Zero- I don't own the PowerPuff Girls or RowdyRuff Boys.
Sick as a Ruff
"Man am I bored." Brick said.
The red RowdyRuff was sitting on a broken wall kicking at the dust bellow his feet making a small trench. Now ten years old he looks just like he did when he was five, just bigger and with short hair again. Sitting next to him was Boomer who was playing with a Yo-Yo, failing miserably to make it sleep.
"Stupid thing sleep already!" Boomer threw down with all his strength and the Yo-Yo string snapped sending the toy through the earth to come out some where near China. "Darn it!"
"You have got to be the stupidest kid on the planet." Butch said as he started to laugh at Boomer. "I mean if we got the stupidest person on earth and put him next to you he would be like "Dude you're so stupid." And that makes you the stupidest on the planet." Butch tried to laugh again but instead went into a fit of sharp coughs. They were so strong he felt like his throat might rip apart and his lungs explode. When he managed to get control of himself again his chest felt like it was on fire and his mouth was filled with phlegm
"Dude you have been coughing all day, just quit it all ready!" Brick shouted when Butch stopped hacking like a fifty year smoker.
"If I could I would dude but I think I might be sick or something." Butch was telling the truth, his stomach was turning over on him but that was the very least of his troubles. His head felt like a knife burning with the fire of a thousand evils was driven in there, he felt hot and dizzy and then there was the problem with his chest. The coughing was bad but he was finding it hard to breathe, and there was the pain in his left side. If Butch had known anything about anatomy he would have known the sharp pain in his chest was where his heart was.
"Awe is poor little Butchie feeling sicky-wickey?" Brick said causing Boomer to fall of the wall and roll round holding his stomach as he laughed his head off.
"Knock it off or I will knock you off!" Butch said followed by a series of light coughs into his hand.
"Yeah whatever, like you could lay a finger on me." Brick said. "But back to the topic at hand, I am bored!"
"We could go beat the PowerPuff Girls up." Boomer suggested as he struggled back to his feet still giggling.
"Dude that is the lamest thing you have said all day I mean it was lamer then lame." Butch said.
"Seriously dude if you can keep to our level of intelligence don't open you mouth." Brick said.
"Well what should we do?" Boomer asked Brick.
"I know, we can go beat up the PowerPuff Girls!" Brick said snapping his fingers as the idea seemed to come out of nowhere.
"That's what I said!" Boomer shouted at Brick.
"Look I am the leader and as such come up with the plans, so shut up." Boomer was forced to shut up to Brick's fool proof logic, the argument well and truly won by him.
There was a large explosion as the boys made the presence known to the city once more. A few quick optic blasts and there was enough fire and smoke to let the whole city know that the RowdyRuff boys were making trouble once again. Then they only had to wait for the inevitable arrival of the PowerPuff Girls and then they could get to the real fun. The boys, over the years, had become less of a problem for the girls and the city as a whole. They still caused trouble but they seemed to have lost their desire to destroy everything in sight no mater what. The only thing that they really kept was the deep yearning to kill the PowerPuff Girls, as revenge for their own deaths.
"These chumps don't stand a chance against us." Brick said as he watched the people flee for their lives. "I wonder if I have time to play a few games before the Powder-puff losers show up… heh powder-puff losers you are just too damn funny Brick." Brick touched down on the ground and walked through the smoke in the direction of the arcade.
"Hey they got "Mega death killers 2" here Brick!" It seemed Boomer and Butch had reached the arcade before Brick had even thought about it. Boomer was at a machine playing some kind of first person shooter while Butch was playing what looked like a generic beat'um-up game. Brick noticed that Butch was still coughing even while he was playing the game, and was even starting to sweat. What he could not know was that his brother was running a fever of over 105 and was getting worse.
"Just don't get too wrapped up, the PowerPuff's will be here soon and then the real fun can start!" Brick said even while he found himself been pulled to the latest light gun game.
