Rising Starrs!
Disclaimer: "Be afraid. Be very afraid." - Tagline of "The Fly"
Chapter 9: Capture!
The middle of the ocean
"WAAAAAAAAAH! HANG ON WILSON! I'M GUNNING THIS SUCKER!" Cobra Commander screamed at the top of his lungs. He was racing a jet ski on the water at top speed, Wilson tied securely in the back. Behind the jet ski, one could see a whole school of sharks coming after them. "DON'T WORRY WILSON! I'LL SAVE YOU! THE MAGICAL FAIRIES! THE MAGICAL FAIRIES CAN SAVE YOU, WILSON! DON'T DIE ON ME MAN! FOR THE LOVE OF GOD MAN, IF YOU BELIEVE IN ANYTHING YOU WILL NOT DIE!"
Man, what a screwball. The sharks thought as they pursued the mentally deserted Cobra Commander.
The Warehouse District
"Great! Just freakin' great!" Craig Starr grumbled. He, Fred, Lady Jaye, and Trinity raced through the warehouses, the laser-blasting flying metal spheres after them.
"Where on Earth did these things come from?!" Daria asked as she zapped one of the spheres with psychic lightning.
"We can figure it out later, sis!" Quinn snapped as she zapped another sphere. Brittany whipped out a pair of shuriken and was about to toss them at another sphere when it sprouted a laser cannon.
"Yeow!" The young mutant yelped as she barely managed to duck in time. She winced as the laser passed mere centimeters above her head. "These things aren't just flying around being nuisances!"
"No kidding!" Craig Starr snapped, dodging a laser blast from one, and smacking another away with his nightstick.
"Ha!" Lady Jaye threw a couple spears at the spears, accompanied by Craig firing his eye laser. The combined attacks managed to destroy a couple spheres. Trinity used their psychic lightning to take down a couple more. "These things are crazy!"
"Do you Misfits encounter stuff like this all the time?!" Craig exclaimed as he shot another sphere down with his eye laser.
"Actually…today is pretty calm." Fred responded coolly, punching down a sphere. He noticed a sphere about to blast Quinn. "Quinn! Watch out!" With a speed that belied his great size, the powerhouse mutant raced in front of the young girl. The energy blast slammed into Fred. "Nn!"
"Thanks, Freddy!" Quinn grinned, blasting the sphere with her psychic lightning. "You alright?"
"Just a little sting, but I'm okay." Fred nodded. Craig looked at Lady Jaye.
"And Cover Girl asked me if I was interested in joining this insanity?!" Craig exclaimed. "You have got to be kidding me!"
"Can't be that much different than that time you met Dr. Strange." Lady Jaye countered as she kicked a sphere away, then dodged a laser blast from another. Craig blinked.
"How the hell-!" Craig started to snap, but stopped. Oh, right. He reminded himself. I told Wanda about that. She must've told Spear-Girl about it. A blush crept up on his face at the thought of Wanda. Dammit... He shook his head. "What ARE these things, anyway?!"
"Some kind of Cobra gadget, I'll bet!" Fred scowled, crushing a sphere in his hands.
"This isn't Mindbender's style, though." Brittany frowned, frying a sphere with her psychic lightning. "He's more into genetics, not technology."
"The big bald meanie must've had some help making these!" Daria realized, destroying another sphere with some exploding shuriken. Unbeknownst to the mutants and ex-Ranger Joe, a small hole opened in a warehouse wall, and some little spheres rolled through the hole wall.
"Hey, what're those?" Fred pointed at the spheres.
"Whatever they are, I doubt someone just sent them to play marbles." Craig grunted. The small spheres released some clouds of sickly brownish-green knockout gas.
"Gas!" The mutants and Lady Jaye coughed and wheezed until they fell under.
Mindbender's Secret Lab
"Four down, several to go…" Dr. Mindbender smirked at the fallen Joe and Misfits. "Now let's check on the ones that are still moving…" The mad geneticist adjusted the view of his monitors. "Ahhh, yes…let's put these babies to sleep…"
"Methinks that good ol' Dr. Mindbender…" Tomax started.
"Has finally gone round the bend. Indeed." Xamot grumbled, crossing his arms. The financier scowled at the crazy bald geneticist.
"I simply must remember to thank that Virus boy for the robotic devices he created for this." Mindbender reminded himself. I know Virus will keep silent about this. Unlike the rest of Shadowatch, he would have no issue with helping me out with this...He then found himself having another issue. If Shadowatch didfind out...it won't be pretty. I haven't treated my subjects remotely as badly as the lab that had those kids in it, but I doubt they'll care in the least...
