THERE BE DRAGONS!
Chapter 10: Hidden Danger
The alert came to him by way of a panicked and frightened Comack.
Jake and Chance were working in their garage on a cloudy day some weeks after the defeat of Turmoil. Dragons were still not seen flying about and Jake could only sigh and stew about it to his friend.
Today, though, they had plenty of work to do, so Jake's mind was focused on repairing the old lady Kat's car at the rear of the garage, the radio was playing loudly in the background. Chance was replacing a water pump on an enforcer rig closer to the entrance.
The song that had been playing was suddenly interrupted and a news Kat's voice excitedly broke in with an announcement that immediately grabbed Jake's attention.
"Reports of a copper colored dragon flying in almost desperate seeming circles around the city are pouring into the enforcers and the radio stations. No one seems to know what the dragon is apparently looking for but its causing a bit of a problem with the city inhabitants...while some are frightened, others are excited and it's these folks that are clogging roads and sidewalks to catch a glimpse of it..."
Chance's head had come up out of the engine to eye his partner in concern. "What the heck?"
"I don't know, but I better find out," Jake said grimly, wiping his paws off quickly then running outside. He looked around quickly as he continued to run through the salvage yard gate and down the deserted street for about a block or two before he deemed it safe enough to alter his form.
Flying high, he paused when he reached the altitude he wanted then bugled loudly. Over Megakat Park, Comack heard him and raced toward Adair.
By now, the enforcer patrols were homing in on Comack only to have him suddenly kick into high gear and fly upward at a fast rate of speed. The choppers could not follow him as he reached an altitude they weren't meant to fly in.
Less than fifteen minutes later, Comack caught up with Adair, his manner frantic.
"Oh thank the stars, I finally found you. Hurry! We must get to our sanctuary immediately before it is too late!" Comack urgently spat out as he wheeled about and took off before Adair could respond.
Frowning in worry, Adair quickly followed until he caught up with Comack. As they raced along, he asked what was going on.
"We're being attacked by what appears to be a Kat in a strange flying ship."
"What? What does this ship look like?" Adair asked quickly, his heart pounding in fear.
"Sort of like a big black spider and..."
"Noooo...it's Dark Kat!" Adair screamed in terror. "Comack, I've got to get my partner! Only the fire power of the Turbokat can take out this fiend!"
"What?...No...You can't bring a Kat to our sanctuary location..and what do you mean partner?" Comack cried, stopping his flight so suddenly that Adair over flew him and had to spin around and return.
"There's no time. I'm a SWAT Kat and the sanctuary is not visible! T-Bone won't know there's something hidden there unless someone shows it to him and I'm not about to!" Adair shouted. "But to fight this omega will take the technology I've built plus the dragon's fire to defeat him! Now go and warn the others to try and push Dark Kat away from our home to better hide its location and I'll return as fast as I can!" Without saying another word, Adair turned about and flew as fast as he could back to the salvage yard.
Comack stared after him in shock and confusion for a long moment. Adair was a SWAT Kat? That was incredible news but like he'd said, there was no time for that, the fight to save his brethren was more important, but later when this was over he would demand an explanation. He rushed away, hoping he would make it in time before anyone was killed.
Flying at his top speed got Adair back to the garage in less then ten minutes. Seeing no one near, he dared to land in the yard and altered back. He ran to the garage, shouting for his partner.
"Chance!"
His tabby friend poked his head out of the garage, a frown of concern and surprise on his face.
"Dark Kat!" Was all Jake shouted as he reached his friend then continued past him to the back of the garage.
His face grave, Chance quickly closed the garage door, posted their sign then hurried after his already disappearing partner. As they dressed quickly, the tabby demanded, "is this why that dragon was circling the city?"
"Yes! Dark Kat is attacking them."
Chance froze in shock. "But how did he know how to find them?"
"I don't know!" Razor said tightly then he paused and gave his friend a hard look. "T-Bone! You are forbidden to know the location of our sanctuary. By now, Comack will have told the others to push Dark Kat away from it so when we get there you will not be able to pinpoint its exact location. It will be bad enough that you'll have a general idea so you must promise me to never speak of it to anyone, not even other dragons! This is for your safety and ours!"
T-Bone stared at his friend for a only a moment before nodding his understanding. "I promise. I know how vital it is that your kind have somewhere to feel safe."
