"Holy..."
In the time it took T-Bone to say that one word, the SwatKats' training kicked in. Razor shot his grappling hook towards the roof of the Annex, and T-Bone encircled his arms around Razor. The hook caught and held, and the two described an arc down towards the annex, crashing into a second story window. As one, they flew across a desk, scattering papers, pens and coffee mugs across the office. Razor ended up lying face down on the desk, with T-Bone face-up on the floor.
"Nice save!" T-Bone said.
Razor sat up, and drew his hand across his cheek. A small piece of glass had gotten stuck there, and he yanked it out. "No more seconds on dessert for you." He jumped to his feet and checked out his body and equipment for damage, and luckily found none.
"So," said T-Bone, who was doing the same, "let's get over to the TurboKat."
Razor put his hand to his chin. "Why don't you go on without me? As long as we've taken this detour, I'm thinking I might as well use it."
"How?"
"Did you notice the force field drop when thosethings came out?"
"N-no..."
"I'm pretty sure they did - and I'm thinking if I can approach from the far side of the building, I might be able to slip in next time they drop it down."
"All right - watch your tail."
"You're one to talk," Razor shot back as he ran down the hall.
T-Bone shook his head and ran down the stairs.
"This is an unexpected stroke of good fortune," said the kat in the black robe. "I was not prepared to have the SwatKats so easily taken care of."
"Jusst as well," hissed Dr Viper, "we may as well be prepared for any contengency. Lower the forcce field."
"What for?" demanded Dark Kat, looking up from the machinery he was working on.
"Perhapss it would be prudent to get a hosstage or two - to buy uss some extra time."
"An admirable idea. See that you are not caught." The kat in the black robe flipped a switch, and Dr Viper hopped out and scuttled down the nearby stairwell.
Razor had sunk two metal hooks into the wall near the sixth floor. While making the climb, he had noticed the force field, which extended slightly out past the edge of the building, go off then come back on. He cursed to himself - if he'd only been a bit quicker, he might've been able to slip in. Well, it was bound to go off again soon. He sighed and tensed himself, waiting.
T-Bone slowly maneuvered the TurboKat to the southern part of the building. Several Enforcers had come up to the roof from the building, and now were tangling it up with the creatures, if one can indeed tangle with raspberry gelatin.
"Lead 'em over this way, fellas," said T-Bone, indicating the southwestern corner of the building. A few Enforcers dodged around the ventilators and such to get to the indicated corner of the building, while the other scattered to other areas. Once they were in position, the Enforcers at the southwest corner dropped to their knees and started plugging the creatures full of bullets. It didn't seem to slow them any, but they did turn around and start lumbering towards them.
"Get clear!" yelled T-Bone, and the Enforcers got up and scurried north. T-Bone lowered the TurboKat and fired the afterburners. T-Bone saw the triumphant looks on the Enforcers' faces, which made him grin himself. Apparently the creatures were melting down as planned.
Bit by bit, T-Bone saw the looks of jubilation turn into looks of disgust. He pulled up and spun around to take a look. The creatures were now basically non-moving blobs on the southwest corner of the building, with smoke or steam coming from them. Nothing that would turn the stomach of an Enforcer, he thought. He set the TurboKat down just north of there, and opened the cockpit, at which point in time he suddenly realized what was causing those looks - the smell. T-Bone lay across the instrument panel trying to calm his stomach down. Buck up, he thought. A SwatKat doesn't lose his lunch inside his plane.
"Not only do the SwatKats survive, but they have taken out our first line of defense," noted the kat in the black robe, in his matter-of-fact voice.
"Perhaps I should send out the rest of the Creeplings," said Dark Kat.
"Most likely a wise move." He reached over and pulled the lever that took down the force field.
His hand had hardly left the control panel when Razor leapt up onto the roof. He ignored everything else and immediately began shooting the gadgets and machinery that were hooked up to the craft, as well as the lower half of the craft itself.
"Meddler!" cried Dark Kat, and jumped ahead. He grabbed Razor by the helmet and tossed him backwards against a ventilator eight meters away,
where he lay momentarily stunned. Turning back to the equipment, Dark Kat bellowed, "It's ruined!"
