Chapter 1 - The Trap
"Brainy, we're approaching Mechanikat's home planet of Catopia." Krypto communicated with Brainy Barker via the communicator in his space suit. "But you probably noticed that already!"
Krypto dodged one of Mechanikat's catbots, this particular design being adapted to move and battle in deep space, and destroyed it with a heat vision blast. The Dog Stars followed after him in their own ship, and tried to give him some coverage as the superdog advanced at the first line of attack.
"Be careful, Krypto. We already knew we wouldn't be able to surprise Mechanikat, so a full force attack is our best option; yet it's also the riskiest move." Brainy talked back, the mentalist canine supervising both Krypto's advance and the other Dog Stars' preparations.
"We're ready, Brainy." Mammoth Mutt, already in her own space suit, nodded at her leader.
"Good. The ship will be on autopilot once we enter Catopia, so we can enter Mechanikat's homebase. Krypto will stay in space to fight Mechanikat's sentinel robots and to capture him in case he escapes from us." Brainy didn't mention she also wanted to keep Krypto in space instead of helping them with the capture since she knew Mechanikat had several special traps designed specifically for Krypto, from red sunlight energy lasers to kryptonite powered robots.
"We're in position now!" Hot Dog said while he and the others entered the battle pods. Brainy nodded and told Krypto they would be attacking now before going to her own pod.
"Ready to launch!" Bulldog grinned before Stretch-O-Mutt bounced next to him... morphing his front paws into a spoon and a fork.
"Alright! We're starting with soup or salad?"
"I said LAUNCH, not LUNCH." Bulldog rolled his eyes. Stretch gave him a sheepish grin and went to his own pod while Hot Dog groaned and rolled his eyes at Tusky Husky.
"Why we couldn't get Ace instead?"
"Because he's Batman's dog. In other words, if we bring him here, we'd do nothing but sit back while he does everything, eh." Tusky chuckled while Hot Dog groaned yet nodded.
A minute later, the battle pods were launched from the ship, and Krypto attacked all the catbots trying to stop them. Soon, the pods launched on Mechanikat's homebase, or, more precisely, crash-landed, making huge holes on the rooftop and already causing some severe damage.
"Alright, Dogstars, hit hard and fast!" Brainy jumped out of her pod and hit a dozen catbots with a telekinetic blast. A moment later, all her companions were attacking as well, with Mammoth Mutt and Stretch doing a double bouncing ball attack that created an opening in Mechanikat's defenses. The rest of the attack force followed after them, with Brainy using her telekinesis to impulse the 'balls' and make them bounce harder and faster while the other dogs covered her back.
"I sense Mechanikat's presence. His main chamber is in front of us." Brainy said while using her telekinesis to levitate herself a bit higher than usual to dodge a kryptonite laser that emerged from the wall; obviously, not being Kryptonian, she wouldn't be as affected as Krypto, but the laser was still hot enough to cause severe injuries. Tusky then destroyed the laser while Hot Dog created a firewall behind them to stop any catbot chasing after the group.
"Hey, it's closed." Stretch stated the obvious as he and Mammoth Mutt bounced on the heavily protected metal door.
"Then, someone must knock the door. Bulldog, can you do the honors?" Brainy nodded at her companion, who grinned back at her before charging full force at the door. Since it was designed to stop, or at least, delay Krypto, Bulldog only managed to dent it slightly, but it was enough to make a very small opening on it, that Brainy could then enlarge it with her telekinesis.
"Alright, let's make some Cat-becue!" Hot Dog, grinning, entered the chamber the first, and started shooting flames at random... which proved to be a mistake since the catbots in this particular room were designed to explode when damaged. Brainy had to create a psychic force field to protect the rest of her team from the explosions while Hot Dog received the full force; luckily, being a pyrokinetic canine, his body could resist the explosions' heat, but the concussive force was still enough to knock him out.
"Tusky, protect Hot Dog. The rest of us, let's continue." Brainy levitated Hot Dog to move him out of the Dogstars' path and gently drop him in front of Tusky, who nodded at her and started attending his friend.
"Explosive robots... whoa, Mechanikat really invested in home security." Mammoth Mutt commented, trying to keep her mind in the mission but still visibly shaken and worried about Hot Dog's condition.
