Chapter 10: Azuvengers Assemble!

It was a slow, strange journey back to Earth for Chiyo. For an eternity, it seemed, she drifted down from the heavens, urging and encouraging the celestial Sakaki to follow her every inch of the way.(1) And every inch was a league for her, Chiyo could see, as the crushing weight of the world's sorrows closed around her as they dropped into the depths of the human sea.

Chiyo settled into her body. It felt a lot like putting on a wool sweater in a dry room, she thought, or having pins-and-needles from head to toe. "Ooh, my head…" she moaned.

"Y'all right, Sakaki?" asked Osaka, who also looked a bit woozy. "You look like one of them headache commercials."(2)

"So…loud here," she said, with difficulty. "Hard to…think…or hear you. So much pain…and fear…"

"Don't worry Miss Sakaki!" panicked Chiyo. "We'll get through this!"

"You're…not helping…"

"Ah. Right." She shuffled over to Osaka. "Please say Mister Strange will get here soon?" she whispered.

"I dunno," said Osaka, fiddling with the Distinguished Dictaphone of Del-Monte (the banana), "all I'm getting is a voicemail. 'Please leave a message after the syzygy.'"

Chiyo whimpered. "I, I'm sure he's on his way. Positive." She saw something in the sky. "Ah! There he is!"

Osaka looked, and gasped. "Look out!"

A bullet-ridden flaming rocket-car roared past, skipped off the asphalt and exploded messily against a nearby apartment building. A man flumped to the ground before them seconds later and was instantly engulfed by his parachute. "Mhh mrrrha!" he said, fist raised in triumph. "Mroo mrot mroo…ack!" He fought himself free. "Mwah ha!"

"Professor Erskine?!" gasped Chiyo.

"You thought you could escape me, my little test subject," he cackled, "but you failed to account for the homing nanobots you consumed at lunchtime!"

"And TV news!" squeaked Mr. Beaver.

"What? But I was sure my Super-Safe-Tee chopsticks would detect any — wait a minute, nanobots?"

"No, not you!" he snapped. "That one over there! Student number 227, Ayumu Kasuga!"

"Huh?" said Osaka. "No way! I had fish!"

"With shrimp," added Mr. Beaver, appearing beside her.

"Waugh!" she said.

"Ah, but little did you know that I spiked the drink that brat Mihama gave you with my super-secret super-soldier serum!" cackled Erskine.

"Try sayin' that three times fast!" added Mr. Beaver, who was once more on his hand.

"Drink?" Chiyo gasped. My energy drink! "And I am not a brat!"

"Even now, it is restructuring your DNA making you faster, stronger, better than you were before!"

"But I didn't drink nothing," said Osaka. "I gave it to Miss Sakaki."

Erskine recoiled in horror. "What!? You fool! It was specifically calibrated for your genetic structure! It's useless in anyone else! Argh!"

"Then why did this…?" asked Sakaki, ablaze with flares coronal.

"Why did what? Holy Heisenberg! What happened to you!?"

"That's the Sakaki character!" Mr. Beaver explained. "You really should learn your student's names."

"Silence, infidel!" he cried, as he slapped Mr. Beaver. "Ow! My hand! But…this is fantastic! Spontaneous energy generation! Flight! Teleportation! I'm even more brilliant than I thought! Mwah ha ha!"

"Uh, Professor, wasn't it supposed to grant supah-dancing-powah instead?" asked Mr. Beaver. "Ow!" he said, after another slap.

"Who needs killer moves when you can blast your opponents into space!" he cried.(3) "Come forth, my hidden HYDRAs!"

A black van with the words "Goons" stencilled on the door-panels squealed to a halt next to him. A squad of heavily armed storm troopers with Cobra-esque helmets and green jumpsuits piled out of the back, making threatening gestures. One of them dragged an unusually short trooper kicking and screaming out of the van moments later. "Get out there, you!" he growled.

"No! No!" wailed the trooper, in a girlish voice. "This is nuts! I didn't agree to this!"

"That voice sounds familiar…" said Osaka.

The professor sighed. "What does it take to get competent minions in this town? Never mind. HYDRA soldiers! Seize them at once!"

"Yes sir!" they cried. "Hail HYDRA! Immortal —"

"Shut up and seize them already!" roared Erskine. Dangerously impractical energy weapons hissed to life as the troops took aim at the young girls.(4)

"Waugh!" cried Osaka. "Guns! With bullets an' everythin'!"

