Chapter 10:
The Break-down
Batman back, and running on
(Gotham: Wayne Mansion)
(Note: this is Dark Knight series, so Morgan Freeman is playing Lucius Fox)
Lucius Fox and Drake Clithe had been working non-stop for several hours, trying to repair the fourth wall generator, while Batman, aka Bruce Wayne, used the Bat computer to help repair the programming. Dr. Clithe was hard at work, siting at a desk, using a magnifying glass to help him see the minuscule microchips as he soldiered wires and made circuits.
"What about the mica capacitors" asked Fox, walking in with a small box.
"Ah, yes, I need two 200 micro farad ones, for the third microchip..."
After some back and forth tech talk, Fox went about installing the capacitors.
"So tell me, Dr. Clithe" asked Fox, "How did you come about this theory, that the world's of fiction actually exist?"
Dr. Clithe removed his glasses, looking at Fox. "Well, it's complicated..."
"Hey, I'm a complicated guy" smiled Fox
Clithe looked down, working out his thoughts into words.
"I guess it's a little bit of both physics, philosophy, and metaphysics. You see, my daughter, she's grown now, wrote stories for a living. She never wrote anything major, but she enjoyed her work. Man, I must be all over the news by now. She's probably seen me... Anyway, she always told me how, when she wrote, that her stories would sometimes, write themselves. I never really understood it, not until eight years ago anyway. In my theorizing, I wondered how is it that fiction could inspire such, a following. I began to wonder, maybe these fictional worlds do exist, somehow, in the minds of people who watch, and read them. What if, due to, collective subconscious, we actually make it possible for these worlds to exist. I could go on and on the metaphysical properties of these worlds, but, I think you get the point..."
"That is fascinating. Truly, it is" said Fox. "And you were ostracized for that?"
Clithe nodded.
"You know" continued Fox, "Some of the greatest minds in history were ostracized for their theories, only to have been proven revolutionary later in time. You, you were able to prove your theory within your lifetime, something of a rarity in the scientific community."
"Yes" said Clithe, smiling, yet somehow skeptical. "And now, I can add my name to those who created some of the worst weaponry on earth. Oppenheimer, Alfred Nobel, all those minds who created such promising things, now some of the most horrible devices the world have ever seen.
Fox nodded. "It's not over yet. Once we repair your generator, we will make this right. Mr. Wayne has a way of doing that."
"How are you sure? How are you sure we can right this..."
"Because I'm Batman, and Batman never fails!" said Batman as he walked in, carrying a disk.
"You just love saying that, don't you?" asked Clithe, somewhat annoyed.
"Well, it's true, I'm Batman..."
"Of course you are!... is the program ready?" asked Clithe.
Batman handed him the disk. "Here you are, ready when you are."
"Well, unfortuantly it's taking longer than anticipated. Some of your technology here is more, advanced than what we have in the Real World. It's actually improving my original design, but it's taking longer for me to work out the math..."
Just then, their was a sound of a door bell.
"Alred!" screamed Bruce.
"I've got it, sir" said Alfred from down the hall.
"They must be back" said Fox.
"That was fast" said Bruce, walking out the room to meet his new guests.
"Just remember to be polite, Mr. Wayne. Remember, they are coming here from different worlds, so they might hear things differently here..."
"I know Fox! Remember, I've studied every known discipline, including fictional knowledge" said Bruce as he left.
Alfred made it to the front door, looking through the peep hole. He saw the familiar face of Jase.
"Welcome master Jase" greeted Alfred.
"Hello, we're back, and we've, brought some extra guests" said Jase as he walked in. following behind him was Bugs, Megamind, Minion, Hiccup, Toothless, Yoda and Mace Windu.
"Greetings" said Megamind enthusiastically.
"Welcome, sir..." said Alfred, surprised.
"So, this is the Wa-een mansion of Gat-ham!" said Megamind, mis-pronouncing the otherwise simple words.
"Yes..." replied Alfred. Looking outside, he saw Optimus and Bumblebee, who were to large to enter through the small doors.
"Ah yes, I was told about you. Please, walk around to the east wing, the glass doors might be large enough for you to enter."
"Great-see you there!" said Bumblebee with his radio voice.
Alfred closed the door and proceeded to the east wing.
"Please, make yourself comfortable, Master Wayne will be with you shortly" said Alfred as he walked away.
"Hey, nice digs" said Bugs as he plopped on a couch.
"So, where are these other warriors you have told us about?" asked Mace.
"Uh, they should be here in a few..."
"Welcome to Wayne Manor!" greeted Bruce, somehow harshly.
"Oh, hey Bats!" said Bugs as he zoomed up to greet the dark knight. Batman simply glared at him, not wanting to shake hands.