"We are all ready here!" Blossom shouted through the smoke.
"And we are going to kick your butts!" Buttercup said as the smoke started to clear showing the three girls standing there ready to fight.
"You won't get away from us this time." Bubbles said thinking of the last time they had ran into the RowdyRuff boys. The PowerPuff's had gotten the boys on the ropes but at the last moment they had escaped by using a passing train.
"Aww come on I was just about to get the high score." Boomer whined as the stopped playing his video game.
"Stop whining ya baby." Butch said still coughing every few seconds. He was feeling worse then ever but would not let anyone know, he was not going to be beaten by a stomach bug… even if it made him feel so bad. The worst thing was the pain in his heart, it was getting worse every moment that past by him and making him feel weak.
"Girls take on your counterpart and make sure they don't escape this time!" Blossom ordered before making a flying tackle at Brick who could do little to block it. Bubbles tried to attack Boomer with a quick punch to the head but the blue Rowdy jumped into the air and crashed out of the arcade roof.
"Guess that just leaves you and me girly." Butch said feeling his legs trembling with each step he took forward. "I am going to rearrange that pretty face of yours and then…" Butch stopped as he doubled over with a coughing fit, this one worse then any he had ever had in his life. When it stopped he felt like all his energy had been drained out of him, his heart was on fire and so was his head. A thick coating of sweat covered all of his skin and he was struggling to get enough air to breathe with, taking big gasps of it like a man who was drowning.
"Are you ok?" Buttercup asked when she saw how bad Butch was looking, his skin was so pale and he was clutching onto his chest right above his heart.
"Never better, so just get ready to have you butt handed to you." Butch tried to take another step but stumbled and went to his knees instead. His vision was doubling now and he felt like his brain was swimming in a pool of water.
"You don't look so hot." Buttercup said with some genuine concern, Butch looked like he was dieing right in front of her.
"I told you i...i…i..." Butch's eyes rolled back in his head and he fell to floor still clutching his chest. High above him Boomer was doing his best to fight Bubbles, but still in the arcade Brick was pushing Blossom back. It was while he was kicking Blossom that Brick saw that Butch was down and hardly breathing.
"Butch!" Brick abandoned Blossom without a second thought, going to where his brother lay. "What did you do to him?" Brick shot his eyes as Buttercup who had not moved since the fight started.
"Me... i… he… I never touched him, he just fell down." Buttercup could not understand what was going on, she had come expecting a good fight and instead she thought Butch had just died at her feet for no reason.
"Boomer get your butt here now!" Brick shouted and with in half a second Boomer was standing next to him, all to glad to get away from Bubbles. When he did arrive though he found himself wishing he was still up there fighting with Bubbles.
"What happened to Butch, is he all right?" Boomer asked as Brick checked Butch's vitals.
"He's alive but something is really wrong with him, we got to get him to a doctor or something." Brick slung Butch over his shoulder in a fireman's carry before he looked at the three PowerPuff Girls. "This fight 'aint over and if you try to stop us saving Butch then I will destroy all three of you."
"We won't stop you Brick, go save your brother." Blossom said as she stood out of the way. Brick was shocked, would he have let the girls go in the situation was reversed? No probably not, he would kill them all by fair means or by foul… even if he would prefer to win a fair fight.
"I am coming so you may cease the knocking on my door, desist in hitting your hand on the entrance way to my home as I, Mojo Jojo, am heading to said door to open it. This better not be another salesman." Mojo said as he undid the vast array of locks that held his door in place. When he did open the door he was surprised to see the RowdyRuff boys standing outside, well two where standing one was been held up by the other two.
"Boys what's going on here?" Mojo hardly saw the boys now, they seemed to like living on their own and he respected their wishes… as long as it suited him and his goals.
"Butch is sick and you're going to cure him." Brick said as he pushed past Mojo and went deeper into his lair. "That or I kill you monkey." Brick added without even looking back at Mojo who had turned as pale as Butch was.
