Author's Note: Hey, and welcome back! I LOVE BIG SUPERHERO FIGHTS! One of the reasons I started writing this series is because I love big blowout action scenes. This was a fight that I had been looking forward to writing for a long time, so I hope you enjoy watching our heroes beat the snot out of each other for a chapter. Read on!

Chapter Eight - Hero Fight!

As the white ball of light rocketed towards Lao Shi, it was swiftly intercepted by a red, scaly missile. Jake tackled the android off course, and the two went careening through the air. The XJ-9 delivered a rocket powered kick towards Jake's snout. Reflexively, the dragon reared back to protect his sensitive nose, and then spun in the sky, catching the robot with his sturdy tail, and slapping her towards the ground. However, she quickly caught her momentum in the freefall. From underneath Jake she activated her rocked pulsars, and shot straight up, landing a mighty uppercut on the young dragon, who spun backwards.

Meanwhile, the grounds were now swarming with Glitch Techs. Dozens of agents in white were scrambling into battle positions. Pearl took note of them going for the tanks, jets, and other machines of war. She stood up precariously on the violet scales of Lao Shi, and aimed down her thumb at the nearest jet. Then, with a hefty thrust she sent her spear flying like a javelin towards the fuel chamber. Her aim was perfect, and the plane exploded, fire and debris flying everywhere. The techs aiming for the vehicles were knocked back by the force, but none were hit by any of the deadly explosion. That bought them some time.

"Amethyst! We gotta help Jake!" Steven shouted over the roar of battle that had suddenly overwhelmed them.

The lavender bird nodded, and began to navigate the skies towards the airborne battle that the dragon and the robot were having. Scale and metal clanged harshly together, as they traded blow after crushing blow that would have crumpled a human. The XJ-9 was by far the more maneuverable of the two. Jake was an agile flyer, especially for his size, but his massive bat's wings could not keep pace with the acute flight provided by Jenny's rocket boots.

So, he was having trouble keeping pace in the fight and staying in the air at the same time. In one particular movement, he swiped with a claw, but left his wing exposed. For a brief, heart-dropping moment, the dragon thought that she would attack his weak spot and leave him defenseless. A dropping red stone. However, his training intuition out-ruled his instinct, and he remembered that there was no way she could know about the cluster of nerves at the base of a dragon's wing. So, Jake tucked his wings in close around him and spiraled like a football through the air, narrowly juking Jenny's empowered kick towards, again, his face.

From the ground came a barrage of noise. Sheer! SheeEr! SHEEeer! Jake glanced with his keen, dragon's eyes to see what the fuss was about. Then, he saw a volley of missiles flying towards him. Several Glitch Techs had grouped up and pointed their hi-tech gauntlets up at the "threat" that was Jake; and apparently, the gauntlets could shoot missiles. At the same time, Jake had just barely parried a punch from the XJ-9, and she was preparing to land another one to his softer abdomen. He had no time to defend against either attack!

"Jaaaake!"

k-bONG!BaBAMbaBONGbabam!

One moment a small, humanoid figure was flying through the air in between Jake and the missile barrage. They curled up in the fetal position. Then, just as they were about to be struck by the onslaught, a massive wall of pink energy suddenly appeared. A crystalline semi-sphere, centered around them. As Jake squinted, for the fraction of a second he saw them before Jenny's punch gutted him, he recognized the star pattern on their shirt.

It was Steven. He had jumped in front of Jake and summoned a massive shield, blocking the missiles.

scREEEr!

Amethyst let out a loud, raptor-like cry of attack as she suddenly swooped in, talons first, and began to claw at the XJ-9's face. The android threw up her chrome-white arms in defense, and this bought Jake the room he needed to catch his breath. The dragon looked down, expecting to swoop in and catch Steven from a perilous fall. To his surprise, he saw that the boy was actually floating calmly down to the ground…

A little too calmly. The Glitch Techs on the ground were getting ready to shoot another volley, and Steven was now a slow-moving target. Like the longest hot-air balloon crash in history. A painful buildup to certain destruction. There was a hum of energy as the gauntlets began to charge, but just before they could fire off another round- Thwam! A large, grey figured suddenly landed in front of them. With a swipe of her massive, hammer-shaped hand, Bismuth knocked down the first row of Tech's, laughing at the ease. Garnet quickly dropped down behind her, and they stood back to back as more of the agents in white poured out onto the lawn.

"Just like old times, huh, Garnet?" Bismuth said. The fusion only grimaced wryly, blocking a strike from a buzz baton and shoving the Tech wielding it unceremoniously away.

"Try not to kill any of them," she said.

