest liked some of my work, but thought I needed a test subject to work with. I was not comfortable testing on animals, but he explained that testing did not need to be destructive or hurt the test subject.
By the end of that Summer we had successfully built an Artificial Intelligence Matrix that worked. We proved you could transfer or down load thought patterns from organic subjects to an artificial brain. It was not very intelligent, it had a very low IQ rate but it worked. Thanks to our two test subjects. A five Year Old Boy and 3 Year Old Dog. Dr Quest asked if he could continue working on the project as he had a few ideas of combining it with a few of his own. I agreed.
Around this time Jarvis and his wife Hilda, he had finally married our Housekeeper a few years before, they told me that they wanted to retire. But they were worried that I would be all alone in the big mansion. I told them that I would not be alone, as with them retiring I could move to Big City, start living around people. They were worried that Big City was now a very dangerous place, but I told them maybe I needed a little danger in my life.
I arranged to have The Mansion shut down, some of the other staff like the gardeners, and maintenance people etc who still lived on the Estate I arrange to keep on to take care of the Place. With the Monies I had received from the sale to Benton Quest I purchased an old rundown building in the Centre of Big City, and had it refurbished. On top of the building a had luxurious penthouse built with its own helipad and hanger. The building had once been originally built as the Head Office of a Bank before the Crash in 1929. I It had 70 floors. and three sub levels which had been used as vaults etc. One had been turn into a Nuclear Bomb Shelter in the 1950's The top Floor was mine, and the 3 Sub levels, and a large private garage that had been used originally when the Bank took deliveries of Bullion and Cash.The other floors I would decide to use or rent out later.
Part of the buildings redesign was I had a two extra elevators put in. These would be private for my use only. One would go straight up to the Pent House, and the other would lead from the Pent house down to the basement levels . I had not given up inventing and thought the basement would be the perfect place to us a personal laboratory. And I arranged to have a couple of cars brought over and had them stored in the Basement Parking Garage at the building. One of which was my Mothers Little Tank.
Jarvis and Hilda retired to Florida, I had given them the keys to one of my Parents Summer Houses. It was small, ok only 20 bedrooms, its own Polo field and 2 Swimming Pools.... It was not the Mansion but had brilliant views out across the Ocean. All the bills would be paid by me. I wanted them to be happy. I had a whole floor of my Apartment Building remodeled and decorated just for them in case they wanted to visit Big City in the future. I had the Building renamed Crowne Tower and moved in.This project had only taken a year.
I had decided I did not need any full time staff, but I at times I had some of the staff come in from the Mansion when I needed help etc. Parker and Penelope would come over every two weeks to visit. Whilst he and I did maintenance of my cars down in the basement, she would cook us a meal in my Penthouse. I enjoyed seeing them as I did miss them both..
Life was good. I was inventing again, I enjoyed walking my Dog Reggie in the Park across the road. I started visiting museums and art galleries in the City. I even tried dating. But being one of the riches people in the Country did make you a target for money grabbing ladies. I was 23 but I had not found something to really do, that would interest me. I toyed with improving the body Armour of the Big City PD, as too many of their officers each year got injured by gun fire. One of few company I retained dealt with making a near impregnable fabric that was virtually indestructible. But so costly that its production would never allow it to make a commercial venture. I had some samples made up. The design was ok, but the cost was far too much to produce for all officers. It was a shame as I believed they could have worked.
This would all change very soon. One evening later that Fall our old Chauffeur and his wife were coming over from the Mansion to see me. I had invited them to come with me to see the opening a New Stage Show at Big City's Opera House. They were on the way to meet me at Crowne Tower and then we would travel on to the Opera House. I said it would be nice to arrive in style, so I had asked him to bring the Vintage Rolls Royce from the Garages at the Mansion. I put on my best Tuxedo and waited for them to arrive. The Weather had been very mild, and the trees in the park were still in fall leaf. It was a pleasant evening, although I had heard that a storm may be on its way later that night.
