Chapter 18: The Cavalry
Before Enigma could bring the plasma blade down on Excelsior, a pulsing sound came from behind the hero before an energy blast struck the villain in the chest, knocking him off his feet and sending him rolling across the ground. Blinking in surprise, Excelsior looked over his shoulder and found Megamind standing behind him, his ray gun pointed at the spot Enigma had just been occupying.
"Ollo," Megamind greeted as he lowered his arm and gave Excelsior a friendly smile, "Seems like you could use some help."
As Excelsior stared at Megamind in uncomprehending confusion, a guttural roar caught his attention. Looking over, Excelsior spotted Kid Incredible, currently in his red monster form, leaping through the air towards Yokai. The supervillain, for his part, had only enough time to look at Kid Incredible in shock before the hero slammed into him, knocking Yokai clear off his column of microbots, sending them both crashing to the ground.
"LEAVE VIOLET ALONE!" Kid screamed as he began to beat on Yokai. For a moment, Yokai could do nothing but try to shield himself from the blows with his arms. Then, with a grasping motion, Yokai managed to wrap a tendril of microbots around Kid's stomach before yanking the hero off. As Kid Incredible was pulled off though, he managed to get in a kick that struck Yokai on the chin and knocked his mask clear off his face. With his mask removed, Yokai's microbot swarm suddenly deactivated and collapsed to the ground, the tendril that had been holding Kid Incredible falling apart, what momentum that was generated from it pulling him off the villain sending him flying a short distance before he landed on the ground on all fours.
As the microbots deactivated and tumbled to the ground around her, Ultraviolet lowered her barrier dome and fell to her knees, taking deep, gasping breaths. Seeing this, Kid Incredible returned to his normal form before running over to Ultraviolet's side.
"Are you okay, Violet?" Kid Incredible asked as he looked at his sister with concern.
"Yeah, buddy, thanks," Violet replied breathlessly as she ruffled his hair and kissed his forehead affectionately before she looked at him in confusion, "But what are you doing here?"
"Mommy and Daddy got a call about bad guys," Kid explained with childish enthusiasm, "We came here in a superfast plane with our new friends!"
With a roar, Oni brought the concrete slab down on Kaiju, but was stopped as Mr. Incredible stepped between them and caught the villain's arms midswing. As Oni looked down at the hero in confusion, Mr. Incredible raised his head and smirked up at the villain.
"You're pretty big," Mr. Incredible observed as his smirk grew into a full-fledged grin, "But I've fought bigger."
With that, Mr. Incredible slammed one of his elbows into Oni's stomach, the force of the blow doubling the villain over as the air was forced out of his lungs. As Oni wheezed in pain, Mr. Incredible uppercut him hard on the chin, the force of the blow creating a small shockwave as the villain was forced back into a standing position and sent him stumbling backwards. In the process of reeling from the blow, Oni dropped the slab of concrete he had been carrying, which Mr. Incredible easily snagged out of the air with both hands. Pivoting in place, Mr. Incredible spun around before smacking Oni with the slab, sending the villain flying in a shower of concrete as the bludgeon shattered from the force of the blow. As Oni landed a short distance away, Mr. Incredible tossed what remained of the slab on the ground and turned his attention towards Kaiju, who was still laying on his back, having watched events unfold in shocked silence.
"You okay, kid?" Mr. Incredible asked as he offered Kaiju a hand.
"You're Mr. Incredible," Kaiju muttered dumbly.
"Sure am," Mr. Incredible said with a slightly exasperated tone, "Now, are you getting up or are you just going to lay there all night?"
Snapping back to his senses, Kaiju took the offered hand and let Mr. Incredible help him back to his feet.
With a grunt, El Macho pulled Laserblade down while putting out a knee to break the hero's back against. Before he could follow through on the blow, however, a large hand came reaching in, cupping Laserblade's back and cushioning him against the blow. As El Macho looked at the hand in surprise, the fingers wrapped around Laserblade before yanking him out of the villain's grasp. Following the hand, El Macho found Elastigirl standing near by, pulling Laserblade back to her and gently depositing the hero on the ground behind her.
"You okay, son?" Elastigirl questioned, doing her best to not take her eyes off El Macho.
"Gotta admit, he kicked my ass pretty hard," Laserblade admitted with a pain filled whisper.
"You just stay down then," Elastigirl said, clear concern in her voice, "We'll get you looked at."