Several dozen feet away, Steven finally touched down onto the grass. Looking out over the hectic battlefield, he tried to see where he would be most useful. The sky was raging now, as Jake, Amethyst, and Lao Shi fought against the XJ-9 and an attack helicopter that was just getting off the ground. He watched in horror as the chopper loosed two missiles at Amethyst.

However, Lao Shi let out a terrible roar so loud that it shook the entire battlefield. Then, there was a sound like thunder, and a bolt of purple lightning came flying out of the Dragon's mouth. It hit the first missile and then chained into the second, blowing both to pieces harmlessly. The great wyrm wasn't finished, though, and he was soon gliding through the air like a snake on water, sliding towards the chopper. It let loose a hail of gunfire from its minigun, but the bullets simply sparked off of the Dragon's ineffable hide.

Defying gravity, the purple beast simply caught the blades of the helicopter in one claw, and pulled the inhabitants of the vehicle closer to his face. There were screams from within the chopper as the techs operating it bailed, jumping out and pulling their parachutes. Once they had all cleared out, Lao Shi seemed satisfied, wrapping himself around the machine like a python would a mouse, and crushing it into scrap before letting it smash into the grass below.

However, before Lao Shi could celebrate, the roar of engines caught him by surprise. Soon, two white Hinobi jets were circling him like flies around a cobra. He went to grab them, but too late, he realized that the wily humans had released enormous cables to wrap around him. With a thrust of the jet engines, the cords went taught, and Lao Shi was temporarily seized. Steven, watching everything go down, began to feel something inside of him. It told him that something was wrong here. None of them wanted to be destroyed by the Cluster. They were on the same side.

"Hey! Everybody, stop!" Steven started to shout, running towards the main conflict.

"ggRROWR!"

Steven was stopped in his tracks as a large, hairy beast suddenly pounced in front of him. Steven gulped as he took in the sight of it. It was somewhere between canine and feline, a horrible hunched monster with ripping black claws and jagged white fangs. It had no eyes, but seemed to be sensing Steven just fine. As the heavy sides of the beast heaved with breath, odd skin-flaps opened up on either side, beneath the layers of orange fur. The beast took one hungry step forward, and Steven mirrored it in reverse.

"Woah. Nice… uh, doggy?" He said, holding out his hands in a placating gesture.

The monster growled again, and Steven quickly realized that it was not interested in talking. It finally clicked right around the time the hulking orange fur ball launched itself at him. With a shout of fear, Steven quickly sealed the air shut around him, summoning his pink bubble. There was a faint thunk! As the creature collided with the large orb. Steven watched with disgust from the inside as it tried to wrap its slobbering maw onto something of purchase, fogging up the bubble in the process. However, its mouth wasn't large enough to pick up the orb of defense, and soon it resorted to ramming into it. The first strike did little damage, but the creature backed up a few paces, and the second slam caused a small crack to form in Steven's bubble. Steven gulped. The monster grinned.

"Ah… Damn, that smarts," Jake muttered, pulling himself up from where the XJ-9 had thrown him into the dirt. He had hardly brushed the soil off of his scales when he heard the telltale sound; the sound of her rocket boot flying towards him. "Oh, gimme a bre-"

CLANG!

Jenny collided with Jake, delivering a solid punch to his jaw. The dragon recoiled, but he was tough, and, rubbing his cheek, entered a defensive combat stance. Using his enhanced sense, Jake began to size his opponent up. She might be the more maneuverable when they were both in the air, but his center of gravity while on the ground was pretty good. If he was patient, and she didn't have any kind of combat analysis program or anything, he figured he could take her. As the lightning quick robot came flashing in for another strike, Jake grimaced. He caught the blow with his scaly fore-arm, and then retaliated with a headbutt. Bad idea.

k-Bong! Their heads collided, but Jenny's proved the hardest. Jake succeed only in dazing himself, and getting another rocket-powered kick to the face. Jake groaned. He was getting sick of that. This time was especially heinous, as she managed to connect her heavy metal boot with his soft, cartilaginous nose. Tears quickly sprang into the young dragon's eyes, and he was momentarily thrown off balance. Jenny, thinking she had achieved a moment to strike, flew in for a strike. As she did, Jake sucked in a violent breath, and she saw too late the glowing embers in the back of his throat.

"a-choAAARR!" Jake let out something between a sneeze and a roar, and a torrent of blazing flame came shooting out of his mouth and nostrils.

For a moment, Jenny stood her ground, throwing her arms up in a defensive 'x' and trying to withstand the blast. However, her inner temperature gauges continued to rise as the blast continued to pour out, and soon the flames were growing too hot even for her space-metal alloy. Jake was breathing fire hotter than re-entry to the atmosphere. The XJ-9 quickly retreated; luckily for Jake, as he ran out of breath at the exact same time, the gout of flame sputtering out until he belched out a small cloud of smoke.