"Actually, I think they're coherent plasma pulses!" quavered Chiyo.

Sakaki flinched, struck by a wave of fear. "Aah!"

"Miss Sakaki!" Chiyo cried. "Please stay calm!"

"M-m-Miss Sakaki?!" stammered the short trooper. "Chiyo? Osaka?!"

"What are you waiting for!?" shouted Erskine. "Shoot them!"

"Yeah yeah!" added Mr. Beaver. "Zappy zappy!"

"STOP!" bellowed a distant, running voice.

"See?" shouted Erskine. "Now some super-hero's shown up and — oh, it's Chihiro."

"Chihiro?" said Chiyo.

"Chihiro?!" squeaked the trooper.

The aforementioned student stumbled into the hostage situation seconds later, out of breath. "Professor Erskine!" she wheezed, waving a suspiciously laser-gun-like pencil case in the air, "you are under (gasp!) arrest, on my authority as an agent of (wheeze!) S.H.I.E.L.D.!" She took a second to catch her breath, took aim, and recoiled in horror. "Ah?! HYDRA agents! I'm doo-hoo-hoomed!"

"Bah!" scoffed Erskine. "You've foiled my plans for the last time, agent! HYDRAs! Destroy her!"

The short one flinched. "What? No!" she said. "This is nuts! This is stupid! I'm not (oomph!) doing this anymore!" She wrenched off her helmet.

"Hey," said Osaka, "isn't that —"

"Kaorin!?" gasped Chihiro.(5) "You've joined HYDRA?!"

"How was I supposed to know that the astronomy club was a front for a terrorist organization!" she wailed.

"But that makes us enemies…so now, we must fight!"

"But I don't want to hurt you or Miss Sakaki!" she gasped.

"Then surrender! Renounce your dark ways and return to the light!" said Chihiro, secretly quoting the S.H.I.E.L.D. training manual.

"Um, what's going on?" asked Chiyo.

"Ah think the plot jumped the rails," explained Osaka.

"I quit!" said Kaorin, tossing her rifle to the ground. "And I'm keeping the complimentary star chart, Ogawa!" she said, shouting at the guy next to her.(6) "Chihiro!" she cried, running to her.

"Kaorin!" They embraced.

The remaining troopers exchanged embarrassed looks. "Uh, can we quit too?" asked one of them.

"No!" shouted Erskine, stomping his feet. "Make with the shooting!"

"You shall do nothing!" said a voice on the wind. Smoke bombs burst in the air, sending everyone into a fit of coughing. When it cleared, half the park was full of pyjama-wearing men with katanas.

"Oh no!" gasped Chiyo. "Ninjas!"

"These girls are now the property of The Hand!" hissed one of them.(7)

"Lousy ninjas!" growled Erskine. "Curse you, Japan, and your ubiquitous pop-culture icons!"

A dramatic spotlight (yes, in the bright of afternoon) highlighted a group of kunoichi wielding electric guitars on the street corner. "Not if we have anything to say about it!" cried the bass-guitarist, striking a killer chord.

"Oh no!" gasped Chiyo. "Rock ninjas! And I can't believe I just said that!"

"Freeze!" said some men in black. "MiB!"

"Prepaere yehselves, heathens!" growled an Irish preacher, brandishing a ridiculous number of bayonets.

"EX-TER-MIN-NATE!" buzzed some ambulatory trash cans. "EX-TER-MIN-NATE!"

Sakaki , now glowing like a furnace, gasped in horror. "No! Daleks!? Not Daleks! No! Nooo!" She collapsed like a neutron star.

Chiyo panicked. "Oh no! Miss Sakaki!" She ran to her, but was repulsed by the incredible heat. We've got to get out of here!" she cried, spying some horrible creatures piling out of a sewer grate.(8)

"Run for it!" cried Chihiro, wild-eyed. "I'll cover you!" Click click, went the pencil case. "Uh…"

"Miss Osaka! Do something!"

"Ah? Oh, yeah, right!" She brandished her umbrella. "Magical Minty Kasuga-Chan Make Up!" A shower of sparkles and groovy flowers later, and she had a funky cloak, an otherworldly umbrella (now held like a staff) and a fetching witch-hat. "C-cower now, mortals, for you face a, uh, mistress of the mystic arts!" She posed. Leaves and dirt swirled around her, and the ninjas fell back as the air crackled with power. "And by the Winds of Watoomb, I shall vanquish me! No, wait! I mean 'thee'!" Too late — the spell clicked, and a tremendous blast of wind hurled Osaka into sky.

