A/N: Reach for the skies as Tajeri Lynn the Extremo Luchadore enters the Imaginary Dome for installment 11 of "The Life Before the Party". There will most likely be only 4 more installments before it is finally over, maybe less. The sequel will cover additional characters not being covered by this mini-series, but a few of "TLBTP's" cast will return. It will also not be restricted to America alone.
"Jackie Chan Adventures" comes to you live at the Toonami Dome from Kids WB and is produced by Sony Television Entertainment. Even at 50+, Chan is still the man.
And now I will address a question asked by a fellow reviewer. The lionsault is a classic luchadore aerial move. When your opponent is down in the middle of the ring, you run toward the ropes, jump so your feet reach the second rope and acrobat backward so your body crashes down on your foe for the 1-2-3. It is named after the WWF wrestler who popularized the move, Chris Jericho, back then known as "The Lion Tamer", who worked in one of the most popular sites for Mexican wrestling, and my beloved home country, Japan.
And you thought all that Japan and Mexico had in common were wrapped foods.
Chapter XI: Vengeance
"Hey Kepler, we're back," said Jade as she, Tohru, Mama Tohru and Xu Lin reentered Jackie Chan's cramped apartment with bags of groceries. "Finally found those wrap-up burritos."
Kepler was placing the peripherals of his laptop inside the duffel bag, and was doing so with sweat pouring out of his capped head and hands thrusting every item in a lightning pace.
"Um, Kepler, you okay?"
"Perfectly, but not our acquaintances."
"You're not serious…"
"The X-3 Com Module synthesized correspondences from Chan's cell phone. The phone's still on, but it's being maintained at Mute 1."
"What is Mute 1?" asked Tohru as he began to gather all the grocery bags in his arms.
"It's a one-way signal devised in the harbingers of Section 13. To make the explanation turgid, information comes to me, but I can't send any information back."
"I do not get it," scrutinized Mama Tohru. "Jackie is a very wise boy. Why would he do that? That junk seller finally made him lose his mind?"
"No. Jackie has a rational explanation. There's a 75% probability that he applied the mute marker without us revealing his locale by making resounding…Uh oh."
"Now what? As if long checkout lines weren't so headachy!" Mama Tohru said in her scratch-the-air tone.
"The cell phone's current location is shifting 3500 feet every 60 seconds." Everyone stared at him incredulously. "The cargo freighter's accelerating at 40 miles an hour, and multiplying by the minute. It's…propelling!"
"Uncle Jackie's been kidnapped, and El Toro Fuerte too!" Jade clamored, her palms on both sides of her face.
"Please calm down, Jade," said Xu Lin, lowering her friend's arms. "As powerful as El Toro is, I know Jackie has the power to save the day."
"Affirmative, Xu Lin," added Kepler as he looked down at the laptop, showing a digital graph of the ship. "But the freighter is moving at expeditious speed. No ship of such magnitude could actually motion like that of an air-liner! Within 2400 hours, midnight to you, the freighter will have reached the vicinity of the South Pacific islands, maybe farther!"
"So? As long as Uncle Jackie's kept the cell phone, we'll know where he'll be."
"Do not count on that, Jade," said Tohru. "The cell phone still runs on Double A batteries, much as I run on grape soda." Having said that, Tohru gleefully dug into the bags for a bottle, before reverting to his humble self. "However, if it is permanently kept on, it will drain the batteries in one and a half hours. That is what I read in the Section 13 manual. Even with the satellite, we won't be able to trace the signal for much longer."
"You know what this means, Kepler?" Jade turned to the doctor with a mischievous smile.
"I am not an individual capable of telekinesis," Kepler registered nervously, "but I can fathom what lingers within your callow intellect."
Tohru's eyes widened in disapproval. "I dislike being the bringer of pessimism, Jade, but we still don't know where the ship is going. Even then, we'll have to reserve and wait to get on a plane; that could take us a day. And Section 13's transportations have been moved to Sacramento."