"As is our craft, I'm afraid," said the other. "I believe the time has come to make our last stand."
"Hey, this area's restricted," said the Enforcer, holding up her hand.
Marc had an answer ready. "I'm here to drop off the SwatKat's cycle," he said, honestly enough. Well, he wasn't sure he was going to return it exactly, but he had returned with it. Whatever the finer points, they didn't matter, as the Enforcer let him through.
Marc pulled into the alley that ran along the back of the City Hall annex. He parked under the fire escape, looked up and sighed. He had hoped had finished all his climbing for the day. I guess not, he thought.
Dark Kat rummaged around the wreckage of the craft, and emerged with a large gun. "The Enforcers are easy prey," he stated. "So first, I'll take out the SwatKats." He swung it around and faced where he had thrown Razor, who was sitting up trying to clear his head. Razor opened his eyes wide, and leapt to the right, narrowly getting out of the way of the approaching shell.
Enforcers, under Commander Feral, had swarmed to the top of the building immediately east of the Annex, and now they took their places along the edge. They launched a barrage of gunfire towards DarkKat, as the kat in the black cloak ducked under what was left of their craft. The bullets apparently weren't doing Dark Kat any serious harm, but he most certainly was feeling them, as he ducked around and spun around to face them.
"So, you wish to be first, after all!" he gloated, and raised the gun to his head.
"Fall back!" bellowed Feral, as a shell was launched in their direction. The shell knocked off a chunk of the building, but the Enforcers managed to escape unscathed.
T-Bone and Razor took advantage of this exchange to meet up behind the elevator shaft. "How you doing?" asked T-Bone.
"Between Dark Kat's toss and that smell, not so good," admitted Razor. "The sooner we wrap this up, the better."
"You thinkin' the nets?"
"We've caught him in them before, but the creeplings cut him free. If we can both him with the nets at the same time, that might keep him tied up long enough to take care of the creeplings, too."
"Yeah, and then...you didn't see Viper, did ya?" Razor shook his head. "Well, we took care of his creatures. We should be able to tackle him now...wherever he got to."
As T-Bone peeked around the corner, Razor got on his radio. "Razor to Feral."
"Commander Feral here," boomed back.
"Listen, can you give us another round of ammo from up there? We need a diversion."
"I'll do what I can," Feral said, and cut the connection.
"Thanks, Feral," said Razor sarcastically. "Ready?" he asked T-Bone, who nodded. "OK - hand count from four, shoot on zero. Wave if you don't have a clear shot. Got it?"
"Got it." T-Bone scurried across the roof towards the southeast corner, picking off two of the few remaining creeplings with his wristgun. He then dove behind a ventilator, narrowly missing getting hit by another shell fired by Dark Kat.
A flurry of gunfire caught Razor's attention. The Enforcers were standing near the crumbling edge of the building's roof once more, giving Dark Kat everything they had. Once more, the bullets seemed to cause minimal damage to him, but it did infuriate him enough to spin around and take another shot at the Enforcers.
Razor steadied himself on his left knee, and stuck his left arm behind him with all four fingers out. He stole a glance at T-Bone, who had all his concentration on aiming in on Dark Kat. Smiling, Razor did the same. He then bounced his arm up and down, with each bounce pulling in a finger.
T-Bone saw Razor's countdown out of the corner of his eye. On the fifth movement, he shot his net. His got there a hair before Razor's, and the two of them effectively enveloped him and knocked him to the ground.
"All right!" yelled Razor and T-Bone together, and they bounded forward, shooting the two or three creeplings left who tried to come to Dark Kat's aid. Once at his side, they shared a high-five, then turned to the kat in the black robe, who still sat nonchalantly under his craft.
"Next..." began T-Bone.
"Next, you will sstep away from them!" screamed Dr Viper. Turning around, they could make him out on the other side of the building. He was waving a gun at somebody that he had in his other arm.
"Miss Briggs," whispered T-Bone.