"Miss Osaka, come back!" cried Chiyo, watching her friend speed into the stratosphere. A small witch hat flopped on her face. "Mff."

The assembled forces of evil loomed ominously. Triggers itched, grips tightened, and an electric guitar wailed through the opening bars of Metallica's Enter Sandman.

Chiyo backed away. "Um, um, if you hurt me, my parents will get really mad, and they have particle weapons!"

Erskine took a look around, shrugged. "Ah screw it," he said, slinging an atomic death ray from behind his back. "Kill 'em all and let Nietzsche sort it out."

"Armageddon!" cried Mr. Beaver, wielding a Tommy-gun.

And with that squeaky battle-cry, the war was on. Not since last Tuesday had Tokyo been witness to the carnage that happened this day in Shizuka Park, as HYDRA fought S.H.I.E.L.D., Deep One ate Dalek, and rock ninja murdered Stairway to Heaven. Fire shuriken and plasma bolts sang through the air, scoring steel and melting flesh indiscriminately. Professor Erskine laughed manically as he sprayed blazing electric death into a horde of gun-slinging Catholic Inquisitors as Mr. Beaver gave a MiB a vicious ear-biting.

Chiyo screamed as some lucky ninjas made it through the melee to take a swing at her. A blood-flecked katana swiped at her skull, only to be brought to a clashing halt by a long, suspiciously spoon-like object. "Eh?" she said. Is that an adamantium ladle?

"Damned ninjas," said an invisible voice. Twin battle-spoons pummelled the offending shinobi and fended off several others. "Are you all right, Miss Chiyo?"

"Huh?" All she could see was a sort of distortion in the air and two vicious looking kitchen elements scything through the opposition. Phase-shift invisibility cloak? she wondered. "Um, yes, Miss…?"

"Names are unimportant," said the voice, as it did a passable drum-solo on the skull of a ninja-percussionist. "Come, we must get you to safety."

"No! I can't leave Miss Sakaki like this! Or Misses Kaorin or Chihiro," she added, seeing them cowering in terror.

The voice seemed to consider this. "Very well," it said, before smashing the head from a passing Cylon. "Although I fear we will not last long without reinforcements."

There was a distant sound of flesh tearing, just audible above the din, followed by a roar like a rabid freight train. An emerald meteorite smashed to earth just meters from Chiyo's invisible friend, scattering stone, dirt and ninjas everywhere. All was still for a moment as everyone paused to consider this new arrival.

The dust cleared. Chiyo gasped. "M-m-miss Yomi!?" I'm never mixing drinks again! she thought.

Yomi turned to look at her, the muscles of her neck twisting like ropes. "Chiyo…okay?" She nodded, dumbly. "Good. Then Yomi SMASH!" She quaked the ground with a hammer-blow, knocking a mob of ninjas from their feet, before sending a robotic tin can into orbit with an uppercut. ("WA-AA-AAGH!" it said.) She roared in triumph. "SMASH IS FUN! Aaowh!" A volley of lasers scorched her backside. "Why you little — argh!" The rest of the gang had gotten the same idea. A mob of ninjas, Deep Ones, Doombots and a Girl Scout doggy-piled on top of her, half of whom she threw right off again with a swipe of her arm. "Dang it, those swords hurt!"

"We have to help her!" cried Chiyo. Searching around, she found a rock and threw it. "Yah!"

It plinked off a HYDRA agent's helmet. "D'ahow! Why you little —"

"Waaa-HOO!" Kagura's enthusiastic cry rang out above the din as she soared through the air and flattened the agent with her mountain bike. "Yeah! Two-point landing!"

"Y'all right, Chiyo?" asked Tomo, riding on the back.

"No!" she said. "Something's happened to Miss Sakaki and Miss Yomi!"

"Eh, she's lettin' off steam is all," said Tomo. "Woah! Ninjas!"

"Ninjas?" said Kagura. "Sweet!"

"And what was that about Sakaki?" asked Tomo. Chiyo gestured over her shoulder. "Holy schamolé!"

"We have to do something!" said Chiyo.

"Uh, maybe we could try a fire extinguisher or something? Woah!" She twisted out of the way of an oncoming sword. "Swords! Swords bad! Agh!"