"Remember Mechanikat designed his security system specifically to defend himself from Krypto. All the traps and robots were made to hurt, slow down, or even kill a Kryptonian; that's why I didn't want him to come with us. And that's also why I asked Stretch-O-Mutt to come as back-up, since Mechanikat has the least experience dealing with him and therefore not ready to battle an elastically powered superhero."
As if trying to confirm her point, Stretch morphed himself into a rubbery yet thick shield to protect his friends from a machine gun's fire; while a machine gun looked very primitive compared with most of Mechanikat's equipment, this gun was held by a catbot, and it fired kryptonite bullets.
"Ow-ow-ow-ow... they burn!" Stretch groaned. His body protected him from serious damage but such heavy fire was enough to cause some serious discomfort.
"Allow me!" Bulldog dodged the machine gun's fire and hit the catbot square in the chest (or what seemed to be the chest), destroying the robot immediately. "Seriously, where does Mechanikat get all this kryptonite? It's supposed to be a rare thing, not something you buy at the local pharmacy."
"Maybe he gets it on Krypton." Mammoth Mutt shrugged as the group continued advancing. Bulldog was about to correct her, mentioning Krypton was long gone, but then remembered that the whole planet was now reduced to huge, radioactive kryptonite chunks, so a villain with access to radiation-resistant robots like Mechanikat wouldn't have much problem mining several tons of the dangerous mineral whenever he felt like it. In other words, Mechanikat's base probably had enough kryptonite to kill Krypto a hundred times.
After advancing for almost a whole minute without getting attacked, the Dog Stars had to stop running because the whole corridor in front of them had lasers aiming at the group; however, instead of shooting directly at the canines, the lasers formed what seemed to be a beams barrier, advancing against the heroes, and a similar one appeared behind them, trapping the Dog Stars between them.
"We have to get out of here before we get sliced and diced!" Bulldog said in alarm while looking for a way out. Brainy made a quick telepathic scan of the area and found out the main wires that conducted the lasers' energy.
"Stretch, hit the panel at the end of the corridor; destroy it completely."
"I'm on it!" Stretch grinned and a moment later proved why his powers were a great asset to this mission, as he could dodge the laser beams better than any other dog by bending and stretching his body in all sorts of positions. Soon, he was the other side of the barrier, and, after morphing his front paws into hammers, he crushed the panel Brainy indicated him, effectively short-circuiting the lasers in front of the Dog Stars, who now could run (or float, in Brainy's case) away from the beams behind them.
The next obstacle was very unexpected; a huge mecha suit, with enough weaponry to take down a small country... and more unexpected, the one controlling it was...
"Snooky?" Bulldog wide opened his eyes when recognizing the midget cat in the robot's control cabin.
"That's right. Do you like Mechanikat's new toy? He is even allowing me to give it a test drive." Snooky grinned while aiming the weapons at the dogs.
"A short cat using a giant suit... whoa, and I thought I was using my power to overcompensate." Mammoth Mutt grinned yet still gasped when Snooky shot the first mini-missile at the dogs. All of them got out of the way barely on time.
Snooky continued shooting at the canines with practically everything in his arsenal, and without Hot Dog, the Dog Stars lacked their main long-range attacker, so they were now on the run and escaping the attacks by mere inches.
"Enough of this." Brainy concentrated and gave a series of instructions to her companions, all of them executing her plan immediately.
Mammoth Mutt bounced around the mecha at high speed, getting Snooky's attention, so he didn't notice when Stretch pounced on him and stretched his body to the max to get the robotic suit in an anaconda-like grip. Snooky then used one of the suit's defenses, an electric field, to try and get rid of Stretch, but his rubbery body was pretty much resistant to this particular defense and, by the time the voltage was just too much even for the elastic canine to stand, Snooky had used most of the robot's energy and many of the systems started failing. Then, Brainy levitated Bulldog, and used her companion as a projectile, the horned dog hitting the mecha's chest with great force, taking it down. Snooky, out of desperation, tried to shoot another missile, this time aiming at Brainy, but Mammoth Mutt hit the launcher at the last moment, which made the projectile to miss its target, and gave Brainy the opportunity to get a telekinetic hold on it.