Batman looked around, seeing Megamind and Minion. "Who are you? Jase, you didn't say anything about, more animated characters."
"Uh, yeah, we may have run into a few problems. Something about the breaks closing and we had to take some detours..."
Then, the floor shook as Optimus and Bumblebee entered the room.
"Greetings, Dark Knight" greeted Optimus. Batman looked at him, as if expecting more robots to show up.
"I thought they would be more of you" he said coldly.
"Another problem doc" said Bugs. "The breaks were not only closing, but closing fast, so we had to grab whoever we found, namely the truck and the car here."
Batman sighed. "Well, that's just great! You know Clithe was just telling me how Loki could bring to like any machine with that Allspark-sceptor of his..."
"What?" said Optimus, half-shocked. Before Batman could answer, the doorbell rang again.
"Alfred!"
"I'm almost their, sir" said Alfred simply.
"You know, the door's right there..." said Jase.
Batman simply glared at him, menacingly. Jase turned away, feeling uncomfortable.
From the door entered Deadpool, Laura, Henry, Spiderman, Ironman, Captain America, and Bruce Banner.
"Hey Bats! look who we have here!" greeted Deadpool. "Though we couldn't get ol' Scarlet here, I think we've got a good thing going here."
Batman simply glared. "Welcome, Wilson."
"Awe, do you have to call me by my real name?"
"Yes."
"Jase! Have you heard from Mike and Jane yet?" asked Henry.
"Not yet, we just got here ourselves. Did you guys run into problems with the breaks too?"
"Yeah. We had to rush it, and then we kind of took a detour through the Lion King, that was neat."
Jase was going to ask more, but the doorbell rang again.
"Alfred!" yelled Batman
'Right away sir" said Alfred, uncomplaining.
"But the door..." started Laura, but Jase cut her off, simply nodding his head.
From the door came in Mike, Jane, Ryder, Katniss, Daffy, Legolas, Aragorn, Gandalf, and surprisingly, Anna.
"Awesome! we're all... Hey, wait, what's Anna doing here?" asked Laura.
"Anna? Where did Megamind come from?" asked Mike.
"We had to make a few side trips" said Jase. "Besides, we could use all the help we could get, right?"
"Ah, Ms. Everdeen" greeted Tony Stark, taking off his helmet. "Admire your work, you know, with the bow and arrow thing. You should meet a friends of mine, have a little archery contest."
"Uh, thank you?" said Katniss as if it were a question.
"Hi, I'm Anna" greeted Anna to Yoda. "You know, you remind me of someone..." she said, rubbing her chin.
"Really, hmm? Glad to meet you as well, I am" said the Jedi master. Anna gave him a perplexed look, wondering why he talks like that.
Legolas walked over to Bumblebee, who was just standing there. "Hello" he said simply. "You're, ah, made of metal..."
"Yes- you're very observant" said Bumblebee. Legolas glared, not trusting many of the characters that surrounded him.
"Hey" said Jane to Rogers. "I'm Jane...you're kind of hunky looking" she said flirtatiously.
"Uh, thanks?" said Steve, awkwardly.
"Hello, I am Gandalf" greeted Gandalf to Batman. Batman simply glared back.
"I'm Batman" he said, as Gandalf backed away slowly. Batman couldn't help that everyone was getting a little chatty and distracted. Slowly, he made his way to Ryder.
"Agent Ryder, we have had a setback, the machine won't be ready for several hours. I think now might be a good time to brief everyone on what's going on."
Ryder nodded. "Agreed. Alright everyone! If I can have your attention please!" Ryder raised his voice. Everyone turned and stood quietly, minus Mike...
"I don't care if she's only sixteen in the movie!" said Mike out-loud to Henry. "In real life she's 23, and if I..." he froze, realizing everyone was listening to him.
He coughed. "Continue"
Ryder rolled his eyes. "Alright! I know you all have a lot of questions..."
"Yeah, like where's the wine!" said Tony Stark.
"Yeah, and I want chimichangas!" demanded Deadpool.
"I meant about Loki threatening the universe and what's our plan of attack!"
"Oh, well that's important too, but then can we have chimichangas?"
Batman rolled his eyes. .
"People! This is serious! We need to get together and lay out our strengths and figure out how to conquer this!" said Ryder.
Everyone stood quiet.
"I agree" said Optimus. "Perhaps you could share some light about Loki and his plan?"
"Right" said Ryder. He looked to Henry, motioning him to come over. Mike followed.
"Henry, you know about these guys better than I do, can you guys brief them about Loki's army?"
"Uh, sure, I think we can do that" said Henry. Mike looked over them.
"Hey, Alfred, can get a projector over here!" called Mike.