Kagura snapped a fist into the offending ninja. "Do you mind? We are trying to have a conversation!" And with that, she leapt off the saddle, planted both feet into a passing Mole Man and spun her bicycle into the face of a giant robot, wielding it two-handed.

"Augh!" said Tomo, as she flew off the back.

"Sorry, Tomo!" cried Kagura, fending off robots with her bike-fu.

"I'll get you for this, Kagura!"

Chiyo blinked back to reality as a hail of bullets skittered off a pair of ladles by her head. "Miss Chiyo!" said the voice, "we must leave now!"

She nodded, spotting Tomo trying to hog-tie some HYDRA with her legs. "Miss Sakaki!" she said, addressing the white-hot ball of light. "Can you hear me? It's not safe here! We have to go! Please, can you fly or, um lighting-bolt us out of here? Or, um, have arms and legs, please?"

Osaka floated down next to her. "Ah don't think she got ears no more, Chiyo," she said.

"Miss Osaka! Use your magic! Help her!"

"Gimmie a sec." She reached down, grabbed her hat, and screwed it on tight. "There we go. Uh, I'm kinda lackin' in the whole great-fiery-ball school of magic, Chiyo."

"GRRR!" said a charging bear.

"Bolt of Bedevilment!" cried Osaka, summoning foul majicks. Blee! A hail of bran muffins splattered deliciously against the beast. "Waugh! That always happens!"

"Takino Tactical Assault! Rar!" Tomo tripped the beast with an outstretched leg then slapped it silly with paddle-shaped hands. "Ha! Owned!"

"RAR!" said the bear.

"Running in terror!" said Tomo, doing so.

"We have to try, Miss Osaka!" pleaded Chiyo.

"Right!" she said. "Let's see, uh…Sakakikus normalis! Talldarkandbishojou! Saata andagi!"

"You…you just turned Miss Kaorin into a rabbit…" wept Chiyo.

"A cute one," said a bewildered Chihiro, holding the Kaori-bunny in her lap.

"I uh, think I summoned somethin' too," said Osaka. Suddenly, a great slimy green pseudopod lashed out from the angry mob behind her, whipped round her waist and yanked her away. "Why is always tentacles?!" she wailed.

"Miss Osaka! Not again!" Chiyo collapsed. "Oh no, this is terrible! And it's all my fault!"

Meanwhile, Professor Erskine had finally had enough. "Our foes are weak, Mr. Beaver!" he cried. "Time for the ultimate weapon!"

"No, Professor!" squeaked the puppet. "It's too risky! It's madness!"

"Madness!?" he roared. "I'll show you madness!" Enraged, he crushed Mr. Beaver's skull in one hand and hurled him aside. "OW! SON OF A SUBMARINER!" Cursing, he plucked a vial of glowing liquid from his pocket and drank it, smacked his lips, and lobbed the empty vial over his shoulder.

"Hey!" said Tomo, as it bounced off her face. "Watch where your — sufferin' succotash!"

Chiyo watched in horror as the professor underwent a monstrous metamorphosis. Muscles bulged grotesquely under his lab coat. Bones creaked and tendons snapped. Skin calcified and crackled, taking on a hideous, reptilian texture. Nails lengthened into claws. And when, at last, the mutation was complete, he put a rose between his teeth, struck a flamenco pose and cried, "Behold the power of science!"

"What the spoon?!" Tomo twisted aside as the exceptionally mad scientist Riverdanced through the mob, punting and trampling ninjas, robots, cowboys from hell and (almost) her. "Yomi! Heads up!"

"Huh?" said Yomi, busy knocking two Mole-Men together. "Doof!" she added, as Erskine trampled her.

Kagura spotted his course through the crowd. "He's goin' for Chiyo!" she shouted. Wresting a staff from a nearby ninja, she kicked off somebody's face and landed in front the monster, ready for battle. "Wait a minute — what the hell am I doing?" She ducked between his legs with a yelp.

"Miss Chiyo!" said the invisible voice. "Run!" The twin ladles leapt on Erskine's shoulders and beat him about the face.

"What she said!" cried Osaka, raising her staff. "Flames of Falan—"

Erskine flicked both of them aside. "Fools! None shall deny me (and HYDRA, I guess) the fruits of my labour!"

"S-stop it!" cried Chiyo, standing before him. "I won't let you hurt Miss Sakaki any more!"