"You know what people say, Snooky; karma is a female dog. In this case, myself." Brainy couldn't help but smirk a bit while sending the missile back at the mecha. Snooky yelped in fear and activated his ejector seat.
BOOM!
The missile hit the mecha and obliterated it, with Snooky getting ejected out at the last moment.
WHAM!
Snooky obviously forgot the mecha was down at the moment, and therefore the ejection didn't send him up, but to the side... and with a wall right ahead.
"Good thiiiiiing... we c-cats... have nine lives..." A very dizzy Snooky walked a few steps after hitting the wall before falling down. "Of course... after this... I probably only have 2 or 3 left."
Besides providing a comedy bit, Snooky's crash landing also made a big enough hole in the wall for the dogs to pass, and this helped them avoid the rest of the corridor's traps and go right ahead to Mechanikat's chamber.
"Ah, the Dog Stars are here. Mmm... I need to improve my security system." Mechanikat, sitting in a throne-like technological chair, smirked at the heroes.
"Give up now, Mechanikat. We have you outnumbered." Brainy said to the villainous feline while Stretch-O-Mutt stretched his whole body around the room. "And now, we also have you surrounded."
"Yes, you're right... but I'm not that outnumbered." Mechanikat grinned evilly.
Brainy barely had time to summon a telekinetic force field to protect Mammoth Mutt, Bulldog and herself from a kryptonite-radiated net, launched from a hidden platform.
"Look, it's Delilah!" Mammoth looked up, spotting the feline femme fatale with the net launcher on her paws.
"And here I thought only Krypton had super vision powers." Delilah smirked before changing the weapon's settings from 'net launcher' to 'machine gun'. Again, Brainy used her force field to protect herself and her companions from the radioactive bullets.
"Yes, maybe you pups aren't as vulnerable to Kryptonite as your super mutt buddy, but you're not invulnerable either and those bullets are pretty effective." Mechanikat grinned and then, when Stretch was trying to catch him lasso-style (his body being the lasso), the cyborg feline pushed a button in his techno-chair, now protecting himself with a personal force field that gave Stretch a painful shock. "And as you can see, I can copy your tricks, Brainy."
The shock made Stretch to retract back to his normal shape. Delilah lost no time and started shooting at him; Mammoth Mutt changed to her ball form and bounced at her, distracting the feline female from her assault and giving time for Bulldog to grab Stretch-O-Mutt and take him out of the line of fire. However, Mechanikat wasn't kidding about copying his enemies' tricks, and the next button he pushed unleashed several cyber-balls that started bouncing on the walls at high speed; with each bounce, the balls gained speed, and therefore the impacts became more dangerous. Mechanikat himself was well protected by his force field, and Delilah covered herself with the platform, but the Dog Stars were in serious danger. The only hero with a minor injury risk was Brainy, but whenever the balls bounced on the force field it made them move faster and therefore endangered her companions even more.
"Oh, I hate karma.. specially when it bounces back at me!" Mammoth Mutt tried to dodge the balls, but even with her body's increased resistance to impacts when in ball form, the impacts were actually hurting her, plus messing up with her own bouncing so she couldn't continue attacking. Stretch-O-Mutt, partially recovered from Mechanikat's surprise, morphed into a shield to protect Bulldog, but the elastic canine was getting to his limits as well, not to mention that his body was having the same effect that Brainy's force field, and every ball he bounced back returned with greater force a moment later.
"Karma can help us too, Mammoth Mutt." Brainy deactivated her force field and used her telekinesis to grab Delilah's weapon. A few moments later, Brainy had changed the weapon's setting back to 'net launcher'. "And Mechanikat isn't the only one who can use an enemy's tricks."
Brainy started shooting nets at the high speed balls, and, by using her telekinesis to direct the nets' trajectory, managed to get all the balls in record time. Then, Brainy used her telekinetic hold to throw the balls-filled-nets at Mechanikat; as Brainy expected, the nets' kryptonite energy messed up with Mechanikat's force field, producing a short-circuit.
"Mmm... I should have considered your smarts when planning my traps, Brainy." Mechanikat grinned while taking out a pair of ear-plugs; without the dogs noticing it, Delilah was putting on a set of ear-plugs as well. "Oh, wait. I did consider it. Let's see how well you think when you can't hear your own thoughts."