Elsewhere in the Warehouse District
"Hey, lookit that!" Paul Starr chuckled, pointing ahead of himself.
"Are those..." Recondo blinked. "...they look like remote-controlled tanks." True to the jungle warfare specialist's word, what seemed to be a line of small green remote-controlled toy tanks rolling towards the group of mutants.
"Okay, it's official." Pietro rolled his eyes. "Whichever one of the Stupid Snake Squad is behind this is either drunk or crazy."
"Shut up and fight!" Wanda snapped, dodging a tank's energy blast and firing back a hexbolt.
"I hate tanks!" Althea growled. She pitched a few shuriken at a couple of the robotic tanks, causing them to explode. "Is Cobra on some sort of toy kick or something?!"
"It is good that these are small then. Otherwise we would have a very bad day." Xi noted as he used his claws to slash open a few more tanks.
"Can't-catch-me-Can't-catch-me-Can't-catch-me!" Pietro teased as he zipped around, driving the tank's targeting system crazy. Pietro also happened to be juggling some rubber balls.
"Pietro! Stop playing around!" Cover Girl snapped as she fired a machine gun at the tanks. Pietro chuckled.
"Aw, come on!" He started to laugh. "I can't help myself! These things are so freakin' slow, I mean, I could drink a cup of coffee and watch the entire Godfather trilogy in the time it takes these guys to-" The young speedster then heard a sound. "What in the-?" Pietro looked up and saw a group of spheres fly towards them. "Oh, this can't be good." Cover Girl blinked at the spheres.
"The hell are those?" The spheres then sprouted laser cannons. "Aw, no..."
Bzzow! Bzoow! Bolts of green energy flew from the spheres' cannons, racing towards our heroes.
"Watch it!" Cover Girl screamed. The heroes scattered as the energy blasts rained down on them.
"Talk about your death from above!" Pietro cracked as he dodged the sphere's energy blasts while creating a tornado to knock over some of the small tanks by spinning his arm.
"Where do these things keep coming from?!" Althea yelled.
"Who knows?! Let's just get out of here!" Cover Girl ordered. She covered the Misfits' retreat with her machine gun. But their retreat was cut off by knockout gas delivered in the same way as before.
Still elsewhere in the Warehouse District
"I knew it was too quiet!" Recondo grumbled as he dove into a warehouse, firing an assault rifle. The target was a large dark green anthropomorphic dragon-like creature. The tracer rounds he had fired seemed to do little more than annoy the creature. "Dammit! I need a bazooka or something!"
"Where the hell did this thing come from, a Renaissance Fair?!" Lance dove into the warehouse alongside him. Todd, Wanda, and Paul were fighting a strange dark green anthropomorphic dragon-like creature. The creature stood about nine feet tall, and had Godzilla-esque spines running down its spine and long tail.
"Did you guys encounter this thing when you escaped?" Todd yelped as he dodged the dragon's furiously swiping claw.
"Nope!" Paul jumped over the dragon's thrashing tail. "Just guards with guns for us!" His star-covered eye glowed a bright purple.
FWASH!
A bright purple beam of energy erupted from the eye. The beam hit the dragon monster between its eyes, making the dragon roar in pain. "Wow! That thing's got some tough scales!"
"YEOW!" Wanda rolled out of the way of a stream of fire from the dragonesque monster's mouth. "What the hell is this thing?!"
"Must be one of Dr. Mindbender's little creations, yo!" Todd answered loudly as he pole-vaulted over a fire blast and pitched a couple shuriken at the dragon. "We all know he likes to make genetic monsters! Hell, he makes his own dates!" The amphibian-like young mutant performed a few leaps and jumps to help him gain some height, and then he spat some acid in the creature's eyes, making it retch and roar loudly in pain.
"Ha!" Wanda hit the dragon-like artificial creature with several hexbolts, causing it to topple into one warehouse, unconscious.
"It's okay! You guys can come out now!" Paul called, waving to the warehouse. Lance and Recondo came out of the warehouse to join the other Misfits.
"Well, that was easy." Todd blinked at the downed dragon. He saw a group of small metal spheres roll towards him. "Oh, no."
Fzzzzzzz!
"Gas!" The group gasped and coughed, but they eventually succumbed to the effects, and fell unconscious.
Uh oh! Looks like our heroes are in big trouble! What insanity will happen next? Can our heroes successfully defeat Cobra and free themselves? Find out in the next chapter! Suggestions needed badly!