"Hmm?" Erskine spat out his rose and raised a roguish eyebrow. "Little Miss Know-It-All wants to stand in my way?"

Her knees quaked. "I, uh, I…"

"Begone, swine!" He raised a hand to slap her aside, apparently unaware that, what with the claws and all, he'd probably decapitate her in the process.

Chiyo was all too aware of what was about to happen. Her eyes went wide and time seemed to slow as she watched her doom whistle towards her neck. Unheeded, the invisible librarian in her head reminded her that it was scientifically possible that she would still be alive and conscious for several seconds after her head left her shoulders, a fact that no doubt comforted the rest of her terrified self.

No! she thought. I don't want to die! Not like this! Someone, anyone, please! Help!

A flash of light, like a million rising suns. A blinding bolt of force cannoned into the mad monster, smashing him through the mob and the wall on the opposite side of the street.

Chiyo blinked. "Wha —"

Seven thunders loosed their voices. Air rippled as a sonic boom knocked Chiyo and most everyone else from their feet. My ears! she thought. Wait! That means I'm not dead. Yay! Oh, unless this is one of those near-death hallucinations I've read about. Hmm. At this point, rational thought stepped in to remind her that she was, in fact, surrounded by about a zillion ninjas, robots, pirates and evil bad men who wanted to do questionable things to her, and she shut up.

A golden light filled the battle-ravaged park. A small sun, shaped like an exceptionally tall Japanese high-school girl, levitated from the Erskine-shaped hole in the wall above the crowd, arms outstretched. It spoke in a soft yet commanding voice that was not so much heard as it was felt, rattling the foundations of your mind.

"All of you, please…stop fighting!" it said. "I…I didn't want any of this to happen! Just…just go AWAY!"

And with that, a thousand spears of light flashed from the sky and smote the ridiculous army. The crack shattered windows for blocks around; no one noticed, since they were all temporarily deaf.

Once she convinced herself that she had not, in fact, become an unwilling participant in a demonstration on electrical safety, Chiyo dared to take a peek through her fingers.

She gasped. She'd expected a field full of scorched flesh and mangled machinery. What she got was a few sad patches of smoking dirt and a gopher who'd popped up to see what all the noise was about. She watched, with the detached amusement of the recently concussed, as it looked around, sniffed the air, then headed back underground for a nice cup of tea.

"— iyo?" said a distant voice. "Chiyo? Y'all right?"

Oh, she thought, it's Miss Kagura. She nodded, once, before trying to shake the bells from her head. "What just happened?"

"Uh, Sakaki, I think?"

Oh no. "Miss Sakaki! Are you — oh my."

The golden goddess of good settled to the ground. Her skin blazed with a warm, gentle light. Her eyes, mouth and hair were like windows into space, black as vacuum and sparkling with stars and nebulae. It was the same with the boots, gloves and belt, except that a fiery, lighting-shaped "S" floated in the midst of each. In short, she looked a lot like Eternity did at the high-school prom.

She looked down at her hands, apparently wondering who they could possibly belong to. "What...what did I just…oh…oh no! I…I've killed them!"

Kagura looked up. "Uh, actually…"

A veritable who's-who of supervillainy fell screaming from the heavens into a nearby lake. After a few moments of coughing and sputtering, they resumed fighting.

"Miss Sakaki!" said Chiyo. "Are you all right?"

The golden goddess of good settled to the ground. Her skin blazed with a warm, gentle light. Her eyes, mouth and hair were like windows into space, black as vacuum and sparkling with stars and nebulae. It was the same with the boots, gloves and belt, except that a fiery, lighting-shaped "S" floated in the midst of each. In short, she looked a lot like Eternity probably did at the high-school prom.

"Um," said Sakaki, summarizing the above.

"Yep, she's good," said Osaka.

Chiyo glommed about her waist, sighing. "I'm so glad," she said. A part of her wondered if she was really seeing the constellation Orion in Sakaki's belt.

The girls swarmed her. "Man, Sakaki, that was AWESOME!" said Kagura. "He was all 'Rar!' and you were all 'Nuh-uh!' and 'Zap!' 'Kaboom!' 'Pow!' How'dya do all that?"

"I, I don't know," she stammered. "And why is Yomi green?"

"That's what I want to know," Yomi growled.

"And who was that invisible sous-chef?" wondered Chiyo.