"Careful," Laserblade said emphatically, "He hits like a truck."
"Oh, don't worry, sweetheart," Elastigirl replied with a confident smirk, "This isn't my first rodeo."
Turning her attention fully towards El Macho, Elastigirl found the villain stalking towards her.
"Elastigirl," El Macho greeted, an excited gleam in his eye.
"Hey, Macho, it's been a while, huh?" Elastigirl questioned as the villain continued stalking towards her, "You know I've always meant to ask but how sweaty do you get under that full mask of yours, because, let me tell you, just this little one causes me to-"
Elastigirl was cut off as El Macho threw a punch at her head, prompting her to juke to the side with surprising swiftness. Dodging his two follow up attacks, Elastigirl snapped her arm at El Macho and punched him in the face. Barely dazed by the blow, El Macho grabbed hold of Elastigirl's wrist and tried to yank her towards him, but only managed to stretch her rubbery arm more. Snapping her other arm like a whip, Elastigirl wrapped it around El Macho's leg before yanking it out from under him. Wrapping her other arm around one of El Macho's, Elastigirl lifted the villain off his feet, and whipped him around before tossing him away.
Rolling back to his feet, El Macho charged at Elastigirl, who rushed him head on. Reaching her, El Macho wrapped his arms around Elastigirl's stomach, but before he could do anything, she swung her legs around and wrapped them around the villain's neck. Slipping out of El Macho's grip, Elastigirl swung herself around the villain's neck with her legs before using the momentum to flip around and throw the man to the ground. As El Macho pushed himself up onto his hands and knees, Elastigirl stepped forward and backflipped while kicking the villain in the head, knocking him down.
Laying on the ground, Torque could do nothing but watch as Rollergrrl slid along the ground with her foot raised to strike the hero. Right before the impact though, there was a whooshing sounds before Rollergrrl was snatched away in a blur of motion. Blinking in surprise, Torque lifted herself up enough to watch as the blur spun around rapidly before Rollergrrl was ejected and thrown into the wall of the prison. Then, in the blink of an eye, Torque disappeared with another whoosh.
Blinking in confusion, Torque glanced around and found she was speeding through the courtyard. Looking up, Torque found the Dash holding her bridal style as he ran, the young man smirking down at her when he noticed her looking at him.
"Don't worry, babe," the Dash said as he winked at Torque, "I've got you."
Torque could only groan in response as Dash carried her over to where Laserblade was laying on the ground before zipping away again. As Dash put her down, Torque's eyes widened in shock as she saw Laserblade.
"Darron?" Torque whispered, grunting in pain as she pulled himself over to him, "Darron, are you okay?"
"I've been better," Laserblade replied before groaning in pain.
"It's okay," Torque said as she nervously touched Laserblade's chest, "Help is here."
Time seemed to slow down as Miss Chemistry watched Bomb Voyage's explosive tumbled through the air. Then, just before it reached her, a beam of icy blue light shot in from the side, striking the explosive and freezing it solid. Her eyes going wide in shock, Miss Chemistry watched as the explosive thudded to the ground in front of her. Looking shocked as well, Bomb Voyage's expression turned to one of rage as he watched Frozone approach on an ice slide.
"Frozone," Bomb Voyage spat as Frozone slid between him and Miss Chemistry.
"Bomb Voyage," Frozone replied, "Still throwing explosive devices at innocent people, I see. The more things change, the more they stay the same."
Snarling, Bomb Voyage grabbed a few devices off his bandolier and threw them at Frozone. Snapping a hand out, Frozone blasted the ground in front of him, rapidly forming an ice wall that the explosives detonated again. Creating an ice column beneath him, Frozone lifted himself over the wall before blasting Bomb Voyage in the chest, knocking the villain off his feet and sending him rolling across the ground.
As the Underminer's grip tightened on her throat, the Driver's struggles grew weaker and weaker as her chest burned from lack of oxygen. Suddenly, just as her vision was starting to darken, Driver saw a hand placed on the Underminer's gauntlet. Looking to the side, the Underminer and the Driver both found Ginormica standing next to them.
"How about you pick on someone your own size?" Ginormica questioned as she glared at the Underminer before squeezing, the gauntlet rupturing with a shower of sparks and broken metal as the villain let out a cry of alarm and dropped the Driver to the ground. Once the Driver was safely out of the Underminer's grasp, Ginormica's touched her watch, causing her to be surrounded by an aura of blue light before she grew to her full height, holding the villain's arm between her thumb and forefinger.
