To Butterfly: "Canon" as far as my stories go excludes the following episodes: "Kwamibuster," "Feast," "Ikari Gozen," "Timetagger," "Chat Blanc," "Battle of the Miraculous." The most-recent of the episodes before my stories break off is "The Puppeteer 2," with everything else having happened at some point before then.
To anonymousfriend27: Those two together are pretty awesome. And yes, someone was using an energy weapon like the ones the Heroes recovered after the alien ship crashed.
Alix stopped outside the bank and held out a hand to hold King Monkey back from charging in. "Hang on!" she shouted. "There are people with guns in there! They shot out the window with an energy weapon! And now there's a bear! So what are we supposed to do?"
"What," he scoffed, "you've never stopped a bank robbery involving energy weapons and wildlife before?"
"Um… no." Alix gave him a disbelieving look. "Should I be concerned that this is what you consider normal now?"
He shrugged. "Honestly, I didn't think this would be our new normal, either," he admitted. "When we defeated Hawk Moth I figured things would go back to normal." He chuckled ruefully. "The devil is in the details, I supposed. Maybe we should've been content with what we had, considering that this is 'normal' now. It turns out that Hawk Moth kept the rest of the criminal element under control while he was in charge; the new underworld boss has been going full-tilt with the crimes. If you want to stay out here since you don't have superpowers, I won't think any less of you."
"No, you'll just bring it up every time we hang out until the sun explodes," she retorted. "Besides, what if that bear decides to sit on you again?" She steeled herself, withdrew her field hockey stick, and said, "Let's do this."
"I make out five in there, minus the bear," King Monkey told her, stealing a quick peek around the window frame. "There are a few civilians in the near corner, a couple more huddling behind the couch off to the side. I don't see the tellers; they're probably hiding behind the counter." He grinned. "I bet I take down more of them than you do!"
"You're on!" Alix smirked. "Loser wears a dress to school on the first day back?"
Without waiting for his answer, Alix put on a burst of speed, shot forward, and leaned into a tight turn to shoot through the bank's front door, at the same moment that King Monkey leapt through the blown-out window. She ducked under a flock of pigeons that dove at her head – "Seriously? Why is it always pigeons?" she grumbled, spinning into a twist as a dog lunged at her side. The bear roared, and she dove behind a table to avoid the paw swiping at her head.
"Um, I think we maybe might have forgotten about something!" she shouted, glaring over at King Monkey, who was shaking his staff furiously, trying to dislodge the pair of cats that had taken hold of it by the ends. Alix pulled a hockey puck out of her backpack and threw it at one of the cats, hitting it in the head and knocking it off King Monkey's staff. King Monkey spun the staff in a tight circle, and the other cat went sailing across the room to land on the bank counter. It hissed and swiped at a pair of pigeons that flew a little too close to its head.
A whip cracked centimeters from Alix's head, and she turned to find the man with the necklace holding a hawk on his wrist and a whip in his hand. "You cannot defeat the Animal Man!" he shouted, cracking his whip again and letting out a shriek. The hawk took off from his wrist, crowed, and shot straight at Alix's face. She ducked a moment before impact, and the hawk's talons struck her helmet and scrabbled a moment to find purchase before its momentum carried it past her. She held her stick in front of herself and backed away carefully, her eyes trained on the Animal Man and ears straining for the sound of the hawk if it returned.
Alix stumbled into a civilian who was cowering on the floor. "You need to get out of here!" she shouted, grabbing the woman's shoulder and pulling her up into a crouch. She turned toward the front door to usher the woman out the front door, holding her field hockey stick between herself and the Animal Man. However, the way was blocked by a robber who pointed a handgun at her.
An instant before he pulled the trigger, Alix swung her hockey stick and slapped the gun up to point at the ceiling. The energy beam lanced through the ceiling, melting a straight line through the roof. Alix could see sunlight through the hole, a moment before another flock of pigeons dove through it. "Are you kidding me?" she shouted, ducking under the swarm and letting the birds fly straight into the man who had created the hole in the first place. He screamed in shock. "Mind taking care of that?" she called, risking a glance to see King Monkey knocking the gun out of another guy's hand and placing himself between the now-disarmed robber and a small family huddling in one corner of the lobby.
"Right!" King Monkey dropped to the floor and swept the guy's legs out from under him. "Uproar!" He grabbed the baseball that appeared next to his head, tossed it in the air, and hit it with his staff, sending it ricocheting off two walls before it struck the Animal Man in the back of the knee. The Animal Man grunted in pain and fell to the floor, cradling his injured knee.
A dog had bounded over to Alix and begun circling around Alix and the woman while snarling. When the ball struck the Animal Man, however, the dog sat back on its haunches, gave Alix a confused look, and yelped before racing out the bank doors, followed by a pair of cats, a flock of pigeons, and a very-confused porcupine. Alix pushed the woman out the doors after the animals and looked around the lobby. The man King Monkey had just knocked down was already back up on his feet. The Animal Man was still down, rubbing the back of his knee. Three more guys, including the one with the energy gun, were aiming their weapons at the civilians on the other side of the room, shouting indistinctly. And the bear was grunting to itself and shaking its head in confusion. King Monkey was busy with the guy closest to him and couldn't do anything for the civilians on the opposite side of the room. She was the only one who could stop this madness from turning into a bloodbath.
Alix grabbed the Frisbee she'd stuck in the front mesh of her backpack, took aim, and threw it overhand. The disk arced down to smack the first guy in the head, throwing his aim off. He dropped to one knee, shaking his head in confusion. Too hyped up on adrenalin to consider the danger, she pushed away from the table next to her and angled herself toward the remaining gunmen, pumping her legs to push herself faster. She grabbed the gun arm of the closest robber still on his feet and wrenched it around behind his back, forcing him to drop the gun and using the momentum to swing her body into the air. She kicked the third guy in the shoulder with both her rollerblades. The man she'd kicked lost hold of his gun, which fell to the floor and skidded away into the far corner. The other man, the one she was still holding, was pulled off balance and fell over with Alix's momentum. She released her grip on his arm and fell to the floor, catching herself on one knee and pushing herself back up to her feet. The robber reached for his gun, and quick as lightning she knocked the gun out of his reach with her field hockey stick before bringing it up with both hands and smashing him over the head, cracking the stick in half. Two down.
She heard a gun charging three meters away and looked up to find the last man, the one she'd hit with her Frisbee, back on his feet, the energy gun still in his hands. She glared angrily, staring down the barrel. Suddenly, he fell to the ground with a thud, and King Monkey stood behind him, panting with exertion.
"I got two of them," King Monkey announced. "You?"
"Two," she told him, gesturing to the two next to her. She nodded to the other side of the room. "What about…"
King Monkey turned to follow her gaze. The Animal Man was still standing, holding his whip in one hand and a chair in the other as an improvised shield. The bear was sitting on the floor next to him, taking in its unusual surroundings. "You would dare to attack the Animal Man?" he demanded, cracking his whip in the space between them. "I will rip you to shreds and feed you to the lions! You cannot stop me!"
"Tiebreaker?" King Monkey asked, grinning and twirling his staff.
"Tiebreaker," Alix agreed, holding one half of her field hockey stick in each hand.
Before either of them could move, however, the bear pushed itself up onto its back legs and roared. The Animal Man turned to look at it in surprise and shouted, "You must obey me!" The bear, however, raised one paw, curled it into a fist, and dropped it on his head. The Animal Man fell to the floor senseless, his whip and chair clattering across the floor out of his reach.
"Well, um… that… works, I guess," King Monkey said, nonplussed.