"Thanks, now let's go!"
The two raced for the jet and quickly boarded. In a matter of minutes, they were soon zooming out of the hangar and racing across the sky with all engines pouring on the power.
When they arrived at the nightmarish scene, Dark Kat's fear ship was hemmed in by no less than twenty dragons. They were flaming it with all they had but it was having no effect due to the ship's upgraded shielding capabilities. Dark Kat, meanwhile, was attempting to pick off the dragons and push closer to the mountain area they were guarding but the dragons were too swift for him to land a shot on so they continued to successfully keep him at bay, but just barely.
Razor cried out involuntarily when at least two dragons got their wings severely singed and fell from the sky. Others quickly helped the injured ones to safety so Razor didn't need to worry about them but that didn't stop him from feeling anger at their pain. He was furious and translated that emotion into action.
"T-Bone, take a high position above the fear ship...try not to let him see you!" He gritted, studying his weapons panel.
"Roger!"
As the Turbokat got into position, above and behind the fear ship, the dragons, though surprised and not very happy about more Kats being near their home, still obligingly pulled back enough to avoid getting injured by whatever the jet was going to do.
Razor shot a scrambler missile toward the ship. Unlike the one he'd used before, this one was seriously amped up to pierce the shields...he hoped!
The missile splashed against the shield and for a second it seemed nothing was going to happen, but then sparks flared forming a corona of volatile energy before exploding causing the ship to wobble quite a bit before stabilizing. Knowing his defenses had been breached, Dark Kat broke off his attack and veered away, firing a brace of missiles in his wake to discourage tails.
Without prompting, T-Bone tore away after it while Razor took out the missiles so they wouldn't hurt the dozen or so dragons following them. Dark Kat headed further north away from the city and began navigating through the towering mountain peaks to try and shake his pursuers.
Joining the chase as he past the city heading for the mountains was a squadron of enforcer jets, increasing the number of angry defenders chasing Dark Kat's tail.
Furious, Dark Kat sent more missiles toward his back trail, trying to decimate his enemies. He managed to take out a few more dragons and several enforcer jets but the rest doggedly continued their pursuit. His next attempt to dissuade his chasers was to drop down below the mountain peaks so that he could blast the walls of the mountain sides as he passed. This had a more effective and devastating result, reducing the enforcers to only four jets but the dragons had managed to swoop out of the way, much to his disgust, however they had reduced to only six which were better odds for him.
The dragon's flames singed his fear ship but couldn't breach it. Even Razor wasn't having much luck penetrating it enough to cause real harm. It was obvious Dark Kat had seriously beefed up his ship's outer hull appreciably as well as made the ship highly maneuverable so he was able to avoid much of the missile barrage being fired at him by the Turbokat and the choppers.
By now the chase had changed direction again, as Dark Kat tried to head toward the city itself. No way did the SWAT Kats nor Feral want that to happen so they stepped up their attack, hammering the fear ship with everything they had.
Hissing to himself in frustrated anger, Dark Kat changed directions once more, this time heading for the chain of volcanoes just south of their present location. He pushed his fear ship to its limits as he made for a specific mountain peak. In less than five minutes, he reached his destination and dived into a huge cave entrance.
Before his pursuers could follow, a massive door slid down with a boom. Frustrated, the allies halted their headlong flight and hovered outside the hideout trying to decide what to do next.
T-Bone and Razor knew Dark Kat had a massive fortress hidden behind those mountain walls and the omega would soon be directing all his considerable resources at them any minute now. What was worse, the evil Kat could now attack them with impunity while he remained safe inside. They had to get in or destroy the whole place completely.
Toward that end, Razor chose to launch a serious barrage of missiles at any weak spot he could find in the mountain attempting to breach the hideout's defenses.
Parking his fear ship, Dark Kat left it and swiftly stalked across the rock floor of his mountain home, his creeplings chittering in excitement and fear around him. Reaching his bank of controls, he called up his exterior sensors so he could see what his enemies were doing.
Suddenly, the whole place shook, sending his creeplings shrieking and heading for the ceiling. He saw what the SWAT Kats were trying to do and sneered at their attempts by firing a special laser at them.