"Or, you know, not," Ginormica amended before tossing Underminer away with a flick of her wrist, sending the villain tumbling through the air before he crashed to the ground on the other side of the courtyard. Then, bending down, Ginormica scooped the drill tank up with one hand and tossed it in the same direction.
"And take your toy with you!" Ginormica called as the drill tank spun through the air, forcing the Underminer to scramble to safety as it slammed onto the ground behind him, coming to a stop on its side.
Balthazar Bratt, still standing on the Strange Visitor's throat, watched the display with an amazed expression.
"Yo, Freddie Mercury!" a voice called from behind Bratt. Turning towards it, Bratt was met by the sight of the Missing Link's scaled fist a moment before it slammed into his face with a meaty thwack, the force of the blow knocking the villain clear off his feet. As Bratt lay stunned on the ground, Link marched over and grabbed hold of the villain's leg.
"Hey, the eighties called, they want their….well geez, everything back," Link quipped before spinning around and tossing Bratt, sending the villain tumbling across the rocky ground with grunts of pain.
Kitsune wasn't sure where she was, but wherever it was, it was a nightmare. After Mezmerella had pushed her into the white, liquid remains of her microbots, it had seemingly become a bottomless sea of viscous liquid. Pumping her arms and legs, Kitsune tried to swim out of the stuff, but couldn't seem to make any headway, feeling her lungs ache and burn as the liquid began to seep into her nose and mouth while her ears were filled with the sound of Mezmerella's unearthly laughter.
Then, all of a sudden, the liquid shifted in color to a light shade of blue and Kitsune found herself staring into a large, monocular eye.
"Are you okay!?" a voice boomed and then suddenly, whatever spell Kitsune had been under broke and she found herself back in the prison courtyard, letting out a gasp as she released a breath she hadn't been aware she was holding. Looking around to regain her bearings, Kitsune found Mezmerella standing a short distance away, with B.O.B. having managed to wedge himself between them, his concerned gaze focused on the hero as she sank to her knees.
"Oh, there you are," B.O.B. said, a note of relief in his voice, "You guys were just like, staring at each other for like five minutes and I was starting to get worried."
"What are you doing!?" Mezmerella hissed angrily after shaking her head clear.
"Hey, I don't know about you but I think she needs to see a doctor or something," B.O.B. replied as he turned to face Mezmerella while gesturing back towards Kitsune with one of his pseudoarms, "I think-"
"Move!" Mezmerella shouted, the lenses of her mask glowing bright yellow as she glared at B.O.B., who let out a loud gasp, his jaw hanging slack as his eye went as wide as a dinner plate. B.O.B. held this position for a moment before he blinked and looked at Mezmerella in confusion.
"Is something supposed to be happening right now?" B.O.B. stage whispered as he glanced around.
"What!?" Mezmerella hissed in shock, taking a step away from B.O.B. as her lenses stopped glowing.
"I mean, you got all intense right there and then your eyes started glowing, so I kind of figured something was supposed to be happening," B.O.B. explained awkwardly, "But I-"
"B.O.B.!" Link shouted in aggravation from a short distance away, drawing the blob's attention as he gestured emphatically at Mezmerella, "Supervillain!"
"Oh!" B.O.B. exclaimed as he turned his attention back towards Mezmerella and seemed to see her for the first time, "Right! Sorry!"
Then, opening his jaw wide, B.O.B. wrapped his mouth around Mezmerella's entire upper body, the supervillain's screams muffled as she kicked her legs about to try and escape. Tilting his head back, B.O.B. lifted Mezmerella's feet off the ground before he spat her out with enough force to send the villain flying through the air.
As Big Guy continued to spasm beneath her, Phantasma placed a foot against the android's chest to keep him from moving around so much as she continued to drive her microbots into his dataports.
"You know," a small, high-pitched voice said suddenly, "I understand he's a robot, but don't you think this is needlessly harmful?"
Looking towards the source of the voice, Phantasma spotted a miniaturized Doctor Cockroach standing on her shoulder.
"Identify yourself," Phantasma demanded.
"I'm, uh, your conscious?" Doc provided hopefully.
Receiving only a blank stare in reply, Doc sighed.
"That would have worked better if I was part cricket, wouldn't it?" Doc questioned.