"I will do my best, but you must know that I can not guarantee that I can cure him, he looks very sick." Mojo said.
"For your own health Butch's better get a whole lot better." Boomer said. "Now where can we put him?"
"Hey Brick why in the hell are we at Mojo's?" Butch had gained conciseness once more, but he still felt too weak to move and the pain in his chest seemed to have gotten worse.
"You're sick dude, I brought you here so the monkey can patch you up and we can go back to kicking the PowerPuff Girls butt." Brick had been pacing back and forth while Mojo was working on Butch's readings. Boomer was somewhere else and right then Brick did not care too much about what he was doing. This was the first time in hours that Butch had woken up and Brick was taking it as a sign that he must be getting better.
"Don't tell me we lost to the sissies because I have a damn cold…" Butch's head went limp again as he slipped back into his coma.
"Dude wake up!" Brick tried shaking Butch but he might as well have been trying to wake up a rock.
"The results are here." Mojo said. The maniacal monkey had been working with the best of his equipment trying to find out what was causing Butch to be so sick. His first thought had been that it might be the Amoeba boy's sickness but the traits were different and it was not spreading anywhere near as fast. Since then he had come up with very few workable theories, all his hopes were with the results of his tests. If they could not tell him what was wrong with Butch he could kiss is ass goodbye.
"Spit it out dorko." Brick stopped shaking Butch and went over to see what Mojo had come up with in the last few hours.
"The computer says No… what that can not be right?" Mojo flicked over the page and scratched his head. "Oh sorry wrong page. Let's see what we have here. Oh-oh."
"Oh-oh what?" Brick said as Mojo's eyes flashed with panic as he glanced over the results the computer had given him.
"Now I want you to know that if I could help you I would, I am very attached to my hide." Mojo started backing away from Brick who was floating ominously closer to him.
"This better not be going where I think this is going or else I would be forced to beat the crap out of you." Brick was now face to face with Mojo, trying his best not to be sick off the smell of banana breath.
"I have no idea what is wrong with your brother, I just don't know enough about beings such as your selves. Damn it I am an engineer not a doctor Brick! You need someone who is an expert with working on super powered beings such as your self."
"That's to bad Mojerk, looks like I got to hit you until candy comes out!" Brick balled up a fist ready to flatten Mojo, but the evil genius came up with a fool proof escape plan just in the nick of time.
"Is that Elvis?" Mojo shouted as he pointed to the empty space behind Brick, the result was nothing short of perfect.
"Where?" Brick said as he turned around giving Mojo Jojo plenty of time to scurry away to safety. "I want to pound that fat idiots face in for getting "Jailhouse rock" stuck in my head for a week… oh great now it's back in there." Brick looked back to see that Mojo had escaped while he was searching for the king of rock and roll.
"Man Mojo has a crummy house." Boomer walked through the sliding doors after searching round for anything fun to do. He had caused some minor explosions and pushed every button that was on display but now was starting to feel bored, there weren't even any video games to play here.
"Boomer did you see that Monkey run past you?" Brick asked.
"Err no dude, why?"
"Man now I have to find him to beat the snot out of him." Brick clicked in his fingers. "He failed, he 'aint got a clue as to what is making Butch sick or how to make him better."
"That's so weak…" Boomer coughed into his hand so lightly Brick missed it entirely. "… I thought he was supposed to be some really smart guy and stuff."
"Yeah well he said he's better with robots and junk then with living things and…" Brick stopped as he noticed that Boomer was coughing again. Boomer was trying his best to hold in the coughs and all he was managing to do was make them smaller and quieter, but it was getting harder and harder to do even that.
"What's that matter Brick?" Boomer asked as he steeled himself against anymore coughs.
"How long have you been coughing?" Brick asked knowing Boomer would not lie to him, not with something so serious.