"What about…the Gear 13?" queried Xu Lin shyly.
"Huh?" said Jade, Tohru and his mother. Kepler only looked at the girl with bulged eyes.
"Um, Xu Lin, you didn't happen to read too many comic books in China, did you?" asked Jade in concern, as if her friend couldn't distinguish fantasy and reality.
"No, her allegation is legitimate," said Kepler urgently. "But…how could you shuffle upon this guarded puzzle?"
"It was simple," Xu Lin shrugged her shoulders. "When I entered Section 13, I noticed on the floor a symbol of a gear with the number 13. There was also an odd slit that was next to the symbol, and I peered into something really big."
Kepler sighed. "So much for the strategically-situated Chinese rug. Hopefully, that wasn't moved to Sacramento."
"Why would you say that? How can this Gear 13 help us?" asked Mama Tohru.
"Welllll.." Kepler began slowly as he tried to recollect his aforementioned creation, "it was built for the purpose of neutralizing the most profound of Californian emergencies. The government sanctioned 13 of these Gears and allocated them in all elite branches. At tops, a Gear can send anyone with speeds of 200 m.p.h. Captain Black had the 13th Gear reserved underground so that its usage would not be immediately accessible. Accessing the 10-level titanium steel layers is only immediately possible via a key, and that's where I will come in. Afterwards, however, I'll have to report to my superiors about my actions. Do you speculate the situation's a demanding emergency?"
"Yes, if you call it that way," added Jade.
"I don't know. Does Kenzo or Dr. Necrosis count as real emergencies?"
"Necrosis?! The evil doctor who tried to blow up the world with a Druid Stone?! He kidnapped Jackie and El Toro?! This is definitely a global emergency."
"Oh, I forgot he tried to disintegrate the globe. Okay, I'll access the local Gear," Kepler resolved as he put in the laptop into the duffel bag and went out of the apartment. Then, his ears caught the piercing noise of a low, vibrating scream, one that didn't sound human. The doctor turned up to the sky and went pale white.
"Jade, are-there-any-additional-individuals-residing-in-the-tenement?"
"Everyone finished breakfast. It's just us."
"Then evade!" Kepler negligently threw the laptop through the open door of the minivan, ran back and grabbed handlebars behind Tohru's wheelchair, pulling the confused big man out of the tenement. "Evade, evade!"
Jade noticed ten sparks up in the stratosphere. "KBRs!" she hastily whispered to herself. She took Xu Lin and Mama Tohru's shoulders as strongly as her lithe arms could and drove them out of the door into the minivan, which Kepler had aggressively boosted once behind the wheel.
Only seconds later, the soaring incendiaries ripped through the apartment, sending the building into a pile of gray dust and cracking glass. The Section 13 minivan by then was on its way to the 13th Gear. Everyone in the vehicle slid down on their seats, except Kepler, who had to return to grasping the wheel after his relaxation almost sent them face first into a tow truck.
"You are right, rock-star scientist", chided Mama Tohru, waving a pointed finger to stab on Kepler's pride. "You don't deserve a driver's license!"
"I do not understand this," said Xu Lin. "How could Kenzo attack us from the oceans?"
"The ship!" said Jade in realization. "It must have some kind of long-range cannon or something."
"To put it succinctly," Tohru said, "our lives are becoming comic books."
"This is too…cool!" beamed Jade, with a clenched fist up in the air.
"JADE!" everyone yelled in great abomination, even Kepler, who lost his focus again and steered ferociously to miss an incoming bus. The steering caused everyone to lean to the left and collapse their heads on one another.
"Oh! Kepler, please calm down," Tohru encouraged patiently, rubbing his enormous temple. "By now, they won't know where we are, or where we will be going."
"Utter what you will", Kepler replied, eyes still glaring at the front window, "but it's better that we proceed into the core of the 13th Gear promptly."