In response, Phantasma attempted to grab hold of Doc with her free hand, but the scientist hopped out of her grasp before touching the device on his wrist and shifting back to his normal size midair, allowing him to dropkick the villain in the chest and knock her off Big Guy, the android's spasms ceasing as soon as Phantasma's microbots were disconnected from him. Quickly rolling to her feet, Phantasma formed a lash with one of her hands and swung it at Doc, but the hero managed to avoid the attack by rapidly shifting his size, taking a moment to study the structure of the villain's arm as he dodged the blow.
"Fascinating, so you're made up of hundreds of individual machines?" Doc observed, ducking as he avoided another one of Phantasma's attacks, "I imagine they must be controlled by some kind of centralized intelligence. A hive mind of sorts, perhaps?"
As Doc hypothesized, Phantasma lashed at him with both tendrils, quickly wrapping them around the hero's body. In response, Doc simply tapped his watch again and shrunk down to miniature size, easily escaping Phantasma's grasp in the process.
"That being true," Doc continued, rubbing his chin ponderously as he returned to normal size, "Your network would most likely be disrupted by a strong enough electrical charge."
Fishing into the pockets of his lab coat, Doc quickly retrieved a few pieces of scrap metal and some electrical components.
"Good thing I disassembled the breakroom toaster before coming here," Doc said with a grin as he held the items up.
In response, Phantasma lashed at him again, but once more Doc dodged by hopping into the air and shrinking. Landing on Phantasma's extended lash, Doc ran down it as fast as his little legs could carry him, working with the components as he ran. Spotting him, Phantasma shifted the microbots in her arm in an attempt to capture him, but Doc leapt free of her grasp once more. Sailing through the air, Doc shifted back to normal size as he landed in front of Phantasma, a crude, sparking device now in one hand.
Before Phantasma could react, Doc slammed the device against her chest, the contraption sending electricity surging into the villain as it clung to her. Throwing her head back, Phantasma let out an electronic wail as her image inducers failed, her form shifting back to that of a human-shaped mass of microbots that quickly began to lose cohesion.
Hearing Phantasma's distress, Enigma turned his attention towards the robot as Doc took a step away from her. Picking himself up, Enigma began racing over to where Phantasma was slowly sinking into a pile of microbots.
"Stop right there!" Megamind ordered as he pointed his ray gun at Enigma and fired off a shot, but the villain managed to deflect the attack by extending his disc and batting the blast away.
Reaching Phantasma's side, Enigma extended his plasma blade and swung it at Doc, who quickly shrank to avoid the attack. With Doc distracted, Enigma grabbed hold of the device with his robotic arm and yanked it off of Phantasma before crushing it.
"I think we've overstayed our welcome," Enigma mused as Phantasma began putting herself back together before he turned his attention towards where Underminer was picking himself up off the ground, "Underminer! We need an exit! Now!"
Nodding his head in reply, Underminer quickly pushed himself back to his feet before scrambling towards where his drill tank lay.
"Oh no you don't!" Ginormica shouted before she began stomping towards the Underminer, her gigantic strides quickly gaining ground on the villain.
Seeing this, Rollergrrl picked herself up before she went skating across the courtyard. Reaching the spot where Yokai was recovering, Rollergrrl scooped his mask off the ground before skidding to a halt.
"Professor!" Rollergrrl called, catching Yokai's attention before tossing his mask towards him. Snatching the mask out of the air, Yokai quickly put it on and raised his hands up to shoulder height, causing his microbots to stir and swarm around him. Thrusting his hands towards Ginormica, he sent a swarm of microbots surging towards her before they leapt up and grabbed at her legs. Grunting in surprise, Ginormica stopped and turned her attention towards the microbots, struggling with them as they continuously grabbed at her arms and legs.
Taking advantage of the distraction, the Underminer managed to crawl back into his drill tank and power it up. A moment later, and the drill tank's cylindrical body began to spin until it managed to get its treds back under it. Once it had done that, the door on its side opened up as its drill began to spin.
"Alright, everyone aboard!" Enigma shouted as he and Phantasma moved towards the drill tank, prompting the other villains to as well.
"Don't let them get away!" Mr. Incredible shouted as he pointed towards the drill tank, leading to the heroes charging towards it.