"Since this morning, it was not so bad earlier but I was coughing my guts out back in Mojo's lab." Boomer said. Now he confessed he could no longer hold back and a large hacking cough came out of him, covering his open hand in phlegm and snot. He was starting to feel the pain in his chest but so far he was sure he had no fever and was feeling pretty healthy apart from the coughing.
"Butch started coughing yesterday and now he can't even stay awake for a few minutes." Brick half said to Boomer and half to himself, speaking his thoughts out loud as if that might help him think through this.
"You don't think I have what he has?" Boomer was suddenly very scared; the thought that he might have the same thing Butch had never even crossed his mind. When he was coughing his lungs out the thought had been lurking deep in the back of his mind but he never let it actually form and take him. It was so easy to deny the truth when he felt fine, but Butch had been feeling fine right up to a few hours earlier.
"If you got it then that means I must have it." Brick said. "It looks like we have no choice, if we are going to live through this we are going to have to do the hardest thing in the world."
"Convince America to take up the metric system?" Boomer suggested.
"No harder then that."
"Create a deep and meaningful reality TV show which enriches and betters the lives of those who watch while keeping original and not resorting to humiliation?"
"Jeez not that hard Boomer." Brick said as he slung Butch over his shoulder. "Just follow me dumdum."
"What do you think was wrong with Butch?" Bubbles asked for about the millionth time that day, and still had yet to get any real answer.
"Bubbles for the millionth-billionth time I don't care what happened to that jerk!" Buttercup was nearly at the point of pulling out her own hair in frustration.
"Don't tell me you aren't the least bit interested in what was wrong with Butch." Bubbles said.
"We have been over this before, I am not in the little bit interested with anything to do with that stupid boy." Buttercup said. "I never have and I never will care about anything to do with Butch. This is not one of those stupid fan-fictions where we get together with those disgusting boys."
"But I think those fan stories are cute!" Bubbles said.
"You would think that, you head is full of cute pink fluffy things so I guess you can't stay connected to a little thing I like to call reality." Buttercup said. "We are in reality where we are mortal enemies with the RowdyRuff Boys, we are in reality where those three are insensitive jerks, and we are in reality where they are the three dumbest kids on planet earth. There is no way that we are going to ever, ever end up with those three boys."
"But in your diary you said you thought the green Ruff was kind of cute." Bubbles then slapped both of her hands over her mouth as she realised what she had just said. At that moment Bubbles knew just how the short English man felt when he said to the worlds strongest Scotsman "Hey nice dress."
"You read my diary?" Buttercup got off the couch and started to walk ever closer to Bubbles.
"Well you left it lying around… in that safe… under the floor boards with ritualistic curses binding it shut… and I only read the pages with writing on them… eep!" Bubbles made the wise move and ran for her very life, moving at super sonic speed with her sister right behind her. What saved Bubbles from been mauled by Buttercup was the proximity alarm going off. The alarm was set to go off in only two situations, one if a door to door salesman was coming and two if one of the girl's enemies was close to the house.
"Girls to the lab!" Blossom's blur shouted as it went past Bubbles and Buttercup. Bubbles felt relief flow through her body as she realised she was safe, Buttercup could not chase her.
"Don't think this is over, as soon as I can I am going Mange on you ass." Buttercup said smiling like a shark. The relief Bubbles had felt left as quickly as it had come, she would need to think of a way out of this soon or hope the alarm kept going until Armageddon.
The lab, where professor Utonium does… well no one is really sure what he does but it usually ends up with some accidental invention. Right now the esteemed professor and his three daughters are looking at the security monitor awaiting to see who it is who set the alarms off. If it was one of the girls enemies the professor would push the button which activated the house defences and would blast them to Timbuktu, if it was a salesman then the professor would push the button that would blast them to… well you get the idea.
"Who do you think it could be?" Bubbles asked in a whisper.