"We? WE?!" came out Mama Tohru in an outrageous outburst. "What do you mean 'We'?! I do not need to be inside the 13th Gear. I'd rather be in the roach motel than go wherever the fireworks are flying!"
"Mama Tohru is right, doctor," said Xu Lin worriedly. "It seems everytime people try to save a part of the world, the rest of it goes down in fire." She bowed her head down in solemn thought. "Besides, we are not warriors, like Jackie or El Toro are."
"Oh yes, we are, Xu Lin. We've dished out whatever they've thrown at us and we keep coming back," butted in Jade with her brand of spunk. "But it doesn't mean we have to destroy the rest of the world. We're going to use the 13th Gear for a quick search and rescue of our friends and Uncle Jackie. Right, Kepler?"
"Affirmative. Though I may inquire that in case the KBRs come within our radar, I'll have to dispatch the threats. Still, the armament of the Gear should sustain mass quantities of damage."
"Well," added in Xu Lin, her solemn lips moving upward into a smile, "I'll do my best to be part of the team."
"That's great Xu Lin," congratulated Jade.
"Hmmph! Rock star scientist, send me to 'Billy Goat's' Rare Finds now. At least he is harmless as pudding," Mama Tohru spoke, her arms crossed.
"Too late," Kepler said as he stopped the car next to the familiar phone booth. "I've got to progress to the Gear. Government agents should be on patrol, so they will consign you to a sheltered destination." He carried the black duffel bag and hoisted it over his shoulder. "To the additional individuals, do accompany me."
"I am not that old a woman! I need no government people," Mama Tohru sighed in resignation as she followed along Kepler, Jade, Tohru and Xu Lin into the phone booth.
Tohru was a massive hassle in the booth, especially when residing in a wheelchair. Everyone felt compacted under the giant sumo's 600 pounds, and winced at the unprecedented strain on their backs. It took a minute for Jade to shut the folded door into place.
Kepler groaned and pulled a phone card out of the duffel bag and slid it inside the proper slit.
The booth zoomed even further down below the designation of basement level.
When the elevator opened, everyone but Tohru spilled over the booth. "Hmm…I didn't know we had safety belts on the side," Tohru mused as he pulled some off the convenient slits.
"In case you didn't surmise it," Kepler rearranged his brown hair, "your magnitude left little expanse for us to employ them."
"I am sorry."
"No time for that, T-Man," Jade spoke alertly. "We've got to save our friends, and the world!"
The room there were in was jet black. Kepler flicked a switch and a single fluorescent radiated across the room, giving way to a marvelous 70-foot cube, with ladders and folded chairs left lying next to the cube. Sealing the 13th Cube was long, hard work, so it took resting on chairs and standing on ladders to get this task done.
"Just give me some time," Kepler urged, searching through the pockets of his ash-smeared lab coat. "I can not recall the proper locality of the key card."
A click was heard, and Kepler's heart raced as the barrel of a gun emerged from the shadows, directing at his burly face, and the minion holding the gun spoke.
"You don't have to find the key card….I'll do it for you."
To Be Continued….
A/N: Extremo Luchadore knows he is aggravating everyone with suspense. This is a rarity, however, for me to update two stories in the same week, so I suppose the fans are getting their money's worth.
Then again, Lil' Spleef is doing the same with her story. I suppose once she is done, everyone will be sighing in relief, only to realize my other story will continue to keep them hanging as well! Hee, hee, hee.
Shadowcell and NocturneD follow us as well when it comes to the infamous acronym "TBC".
That's okay, because the focus we put on our stories doesn't mean there's excessive crowding in the JCA section. Have you amigos looked at Digimon? There are so many stories that my brother, CrazedChakra, doesn't even have a single review! On the other hand, Tajeri Lynn feels grateful that he joined Fanfiction.Net while the JCA section was still in its youth. Who knows? I may be staying there even after the series is done. It helps me figure out what series I plan to make.
Adios, amigos!