"Yes, master Michael" he said as he walked away.
"Man, that's never going to get old!"
About 20 minutes later, Henry and his friends were able to put together a rough presentation using the information on their cell phones about their enemy, and their mind controlled allies. Everyone stood before the projector, awaiting for their questions to be answered. Jane stood by, using her Bluetooth connected iPhone to control the screen.
"Alright!" said Henry out loud, holding a pointing stick, "this..." he pointed to a picture of Loki on the screen, "...is Loki from the Avengers universe. You Marvel guys should know about him."
"Alright" continued Mike. "...so our Norse friend here has a god-complex and loves seeking out glory and praise. He is an expert in face to face combat, has super strength, and can project holographic images of himself. He also has this scepter, which needless to say can control people, fire blasts of tesseract energy, and thanks to a magic cube belonging to the Transformers Universe over there..." Mike referred to Optimus and Bumblebee"...can bring to life any machine and control it. According to our favorite Merc with a mouth..."
"That's me!" said Deadpool raising his hand enthusiastically.
"...He also has Thor, Loki's brother, adoptive brother, under his control. Thor is member of the Avengers, but is now under Loki's mind control."
"He also controls..." cut in Jase, signaling Jane to change the slide, "...Superman, from the DC movie universe, well, the little bit that exists anyway..."
Batman shot him a glare.
"He's an alien who is super strong, fast, can fly, has heat vision, x-ray vision, super hearing and sight, invulnerability...basically the Avengers in one package..."
Now Stark shot his a glare.
"Like Thor, he is also a good guy. Along with...Queen Elsa from Frozen..."
Anna looked sadly at the picture of Elsa on the screen.
"...She can basically do anything she wants with ice and snow: icicles, snow storms, freeze people solid, never-ending winter, bring snowmen to life... You know, anything with ice."
"Ok, so that's it for the good guys, now for the bad guys... We have Darth Vader from Star Wars..."
Yoda and Mace looked confusingly at the image, not recognizing the image.
(You know, it just occurred to me that this will be a major source of confusion and continuity problems. If you see something not working right between Vader's relationship with these two, just ignore it. Man, this multi-universe thing is hard!)
Henry saw there confused faces...
"He's, uh, a Sith from the future, so you guys wouldn't know him." said Henry. "Basically, he controls an army of Storm Troopers, and has great knowledge of the force..."
"The force, ladies and gentlemen, is what gives a Jedi his power" said Mace Windu out loud.
"An energy force that surrounds us, it is" said Yoda. "To manipulate objects, and sense one's surroundings, it can be used for."
Anna whispered to a nearby Spiderman. "Why is he talking like that?"
Spiderman shrugged his shoulders.
"Yes. His storm troopers are armed with laser blasters, and have flying fighters..." he said as Jane flipped through several images, "...speeders, and walkers, all armed with large blasters. Loki also has Uri-Kai..."
Legolas, Aragorn, and Gandalf looked to each other.
"Umi...Kites?" asked Megamind.
Henry stepped in now. "Uri...you know what, just call them orcs. They're armed with swords and bows, pretty much medieval stuff, but are way stronger than normal humans, and harder to kill too. There are also Raptors, basically six foot long lizards who are fast, good jumpers, and can slice you open and spill your guts. Oh, sorry for all you PG guys out there.."
Anna cringed at the thought, while Megamind held his mouth to prevent vomiting. Hiccup looked to Toothless and shrugged his shoulders.
"Also, there are two T-rex, basically giant lizards who can rip a car to shreds..."
Legolas raised his hand.
"...Cars are large, horseless chariots that can go really fast" said Jase, anticipating the elf's question.
"And last but not least..." said Mike, "There are the Decepticons..."
Optimus stared at the screen more intensely as the next image came on screen.
"...Loki brought Megatron and Starscream here..." said Mike, pointing at the screen "...and then stole Allspark... a cube thing that can make more big robots, and used it's energy on his staff. No he can make more robots at will. OK, Henry, did we miss something?" Mike asked his brother.
"Uh, I don't think... oh yeah, Godzilla."
"Dang, you're right, I forgot about that! Jane, quick, find a photo!..." Jane went through her iPhone, trying to find a picture online. After a minute of awkward silence, she finally got a picture d it on the screen.
"Right, Godzilla. basically, a 350 foot tall lizard. Very powerful, impervious to most weapons, regenerative powers, and can breathe a powerful atomic breath of radioactive fire."
Stark stared with wide eyes. "Sounds fascinating!"
"...Luckily, as far as we know, Loki hasn't brought him in yet, so we still have time... I... I think that's it. Any questions?"
Anna raised her hand first.
"I do. What about those good people under Loki's control? How can we save them?" she asked, referring to Elsa.