Mechanikat activated his next weapon; an ultrasonic one. Thanks to their ear-plugs, Mechanikat and Delilah were well protected, but the dogs fell to the floor, covering their ears in horrible pain. Even Brainy was having troubles to use her powers now, as the noise didn't let her concentrate. Mechanikat grinned and pushed another button, this one calling for several of his Catbots he had prepared specially to resist ultrasonic frequencies.
"Heh... time to put these dogs to sleep. Permanently." The cyborg feline made a hand signal; with the ultrasonic weapon working, the robots wouldn't get a verbal order and the noise would mess with an electronic one, so these robots were programmed to obey visual commands. The Catbots then extended their weapons; powerful claw-like blades, and walked towards the fallen heroes.
"Ow! I don't like this music!" Stretch-O-Mutt, out of instinct, morphed his ears to form thick and very effective ear-plugs. "Ah. Much better. Hey, guys, you need... Yipes!"
Even if Stretch would never win a Nobel Prize, he wasn't as dumb as most thought, and when looking at the robots, he lost no time and morphed his paws into mallets, literally jumping into action. He started punching/malleting all the robots at full speed, still conserving his ear-plugged, and soon only a handful of robots remained. Stretch then extended one of his paws and changed it from mallet to earmuffs, protecting Brainy's ears.
"Thanks, Stretch-O-Mutt. I needed that." Brainy focused her mental powers and sent a telekinetic blast to the remaining robots and then to the room's walls, shattering the speakers/devices that produced the powerful ultrasonic attack.
"I'm really starting to hate you all." Mechanikat growled while removing his ear plugs. "Well, I'm out of tricks but one... but this one is a killer."
The cyborg cat and his throne disappeared from sight thanks to a hidden trap door. When Brainy and Stretch (Bulldog and Mammoth were still on bad conditions after the sonic attack) tried to capture him, a huge bomb emerged from the door, covering Mechanikat's escape, and, according to the counter, shortening the Dog Stars' lives to...
"TEN SECONDS!" Brainy gasped. She immediately recognized the bomb's design; it was too complex to disarm in such a short time, and probably powerful enough to level a city block.
"What did you say..." Delilah still at the platform, gave a look and paled in fear. "A BOMB? MECHANIKAT, YOU JERK!"
Obviously, Mechanikat didn't care that much about his minions' lives, and since she had her ears plugged when Mechanikat activated this final trap, she didn't hear him saying the whole 'this one is a killer' speech.
"What are we doing now?" Stretch asked in a hurry. Brainy growled softly and then levitated the elastic canine, Mammoth Mutt and Bulldog out of the room.
"STRETCH, COVER THEM!"
Stretch-O-Mutt reacted and did as Brainy told him, covering his companions and then thickening his body for more protection. At the same moment, Brainy formed a large telekinetic force field around the room in order to contain the explosion.
Unfortunately, for this to work, Brainy had to be inside the force field.
"LET ME OUT, YOU STUPID...!" Delilah tried to get past the force field but then noticed the counter was in 2. "Oh. This is gonna hurt."
BOOOOOM!
The explosion's shockwave was felt all over the base. It was strong enough to wake up the unconscious Snooky.
"Ngh... what did I miss?" Snooky groaned in pain; then, he went to the closest escape tunnel. He'd ask later.
When Bulldog, Mammoth Mutt and Stretch-O-Mutt finally could stand up and get back to the room, they froze on the spot. The whole place was completely devastated, and with a slight green glow; this bomb was a kryptonite one.
"W-we can't enter there... without... a radiation-proof suit." Mammoth Mutt said, holding back tears.
"And... we'll need one of those suits... for her too... right?" Stretch gulped, sweating cold rubber.
"Yes... and... who's gonna tell Hotdog and Tusky?" The little alien Chihuahua closed her eyes.
"Probably the same... that will tell Krypto."
Bulldog was out of words and was only trying to keep himself from fainting, snapping, or hitting everything on sight. The only thing capable of keeping him conscious was the sight of Brainy's immobile, charred, and radiated body, lying in the middle of the room.
The trio was so shocked by the sight of their fallen leader that none noticed the same fate had fallen on a cat that got practically no protection from the platform she was in at the moment of the explosion. She would need more than 9 lives to get better after this.