"I don't know anyone stupid enough to come here after that last salesman came over trying to sell double glazing to us…. And Bubbles you don't have to whisper, this is a sound proof room." Blossom said.
"Oh sorry." Bubbles said in a normal tone of voice. "I wonder who it is?"
"Well if you can be patient for about twenty seconds you can see for yourself." Buttercup said. Exactly nineteen seconds later the whole Utonium family was shocked to see who it was that had tripped the proximity alarm. Standing outside the girls door was the RowdyRuff Boys, well two were stranding the other was been held up by the other two.
"I knew those guys were dumb but they must have known we would be ready for them since that whole Boomer incident five years ago." Blossom said when she saw the boys at the door.
"Who cares, waste them professor!" Buttercup said.
"No wait I don't think they're here to hurt us… Butch still looks really sick." Bubbles said.
Brick knocked on the door with his free hand, well he actual pounded against the door, if it had not been made of a super tough metal then there would be a rather large hole at the front of the PowerPuff Girls home. It was when he started to knock that the girls could see he had a large white flag tied to his wrist.
"This has got to be a trick of some sort, push the button professor and get rid of them while we can."
"This doesn't look like a trick to me, Butch seems to be really ill and I don't think Brick would ever even pretend to surrender. It's not in his character." Blossom said.
"I think Brick is saying something, is there any way we could hear him?" Bubbles asked when she noticed that Bricks mouth was moving. The Professor pushed a few buttons and then a microphone outside the house turned on letting them hear what Brick was saying.
"…the door you stinking girls right this second or I will break it down! Don't pretend you're not in. Look we come in peace… man does that sound weak… we don't want to fight you, Butch is real sick and Boomer's getting bad himself." Brick stopped and coughed a few times. "I think I'm starting to get it to. We have no one else to turn to, please open the door and let us in." Brick waits for a moment longer but gets no response. "Look I know you don't like me and you have every reason not to trust me but if you don't help us no one else will. If you do you can name your price, anything you want… we will give up our powers, stop trying to kill you hell we will become goodie goodies if you can help us."
"Brick no we cant do that…" Boomer's voice had gotten weaker in the short time it had taken them to reach the girls house, the coughing had gotten steadily worse for him and was starting to strain his throat.
"Boomer I am the leader so you will do what I say." Brick said. "If I have to give up everything to make sure you two knuckle heads stay alive then that's what I will do, after all if you both die who will I boss about? And don't forget it's in my best interest to get a cure pronto."
"For a moment there I thought you were going soft on me dude." Boomer said with a forced weak smile across his face, he could see how much it was taking Brick just to be standing here. Boomer had also seen Bricks face when he tied a white flag to his wrist, the expression of sheer disgust and loathing but he did it any way.
The door slowly opened and standing there were the PowerPuff Girls looking so tense that if either Boomer or Brick so much as coughed a fight might have broken out. Luckily the boys managed to hold back until they had been invited into the house.
"Your conditions are accepted, you have to promise never to use your powers for evil again and we will do everything we can to help you." Blossom spoke in a diplomats voice which set Brick's teeth on edge, the sheer prissiness of it would have been enough to make him sick in normal times… but this was as far from normal as it could be.
"Very well, my brothers and me promise never to use our powers for evil ever again." Brick said. "Now can we come in?"
"That's it; you just say you won't ever use them… I bet you will break that promise the second you and your brothers are better." Buttercup said. She was not sure how she had been convinced to even hear these boys out; they were liars through and through. Buttercup regretted not taking the chance to vaporise the three of them, one button push was all it would take and then they would be gone forever.
"Hey we maybe a lot of things but one thing we always do is keep our promises, can you say the same?" Brick glared at Buttercup, not even seeing the others anymore. It was all he could do to stop himself from rushing at that smug face and hitting it until there was nothing left but a red pulp.
