"Morning Glory" Short story Author Unknown V Storybook (World International Publishing Ltd.)

The Visitors plan to kill thousands of disloyal humans held prisoner in the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.

Story Summary

One bright spring day, Diana has scheduled the slaughter of thousands of disloyal humans held prisoner in the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. Among the prisoners, however, are several disguised resistance members with guns, including Ham Tyler. As the festivities are about to begin, the resistance fighters pull out their guns and begin shooting at the Visitors. Two skyfighters piloted by Donovan and Kyle join in as well and soon the prisoners are all striking out at their captors.

The Visitors are forced to flee the Coliseum in fear. Diana's day is ruined, but for the people of Earth, the day is not so bad.

THE END 

Notes from the V Chronology

The opening paragraph of the story indicates it takes place in Spring. However, this makes it difficult to place the story accurately in the chronology. The first day of Spring arrives during "The Deadly Rites of Spring", but there is no break in the timeline to insert this story afterward because the following episodes all take place immediately after one another up to the final episode of V. More glaringly, the story features Ham Tyler, who is in Chicago at this point in the chronology. I've decided to place it at the latest open spot before Tyler leaves L.A. at the end of "The Betrayal"; we can always figure that Spring comes early in L.A.! 

Didja Know?

This story appeared in the British 1984 V Storybook, a kids book of short stories all about V. The stories are all pretty lame.

Didja Notice? 

In the illustration on page 24, the Visitor emblem on Diana's uniform is on the wrong side.

Page 24 describes Diana's quarters on the mothership as "palatial" and "sumptuous". In the TV episodes, her quarters do not appear to be anything fancy, though in issue #9 of the V comic book, "The Poison in the Apple", it does appear more so.

The Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum is never named in the story, but page 25 describes Diana watching her communications screen, which is showing the forced gathering of thousands of people for slaughter, who refuse to publicly state their loyalty to the Visitors, at the football stadium of the Los Angeles Raiders. Now an Oakland team, at the time the Raiders NFL team was based in Los Angeles. The stadium then, is the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, where the team played during their L.A. tenure.

Page 25 also mentions Santa Barbara. This is a coastal city located about 95 miles north of Los Angeles.

On page 25, Snake-Eyes refers to the Visitors as "dinosaurs".

When Sonny is revealed as a Visitor, the text describes reptilian eyes as black. In the TV episodes, the Visitors' eyes are depicted as red, with some yellow around the pupils. But that doesn't mean there isn't some variation in coloring among some individuals.

Page 27 describes a disguised resistance fighter pulling out a Hech and Kochler machine pistol. There is no such manufacturer as Hech and Kochler, but there is a gun manufacturer called Heckler and Koch; either this was a gaffe by the writer or just a small joke.

Another resistance fighter lifts "a Thompson sub-machine gun of the kind popularized by Al Capone and his men." This is true. Al Capone was a Prohibition-era gangster who led a crime syndicate; many Prohibition-era gangsters, including Capone's men, used Tommy guns.

Unanswered Questions

How did the resistance members manage to get inside the Coliseum/prison with guns?