"Buh…bunny?" said a shell-shocked Chihiro, holding her former classmate.

"Behold!" cried a jubilant Osaka, pointing. "Dr. Exposition hast arrivedetheth…eth."

An electric-blue ghost in the shape of an ex-neurosurgeon in a ridiculous cloak levitated down from the heavens. "Ayumu, I asked you never to call me that," he said, irritated.

"Sorry Steve," said Osaka, not looking it.

"That's Doctor Strange, confound it!"

"Doctor Strange!?" squealed Tomo. "Master of the mystic arts!? Sorcerer Supreme of the Universe?!"

"Author of A Short Treatise on the Neurological Intricacies of the Upper Hippocampus?!" asked Chiyo, jumping in.

"Yes, actually," said Strange, surprised. "See, Ayumu, I told you it would sell."

"Curse you," muttered Tomo, miffed that she'd been out-fangirled.

"So, lay it on us, Steve-O," said Osaka. "What's with all the thunder and lightning?"

"Why is there a rabbit here?" asked Sakaki. She stroked its ears, hesitantly. The bunny squealed in apparent ecstasy and fainted. "Ah!"

"Hmm, I suppose we should fix that first," muttered Strange. He snapped his fingers. "Yamaani!"

Poof. Kaorin morphed back to normal, meaning that Chihiro was now holding a 98-pound schoolgirl instead of a 90-gram lagomorph. "Glorf!" she said, as she was flattened.

"She'll probably think this was all a dream when she wakes up," said Strange, pre-empting Sakaki's question. "I would suggest you keep it that way."

"Dr. Strange, please!" said Yomi. "What's happened to us?"

"Hmm…" Strange looked intently at each of them, his eyes burrowing through their minds and souls with the gentle hands of a skilled practitioner. "My diagnosis? Destiny."

"That no help!" she snarled.

"I don't suppose you're related to Banner, are you, Miss Mizuhara? Didn't think so," he muttered, as Yomi took her aggression out on a street sign. "Although your strength is probably controlled by your emotional state, so you might want to take a chill pill."

"One of these?" asked Osaka, producing a roll of Mentos™."

Strange twitched. "One of these days, Ayumu," he muttered, "bang! Zoom! To the moon!"

"Been there, done that."

"By the Shades of Sattanish," he sighed. "Regardless, what I meant was that all of you have been caught up in a much larger series of events beyond your control and been changed irrevocably as a result."

"Sweet!" said Tomo. "What do I get? Plasma spit? Rocket toes!?"

"Ah, not quite," said Strange, deliberately avoiding eye contact. "Now, I'm still sorting out all the details, but I can assure you that all of you are in perfect physical health, and are not in any immediate danger that I can sense."

"'Immediate'?" said Chiyo.

"I would suggest that you take a moment to collect yourselves," he continued, "get your things from school, and have a good night's sleep. And absolutely no super-heroics before bedtime. I shall contact you later tonight with more information."

"Sleep?" said Kagura. "You kiddin'?! I'm so hopped up on adrenaline I could stay up all night!"

"Actually, that was a subtle attempt at planting a mental suggestion in all of your heads."

"Oh. Hey, wait a minute!"

"I'm beat enough to collapse right now," said Yomi, now back to her normal self.

"Man, you look like a walkin' wardrobe malfunction, Yomi," said Tomo.

"I know."

"Please try not to destroy the city before then," he said. "And as for you, Chiyo Mihama…"

"Eh?"

"…Do not let today's events weigh upon your conscience. You were not at fault; indeed, you may have saved countless lives through your chance actions. And I sense that you shall save many more in the days ahead."

"Um, thank you for the reassurance, Doctor Strange, but that doesn't make a lot of sense."

"Good. Now, if you'll excuse me, I must attend to a pressing engagement of cosmic significance."

"Tea with Dagon?" asked Osaka.

"Thank you, Ayumu, for ruining my dramatic exit," he huffed. He transmuted into a cloud of radiant, yet vexed, cherry blossoms.

The girls took a moment to ponder the wizard's words of wisdom. "Is he always that vague?" asked Yomi.

Osaka nodded. "Sometimes he speaks in pig-Latin."

"Shouldn't we do something about all this?" asked Kagura, indicating the apocalyptic park grounds.

"Oh dear!" said Chiyo, as if noticing it all for the first time.