"Oh, yeah..." said Jase, looking to Mike. "...Basically, they can be freed by a concussion, a hard knock to the head."
"Oh, are you sure that's necessary?" said Anna nervously.
"You thought it was necessary a few hours ago!" complained Daffy.
"Hey, I have a question!" said Spiderman. "Uh, how did Loki get into the Real World to begin with?"
Mike, Jase, and Henry looked to each other. Everyone else, however looked to Deadpool.
"Oh my...come on!" said an annoyed Deadpool.
"Actually, I'm the one to blame" said Dr. Clithe from behind. He and Fox were waiting for a program to download onto device, so they came out to see how it was going. Everyone turned to see the un-assuming, simple looking man behind them.
"You?" asked Stark in surprise.
"Yes. My name is Dr. Drake Clithe, and I built the device, the... fourth wall generator, which allowed Loki to enter my world. He then used me to bring in his army, which he quickly brought under his control. This, all of this, is all my fault.
Everyone stared, not knowing what to make of Clithe's confession. That is, all except for Anna, who, to everyone's surprise, and partial amusement, ran forward and tackled the man.
"You! You are the one responsible for getting my sister kidnapped!" she screamed, shaking his head rapidly. Spiderman and Legolas ran forward and grabbed her off of him, trying to calm her.
"Whoa, easy there, killing him is not going to help anyone!" said Spidey. Jane now ran forward.
"Anna, it's not his fault, he didn't know any of this would happen!" she told her. Anna took a few short breathes, trying to calm down.
"She's right" said Hiccup, coming forward. "Because of him, we, Toothless and myself, were forced to serve a madman, to hunt down and enslave innocent people."
This came as a surprise to the young people. Hiccup must have been holding this in.
Now, Legolas came forward. "You mean, that because of one man's foolish attempts to control something he could not hope to understand, we are all now in trouble?"
Now, everyone started agreeing with Anna and Hiccup, grumbling against this man.
"Wait, hold on!" screamed Ryder. "This man is meant no ill will to anyone!"
"No, they're right!" said the doctor. "I did this. Because of me, many worlds that were once safely isolated have now been thrown into chaos! I have released a madman, who has forced many against his will, and has killed just as many, in an attempt to rule the universe..."
Everyone stood in silence, seeing the guilt and shame on the man's face.
Clithe paused for a moment as Fox walked in behind him.
(Now picture this with Morgan Freeman's voice in all its glory...)
"He may have caused this..." said Fox. "But he is willing to fix this. Don't blame this man for what has happened, he simply could not have known what he was getting into."
He now walked forward, into the crowd of assorted collection of alien and human, animated and live action characters.
"People! We have before us some of the most heroic, powerful, most influential people in all of fictional history. Only together can we end this and restore the fourth wall, and save our worlds from tyranny. We have all once defeated a seemingly unbeatable foe, bent on destruction, with the odds stacked against us back in our own worlds. Now, together, we can do it again."
"Will you stand together and save our world? Will we stand together, as an Alliance of the Fourth Wall, and destroy this threat?!"
Everyone broke into cheer. One couldn't help but feel the energy of so many, diverse people ready to go into battle. Herny turned to his brother Mike, who was tearing a little.
"Dude, are you crying?" he asked.
"It's just that Morgan Freeman. Damn, he makes everything sound epic!"
Soon, everyone, Anna and Hiccup included, forgot about their anger towards Clithe. Clithe and Fox dismissed themselves, so that they could return and finish repairing the machine.
"Well, since we'll be here all night, I say we party!" screamed Deadpool, turning to a nearby stereo system which he already connected his phone to. Turning it on, he played and started singing to his favorite tune...
"WHAT DOES A FOX SAY? Ring-ding-ding-ding-dingeringeding..."
Instead of joining along, everyone just stared at Deadpool making a fool of himself.
"...Wa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pow... wa-pa-pa-pa...pa...pa...pow?" Deadpool stuttered, not singing along anymore, realizing he was the only one with that idea.
"Huh, fine!" he said as he turned off the stereo.
That night, Alfred prepared rooms for everyone to sleep. The Autobots were content with simply transforming into their vehicle modes in the main room, while Tony Stark stayed up with Clithe, Fox, and Batman, curious about the machine...
No one wanted to join in?! I would have thought that after that speech, everyone would have joined in!
Uh, dude, everyone is in battle mode.
So was I!
But you're insane!
Oh yeah...
So, the next chapter, the chapter you've all been waiting for, is coming. Now, it is time for battle! See you soon...
P.S. If anyone thinks Lucius Fox's speech could be better, please feel free to let me know what I could add. That man, he makes anything sound interesting!