"XJ-9," came a voice inside of Jenny's head. Somebody was speaking to her through her built-in comms. Most likely… "This is the Director. Stand d-"

The android quickly shut off her comms, focusing on the battle at hand. Keeping the link open required processing power she didn't have, as a lot of it was beginning to drain into self-repairs and keeping her flying. She continued to float in the air above Jake, the two of them squaring off in a stand-still as the chaotic battle raged on behind them. Despite the intensity, and the cries of pain from both of their allies, neither looked away. They each waited for the other to make the next move. Eventually, Jenny proved the least patient of the pair. A hatch in her chest swiftly opened, revealing some kind of round cannon, which she aimed down at Jake. He grimaced.

"Alright," she said, "time to wrap this up."

There was a low whining, and wisps of blue light began to gather in the cavity in Jenny's chest. Jake squinted, unsure at first if it was a trick of the light. Then, his eyes widened as he realized the truth. If it was an energy blast, like he suspected, there was little chance that he'd be able to dodge. He wasn't sure how well his scales would hold up against such a beam either. The dragon grit his fangs in concentration, thinking about how to handle the situation. Maybe if he could distract her… What was he saying, she was a robot. Still, she had displayed various forms of emotion, and the way she talked did seem oddly human. Maybe…

"Hey," he called up to her, catching her slightly by surprise. She looked down at him.

"You can talk?" She asked, the laser still charging.

Bingo. Jake kept her chatting.

"Oh, foshizzle," he said, glancing from her eyes to the slowly charging beam. "I know you might not know me, but I'm the AM-Drag Mac Daddy of NYC."

"What?" Jenn said, tilting her head to the side. The beam was nearing full charge, evidenced by the high pitch of the whine it was giving off.

"What I'm basically saying is," Jake continued, barely hiding his smile even behind the dragon's stony visage. "Here comes the D-Train!"

With that he snapped into action, spinning and lashing out with his tail. He moved at just the last second, and his mighty appendage collided with the robot just microseconds before her blast fired off. The resulting blow caused the XJ-9 to falter slightly, turning and aiming her chest beam in a different direction. At first, Jake was full of soaring pride, having outwitted his opponent. Then, he followed the trajectory of where the beam was going, and his heart sank.

It was flying straight towards Steven, and the boy was out of earshot.

The half-gem was being circled by the hairy beast. Every few moments the eyeless monster would lunge in. Sometimes it was a feint, a halfhearted swipe before the creature retreated to its stalking. Other times, it would come in earnest, ramming into the pink bubble and causing further damage to it. At this point, the ball was all but destroyed. One final pounce from the beast was all it took. With a shattering sound, Steven was thrown to the grass, and the popping bubble launched the monster a few paces back as well. Steven was on his feet moments later, wobbly but ready for action, looking for a plan.

"Kid! Look out!" Came an unfamiliar baritone.

Steven craned his neck to see an overweight old man charging towards him, Hawaiian shirt flapping in the wind. He was waving his beefy arms frantically, and pointing towards something. Steven followed his point, just in time to see Jake tail-slap the XJ-9. Just in time to see the laser beam fire. Time seemed to slow down. For a split second, Steven was staring face to face with th deadly blue beam. Then, with all the will and courage he could muster, he throw his arms up in front himself, and focused. Hard.

With the sound only a laser could, the beam was suddenly reflected. Steven had summoned his shield just in time, refracting the blue beam away from himself. Unfortunately, he wasn't able to direct the blast in any particular place. The result was that the powerful beam ricocheted, blasting through the side of the Hinobi base before finally crashing into the tree line beyond. The resulting explosion caught everyone off guard, and nearly everybody on the battlefield hit the ground.

As the smoke cleared, a bright yellow beacon caught everyone's attention. The fighting had died down, and everyone was mostly licking their wounds, recovering from the massive explosion. They were all quickly drawn to the flowing yellow coat of the woman in charge. The white pixie cut weaved its way across the grassy field strewn with smoking machine parts and injured Glitch Techs. As she continued walking, Jenny slowly brought herself down to the grass, touching down more timidly than anybody could have expected to after that display of power.

The Director caught her gaze and held it disapprovingly for a few seconds, before she turned to address the greater crowd. Even the gems and dragons had turned to see what this newcomer had to say. She clapped her hands together, a bit of a wry expression forming behind her tinted goggles. Then, she spread her hands wide, looking back and forth between the gathered forces as if they were children in her classroom.

"So," she called out, her voice carrying surprisingly well for a woman her age. "We done here?"