Chapter 10: Battle of the Toons Part 1

The first thing I could feel as I came to was the intense throbbing pain in my skull. The second thing I could feel was someone rubbing my face. I slowly opened my eyes and discovered that the person rubbing my face was none other than Yakko Warner. My head was in his lap. The hand that wasn't rubbing my face was holding a tissue to my nose, which, I realized, was bleeding. I felt something cold over my eye and realized it was an ice pack. I slipped a hand under it and hissed in pain as my hand brushed against my swollen black eye. My skull felt ready to explode. Luckily, he had the good sense to have the ACME BARF BUCKET handy.
"What… what happened, exactly, Yakko?" I asked groggily after finishing my barf bucket business. He attempted a smile.
"After you literally saved my life, that idiot Cassie smashed you against a wall. We all thought you were dead…" he broke off and swallowed hard, and in that instant, I saw something in Yakko's eyes that I never thought I'd see in a Warner, or a toon for that matter.

Hate.

Hate, in the eyes of loquacious, wisecracking Yakko Warner.

I did not like it one bit, and I wanted to put a stop to it. So I did the one thing I knew would work.
I lifted my head and pecked him, right on the nose. The effect was instantaneous. He let out a whoop and started turning backflips. I grinned. When he was done, he helped me up and we made our way back to the battle. Cassie smiled evilly. "Back already, Leela?" she lifted her arm and got ready to attempt some other black magic. But suddenly, she howled in pain.
Pinky had snuck behind her and sank his sharp little teeth into her ankle. "Leave my friends alone!" he cried. Meanwhile, Brain had shot some sort of ray gun at her, and she was being electrocuted. When she had recovered, her stare could have melted metal. "So you wanna play it that way, huh?" she growled. She lifted the albino mice high into the air with her telekinetic powers, then flung then away with the force of a cannon.
"PINKY! BRAIN! NOOOOOOO!" I screamed. I might not know too much about Cassie's powers, but I knew this much. Mice hurled through the air + stone walls/floors = NOT GOOD.
I ran toward them, my friends right behind me. My blood froze. Brain was stirring, he seemed dazed but otherwise unhurt. Pinky, on the other hand, was a whole different story.
He wasn't moving, his leg was mangled and bloody, and worst of all, I couldn't tell if he was breathing. All I could think was no.
No, no, no, no, no.
I knelt down by the two mice. Brain was already by Pinky, and his face mirrored my thoughts. "Pinky," I said, swallowing the lump in my throat. "Pinky, it's us. Are you alright?" Brain looked at me in disbelief.
"Alright?!"
"Well, I meant besides his leg, obviously!" I snapped.
I couldn't help it, I was just so worried and stressed. I gently touched Pinky's leg to try and assess the damage, and he let out a loud squeal.
"He's alive!" I cried.
Pinky slowly opened his eyes and let out a whimper.
I gently lifted him up into my hand.
"Ok, Pinky, your leg is broken, so I'm going to try to fix it, ok?"
"Ok," he whispered.
I reached into my hammerspace and took out a toothpick and some string. I snapped the toothpick in half, then put the two pieces on the top and bottom of the quivering mouse's leg. Then I secured it with some string, which made him squeal again. The whole time, I was whispering, "sorry, sorry, sorry…"
Finally the job was done. I popped the little guy into my pocket. "Just try and get some rest, ok Pinky?" he nodded. We all started back to Cassie, eager to restart the battle and get some revenge.
Suddenly, there was a giant CRASH. Bubba yelped.
We turned, only to see that the small tunnel had gotten much bigger, due to numerous toons busting through. It was the entire cast of Animaniacs!
Katie Ka-Boom, Rita and Runt, and the Goodfeathers all hurried over to us.
"Leela? Are you ok? What's going on?!" asked Katie anxiously, giving me a hug.
"Who beat you guys up? Lemme at 'im! Lemme at 'im!'' yelled Pesto.
"There's a bad guy around here. Definitely a bad guy!" added Runt.
"What are you guys doing here?" asked Francesca.
"Did that booming voice happen to you guys?" asked Katie. We nodded. "It happened to everyone in Burbank actually!" Katie told us.
"Are you gonna tell us what's goin' on?!" snapped Pesto.
"You see that thing that looks like all of us smashed together? That, my friends, is Ella Stellar." I said.
They all let out identical gasps.
"And that's only the tip of the iceberg," I continued. "She tried to choke Yakko!"
I had never seen so many angry-looking toons all in one place.
"But Leela saved me!" gasped Yakko.
"Then Cassie threw Leela 10 feet away into a stone wall!" wailed Skippy.
"And knocked her out!" added Dot.
"Then when I got back to the battle, Pinky and The Brain attacked her, and then she threw them into a stone wall, and broke Pinky's leg!" I yelped, indicating the semiconscious mouse in my pocket.
"WHAT!?" Katie shrieked, her eyes glowing bright white. "WHAT!?" she repeated, her voice deepening. She got bigger and bigger, evolving into a huge monster. With a roar, she started towards Cassie, whom, I was pleased to see, appeared to have second thoughts about threatening us again.
"THAT'S IT!" roared Pesto, tearing a beeline straight towards Cassie's head, the other Goodfeathers right behind him. Rita let out a yowl, her fur standing straight on end, and went straight for Cassie's leg. Runt, likewise, let out a growl I didn't know he was capable of and tore after his feline companion.
"Buh-KA!" Chicken Boo appeared in front of us.
"Boo, thank goodness you're here!" I cried and repeated our story. I had never seen an angry-looking chicken before, but Boo managed it. He ran towards Cassie, flapping his wings and yelling what I can only imagine were chicken swear words.
Just then, Skippy cried out, "Aunt Slappy!"
Slappy, who was launching a bomb out of a cannon, turned.
"Skippy! That's my boy! Always running to face the villains!"
We all ran to Cassie, who was swiping at the toons, trying to swat them away. However, the toons had great dodging skills. We all joined in, taking mallets and anvils out of our hammerspaces, when disaster struck. Cassie reached down and managed to grab both Skippy and Francesca. She cackled.
"If anyone touches me, you can be sure that you will never see either of your little friends again! MUAHAHAHAHA!"
Bubba was barking and snarling his head off, but even he knew to keep still.
Suddenly I had an idea. It would be risky, but I needed to try it.

Oh man... now what are we going to do? On the plus side, Yakko's ok! Well, Yakko spelled backwards is Okkay!