Next to Jarvis and his wife Hilda, Parker and Penny were like family. She was our Cook, a larger than life Lady, always laughing and singing. She had trained to be an Opera Singer, but had met Parker fell in love and given up on her passion to be with him. Parker had been my parents chauffeur for years. He had I was told a bit of a shady past, but he was very loyal to them. I had asked Penny to sing at my parents funeral. At first she refused, but I reminded her that my Mother always loved to hear her sing. She did, and it was very fine.
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| Penny Parker and Young Radley aged 15. |
Parker had even taut me to drive around the grounds of the Mansions . I was just 5 when he sat me on his lap and helped me steer the car around the grounds. My Father had many cars, my favorite was a 1965 Chrysler Imperial. It was Big and Blue with Ox Blood Red leather Seats, and that its the car I learnt to drive in.
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| First Driving Lesson |
It was built like a Tank My father had had it custom built as a Birthday present for my Mother. She preferred one of the smaller sports cars they owned as she liked to drive herself when possible. She used to call it her little Tank. It had been built with lots of safety features. Parker told me that it was Bomb Proof, and always kidded me that we should find out if it was true one day. Parker used to point out that the hood ornament had been specially designed with a Small Golden Crown. I loved driving Mom's Little Tank. Parker even let me wear his special driving gloves when I was driving it., They were brown leather with his initials on them. He had been given them by his wife Penny when he had been appointed head Chauffeur by my Father years before. It was not long before I was playing at Chauffeuring him around.
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| Radley The New Chauffeur |
Soon Parker was sitting in the Back, whilst Reggie became my co driver.
I would later learn that Aloysius Parker and his wife Penelope were running late due to traffic in town, he thought he would take a short cut though Big City Memorial Park. This turned out to be a costly error.
They had not arrived at the time we had agreed I had decided to go down and wait on the street. After another ten minutes I rang the gate house at the Mansion from the phone on the Tower's Reception Desk. I was then to be told that The Parker's had left over an hour and a half earlier. Going back onto the street I saw a Two Ambulances rush by with their sirens whaling. They both entered the Park Gates over the road from the Tower.
Being interested in what had happened I ran across the road and into the Park. I saw number of Police Cars had stopped half way along Central Park Drive. The Blue lights reflecting in the large lake that ran along side it. Running up to the lake I could see that there appeared to be two bodies laying beside the Road. Both had been covered up. I Assumed that they were dead. I walked forward and a Police Officer asked me to step back as this was a murder scene. I then recognized the Police Chief who I had any seen a few days before when I was invited to and had sponsored a Big City PD Fund Raiser. I called over to Chief Ramsey, who walked over to me.
" Good Evening Mr Crowne" he said," Its a Car Jacking I think . Two Elderly People. No sign of the car, but I think it was expensive" . As we found this clutched in the Lady's hand" Chief Ramsey held up a plastic evidence bag. Inside I could see it was a cars figure head, It was covered in Blood.
" That's Elinor or The Spirit of Ecstasy, its from a Rolls Royce" I told him
" One of them British Cars ? " Ramsey said scratching his head
I nodded, than noticed this Figure was knelling, and not standing. An unusual version of the famous mascot, the same version was on my own Classic Rolls Royce. The colour drained from my face. I asked if I could see the bodies as I thought that I knew who they were. Ramsey told me that he should not, but as they had not found any id this may help. Before I saw the mans body I knew it was Parker. A hand was poking out of the covering. He always wore his special Brown Driving Gloves when he used to Drive my Parents around in the Rolls or Roller as he called it.
Pulling back the cover I confirmed it was Aloysius Parker, my Chauffeur. The woman must be his Wife Penelope. They showed me her face, she looked asleep. It was Penny. It was the only time I had seen her not smiling.
I turned and walked away. " You Ok, Mr Crowne ?" said Ramsey walking up to me. I shock my head and explained that they were coming to meet me. This was my fault as I had asked them to bring the Car. The Car that was now missing. I gave Ramsey the description and Licence Plate details. And excused myself and went back to Crowne Tower.
"Its Not Your Fault Mr Crowne" Ramsey called out behind me.
But I knew it was.
Next time A deadly game to catch a Killer.
Until Then ENJOY !
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