Outside, Feral and his few jets had joined forces with the Turbokat in firing everything he still had aboard at the mountain door. The dragons flew close and did the same until the whole mountain shook and glowed from the flaring heat of the dragon's fiery breath. They were making some headway breaking through the massive door when Dark Kat attacked.
Bursts of blue lightning shot up from a hidden gun port in the mountain, quickly making sushi of the last of the enforcer jets, forcing Feral and his enforcers to bail out of their badly damaged jets that could no longer sustain flight.
The dragons avoided the beam as best they could, their flames only able to hold it at bay but not force it back to its owner. The Turbokat roared into place and Razor took careful aim with his own Mega Laser, managing to destroy the beam, taking a ton of rock off the mountain as well which cascaded down into the valley below.
Inside his fortress, Dark Kat screamed in impotent fury. "No! I had it planned soo well! The dragon colony should have been dead. Those miserable SWAT Kats shouldn't have known of my attack nor the enforcers. How did they find out?" He fumed angrily.
"No matter! I've decimated enough of them my next trick should take out the rest of those annoying pests once and for all!" He snarled as he reached out and pushed a certain button on his control panel.
From a hidden launch pad, a huge, oddly shaped, missile fired up and raced out of the silo it was nestled in. It reached the outside seeking its target...the Turbokat!
"Razor!"
"I see it! My instruments tell me it's another one of those heat seeking types!" Razor said tightly, immediately sending a plain old missile at this new and deadly weapon heading for them.
Unfortunately, his missile was shredded easily leaving the deadly payload still on their tail. T-Bone did his best to try and keep ahead of it but it was a losing battle.
"I can't keep this up, Razor and it's getting closer and I'm not sure Plan Z is going to work this time!"
"You're right there, that leave only one thing left since my weapons aren't affecting it..." he said, more to himself than his partner, as he prepared to leave the cockpit. Yelling over his shoulder one last instruction, "keep away from that thing until we take it out...," he was gone.
"Nooo, Razor don't..." T-Bone cried out but it was too late. Moments later, he spotted the red dragon flying to the rear of the jet. "God! Be safe buddy!" He murmured a desperate prayer as he continued to keep the Turbokat out of reach of the missile.
Once in free air, Adair bugled for his compatriots and they quickly responded to his call. Flying close they waited to hear what he had to say.
"We're going to concentrate our fire on that missile but remain safely back so the backlash of its explosion won't harm us...let's go!" He ordered.
The others fell in behind Adair as they raced to catch up to the beleaguered Turbokat. Getting within a twenty mile radius of the missile, the dragons fanned out into a line and, at Adair's command, fired in unison. It took a solid five minutes of continuous fire to finally destroy the missile.
The concussion from its destruction sent dragons flailing backwards through the air as well as sending the Turbokat into an uncontrolled spin before T-Bone was able to regain control once more.
Recovering, the dragons gathered together once more with the Turbokat hovering above them.
"What do we do about that omega? He's hold up pretty good in that mountain," Byron asked Adair.
"Dig him out!" Adair growled. "And I have just the thing in the jet to accomplish that. You guys take a high position and pick off any escapees from within as they try to flee. Kill the pink creatures but not the Kats dressed in all black clothing, got it?"
"Gotcha!" Comack agreed, taking off without further questions as Adair wheeled away to head back to the jet while his fellow dragons gaped at the red dragon's retreating back in confusion.
Through their minds ran one question, 'what does he mean return to the jet?' Giving each other a troubled look they decided to shelve that concern until they had time to address it then tore off to catch up with Comack.
The Turbokat held its position as Adair flew in close then reentered the jet in one of those quick alter and roll moves he normally used. Within seconds he was once more back in his seat.
"Glad you guy's fire was able to take out that missile, buddy. What do we try next to ferret out Dark Kat?" T-Bone asked.
"Take us back! We're going to dig him out using my mole missile!" Razor growled.
"Oh, like we did that last time to get into his hideout!" His friend said, pleased, as he quickly raced back to the volcano in question.
"Yeah, like that time, but I'm not just going to make one hole...I'm going to make Swiss cheese of his mountain."
T-Bone laughed darkly. "Great idea then the mountain will come down on him!"
That's the idea!" Razor said, coldly, setting up the boring device and his missiles that did the same thing, for the assault to come.