"I'll take care of it," said Chihiro, supporting Kaorin. "S.H.I.E.L.D. has cleanup crews for just this kind of situation."

"Hordes of ninjas?" said Yomi.

"Unit 447C," Chihiro replied automatically. "The goons should tire themselves out in a few minutes; we'll mind-wipe them afterwards. I'll take Kaorin home, and, uh, dig out Erskine as well."

"Help!" said a muffled voice from the rubble. "I can't stop doing the rumba!"

"I'll talk to you all tomorrow about, you know, the whole super-power thing. If I still have a job then. Oh, my life sucks…" She shuffled off, despondent.

Meanwhile, Sakaki had faded back to her usual gigantic self. "Are you sure you're okay, Miss Sakaki?" asked Chiyo, still latched around her. She nodded. "What about the, um, voices?"

"I can still hear them," she said, "but they're not as loud. I think I can control it now."

"So no more hopping to the moon?" She nodded, once. "Good."

"Hopping to the what now?" asked Kagura, picking up the pieces of her bike. "Man, I just bought this!"

"I think I can fix that," said Sakaki.

"Seriously? Sweet!"

"Do it later," said Yomi. "I'm done for the day. Let's go home."

"You sure that ain't Strange's hypnotism talking?"

"Nah, he didn't do nothin'," said Osaka. "He was messin' with ya."

"Must…go…home…sleep," droned Tomo, apparently in some sort of trance.

"Uh…"

***

Hundreds of miles away in a place forgotten by time, a woman was watching television.

Half-watching, actually. Make that quarter-watching, since she was also talking on the phone, doing her nails and reviewing her slow but inexorable progress towards global domination (or, as she saw it, world peace).

The place was something of an ancient, slightly crumbling monastery, complete with stained glass windows and arcane frescos depicting the history of the world. (There was a lot of blood, obviously.) Except where the altar would normally be, there was a large desk, one of those executive models with all the aluminium and the swinging monitor arms and such, a small video wall, and a woman in a red dress.

It is completely accurate to say that this woman had a body to die for; people did just that on a regular basis. Sculpted legs, voluptuous chest, golden hair, eyes of cobalt steel…she normally let her opponents take it all in before shooting them in the face. That was a rare necessity, however — she was usually able to convince them to do it themselves.

At the moment, she was tracking about seven different news broadcasts on the video wall before her, no doubt ruining her eyesight at the same time due to the cavernous lighting. On the main screen was a broadcast from Japan, where a man named Jameson was denouncing the mysterious golden figure who had saved most of Tokyo earlier in the day as "a menace."

She nodded, listening to the voice on the phone. "Yes," she purred, "I'm watching it now. Really? She did? Like a million exploding suns, you say? I see." She gave her nails a final buff. "This is good news. Thank you, Mr. Beaver. You shall live to see another day." She hung up. A nun wearing an AK-47 shuffled in, removed the receiver, bowed, and left.

The woman watched the golden goddess with piercing eyes. "'And the light of justice shall lead them,'" she whispered, quoting something. "Yuumura?" she said to the shadows.

"Yes, my lady?" they replied.

She smiled, sensuously. "I want her."

The shadows nodded. "Understood, my lady."

(Footnotes)

1. (Sigh.) No, this does NOT mean she is a 2,000-foot-tall massively powerful armoured humanoid energy god, although she could probably give Arishem's thumb-o'-doom a good workout.

2. You know, the ones with the throbbing reds and lightning bolts. Character actor Johnny McSeethrough made a fortune starring in those ads before the CG revolution made him obsolete. Today, he can still be found on the streets of Hollywood, eking out a pitiful existence cosplaying Alfred Hitchcock's silhouette.

3. Famous last words.

4. Isn't that always the way? The big boss says, "Seize them!" or "Take them alive!" and the minions open up with repeating laser ferrets. Worse still is "alive and unspoiled," which involves sending killer robots back in time to give your grandparents a wedgie.

5. Second string character in Azumanga Daioh. Shortish, cropped hair, infatuated with Sakaki and utterly gypped by this one scene cameo.

6. This cameo, in contrast, is far more than he deserves. Ogawa is also known as "the only other male character in Azumanga to get a name." He has, like, two lines of dialogue. He's the fellow with glasses in episode one.

7. The Hand are like the yakuza, except they're ninjas and they have magic ninja powers or something. Recently, they took out a giant robot by stabbing it to death.

8. Mole Men. Don't ask.