"Buttercup enough" Blossom seemed to hold as much control over her sisters as Brick held over his brothers, the second Blossom had spoken Buttercup took a step back and the tension in the air lifted a little. "Come in Brick." No one had ever thought they would hear Blossom acting so civilised to a RowdyRuff Boy, least of all Brick. For a moment all he could do was stand there while his brain tried to get to grips with what was going on.
"Hey we going to just stand here all day or what?" Boomer asked.
"No dude, lets go in."
"So the symptoms start with a mild cough and escalate to this level with in a day?" Professor Utonium was looking into Butch's eyes with a penlight and noticing they hardly reacted to the light, a very bad sign.
"Symptoms?" Boomer asked, his voice now sounding closer to Bricks then his usual smooth voice. He looked to Brick for answers and all he got was a shrug, Brick had no idea what the word meant either.
"Umm… the effects of the sickness you have." Professor Utonium said offhanded as he was paying very little attention to the other two Ruffs'. "Well it does not seem to be too good, all three of you have this sickness and it seems Butch is having no luck at beating it himself."
"Mojo couldn't even tell us that much…" Brick stopped for a moment and turned to Blossom, who was keeping guard on him. "…Would beating the stuffing out of Mojo be classed as using our powers for evil?"
"Why would you want to do that?" Bubbles asked, she was standing over Boomer not the least bit worried that he might try anything.
"That's between me and the monkey." Brick said.
"Beating up anyone for no reason is wrong, so no." Blossom said.
"Ah shoot." Brick said. "Mojo is one lucky monkey; I was going to make it so he would be eating his bananas with a straw." Brick sounded incredibly disappointed, and he was.
"Well I think I might be able to give you a few answers that Mojo could not." Professor Utonium said. "The first been what is causing your problems in the first place. You three have a virus which appears to be attacking your respiratory system with brutal effectiveness. As best as I can tell this was a normal stomach bug that Butch must have caught a few days ago."
"Whoa hold up." Brick said. "You're telling me that Butch is dieing for some crappy twenty-four hour stomach bug! That is so weak."
"No Brick it is no normal stomach bug, not anymore anyhow." Professor Utonium picked up a clipboard and started to flick through its pages. "If I remember correctly you boys were made slightly different to my girls. The biggest difference been the binding agent used for you. I used Chemical X for the PowerPuff Girls but Mojo was forced to use toxic waste on you three. According to these tests when Him brought you back he must have used the same formula…"
"No he didn't." Boomer was feeling terrible now, his fever was running rampant and the pain in his chest was so great he was sure he would drop dead from it any second now. "Him just used magic to bring us back, pulled us out of hell or wherever we were."
"Well whatever the method the results are the same, you boys have a large amount of toxic waste in your bodies and it's started to affect you badly. The virus was normal until it infected Butch; the toxic waste in his body mutated it into the virus that is now killing him."
"Professor is there any chance we might have caught it or anyone else the boys have had contact with?" Blossom asked.
"No, the virus has mutated to be very specific." The Professor showed them a picture of the virus magnified to fill up the whole page of paper. "This virus is perfect for getting past the RowdyRuff Boys immune system but would be instantly destroyed in anyone else body. There is no risk of an outbreak like in the Amoeba boy incident."
"Hey guys I don't want to sound like a sissy but I don't feel too good." Boomer said just before he fell back into the bed and into the same coma that Butch was in.
"Boomer!" Brick zipped off the bed he was on and was beside his brother before any of the girls could even think about acting. "Come on you are not giving up that easy, get up this second! That's an order Boomer." Brick shouted as he tried to rouse Boomer but all he got was a slight flicker of Boomer's eyelids and then nothing.
"Brick…" Blossom stopped there, what was there that she could say? What could make this all right, make the fact that both of Brick's brothers were dieing go away?
"Two down and one to go, the RowdyRuff Boys wiped out by a goddamn virus." Brick said. "If you are going to help us then you better hurry, 'coz I have a feeling that if you called for us tomorrow you would find us grave men."