"Oh no no," Bomb Voyage said as he stopped in front of the ramp leading into the drill tank and grabbed some explosives from his bandoliers. Tossing them into the air, Bomb Voyage turned away from them as the explosives detonate with blinding flashes of lights, catching the heroes off guard and stunning them. Following this up, Rollergrrl stopped next to Bomb Voyage before placing her hand down on the ground, sending her energy spreading out towards the heroes, causing them to lose their footing and fall to the ground. With the heroes taken care of, the Syndicate quickly retreated into the drill tank, which dug into the ground and disappeared.
As the heroes recovered, the Dash got to his feet first and rushed over to the tunnel that the drill tank had disappeared down.
"I can go after them!" Dash shouted as he moved to run down the tunnel, but was stopped as Mr. Incredible grabbed his shoulder.
"Not by yourself, you can't," Mr. Incredible replied, "None of us can keep up with you and you can't handle them all by yourself."
The Dash looked like he wanted to argue before he sighed in defeat while placing his hands on his hips.
"Come on," Mr. Incredible said as he gestured backwards with his head, "I think our new friends are going to need some help."
As everyone was recovering from the end of the fight, Excelsior raced over to where Kitsune was still kneeling on the ground, skidding to a halt in front of her.
"Riley!" he exclaimed as he wiped off his helmet and threw it on the ground next to him before grabbing hold of Kitsune's shoulders and looking at her with a terrified expression, "Riley are you okay!?"
Slowly, her hands shaking, Kitsune raised her hands and removed her mask, looking back at Hiro with her blue, tear-filled eyes.
"I….I don't know," Riley whispered, her voice hitching as tears began streaming down her face, "I don't know, I don't know, I don't know!"
Her words dissolving into sobs, Riley leaned forward and buried her face into Hiro's shoulder, the boy instinctively wrapping his arms around the girl as she gripped the front of his costume and cried uncontrollably.
Standing a short distance away, Ultraviolet watched the scene unfold with a sad expression.
"Violet!" Elastigirl called out as she made her way over to the hero's side.
"Mom!" Ultraviolet replied as she walked over to Elastigirl and embraced her, her mother quickly returning the gesture.
"Are you okay?" Elastigirl questioned as she took a step back and looked her daughter over.
"I'm fine, I've been in worse straights then that," Ultraviolet replied with a smirk that quickly morphed into a worried frown, "But I'm not sure about the others."
Glancing around, she looked at where most of the Big Hero 9 were gathered.
"Fred, Darron and Yuri are pretty beat up," Ultraviolet said before her eyes fell on Tip, who was sitting on the ground with her face in her hands, with Oh putting a comforting arm around her, "And god, Tip. Underminer just tried to….just tried to strangle her."
"We knew that most of these guys were the worst of the worst," Elastigirl replied, her expression troubled, "But I have to admit, even I didn't think that Underminer would stoop that low."
"Baymax looked pretty bad too," Ultraviolet continued as she looked at where the android still lay, Megamind and Doc standing over him with concerned expressions, "I know he's a robot but it sounded like Phantasma was messing with his programming, which I'm sure could be bad."
With that, Ultraviolet looked back at where Hiro was still comforting Riley.
"And God, poor Riley," Ultraviolet whispered, her voice full of sympathy.
"Mezmerella got in her head, right?" Elastigirl questioned, "That can get messy but I'm sure she'll recover."
"It's worse than that though, Mom," Ultraviolet argued, "Riley's a super. She's an empath, a...a psychic, like Mezmerella. I don't know for sure but I'm worried that may have made it worse somehow."
As Ultraviolet wrapped her arms around herself protectively, a thought occurred to her.
"Why are you guys here?" Ultraviolet questioned as she looked at Elastigirl in confusion, "Not that I'm complaining, mind you, but how did you guys know we needed help?"
"We got a call from an old friend of ours," Elastigirl explained.
"Stan," Ultraviolet replied, her eyes widening in realization.
"He wasn't exactly interested in watching his son get beaten to death," Elastigirl said solemnly, "So he gave the AVL a call and we got dispatched."
"Well, thank God for that," Ultraviolet said with a sigh, "Now what do we do?"
"Now?" Elastigirl questioned before looking upwards. Following her mother's gaze, Ultraviolet spotted an aircraft descending to hover over the prison. It was large but sleek, supported by four engines at each of the corners, the bottoms glowing blue as they hung in a VTOL formation.
"Now we head home."
A/N: And that's the end to the big fight. Hope you all enjoyed it! As always, feedback and critiques are always welcome, so please review! Later!