By the way, you might have assumed that I've been calling Baymax 'Monster Baymax' by virtue of the fact that Hiro removed his healthcare chip, thus turning him into monster. That is true ... but it's only half of the truth. In the original Big Hero 6 comics, Baymax's name is literally 'Monster Baymax', and no - he definitely wasn't made for healthcare. Calling him that when his chip was removed is a nod to his origins.
Anyway, on to the story.
Chapter 9
Making a Bolt
"Ow ... Owwww ... My head ..." the red rat groaned. "... Where am I?"
She stiffened as it all came back like a waking nightmare, accentuated by the desolate, devastated environment. Sitting up on the street, she spotted a sparkling carpet of shattered glass coating the sidewalk - a side effect of Mr. Incredible's shock wave upon smashing into the road at the hands of Baymax. Where was the super now?
The answer came in the form a rumble.
Frantically glancing about, she noticed that the sound emanated from a gaping hole surrounded by a spiderweb of cracks - Mr. Incredible's point of impact. His meteoric fall had left him embedded in ground had left him embedded deep within it ... but not for long.
The rumble increased to a cacophony as the street tore up around the hole, massive chunks flying into the air in a wave that swept towards her. The red rat scrambled as the pieces pounded down by the tons, too close for comfort. She took refuge under a car and winced at the sound of rubble storming the vehicle above her.
"No, no, no!" she exclaimed as the weight of the rocks made the car cave towards her.
With a few well-placed Blackberries, she supported the vehicle with their swollen masses, before darting close to one of the wheels. In her mind, it was the least likely area to collapse. Would those measures spare her for long? She honestly wasn't sure. The rat squeezed her eyes shut, dreading the thought of watching her demise as it unfolded. Fortunately, the rain of rocks ended and the car had held up.
She opened her eyes and was shocked to see that the shattered earth had stopped just short of the vehicle, leaving a rugged region of gouged out ground. At the centre of that region was Mr. Incredible, who had erupted from the road like a living volcano. Muscles taut and teeth gnashed in aggression, he looked to and fro for his opponent.
Monster Baymax was not one to disappoint.
At first, all that could be seen was the speck of light in the sky, generated by Baymax's jets. Blasting past speed of sound, the robot shot from the distance in the blink of an eye. The rat squeezed her ears shut as Baymax's supersonic thunderclap shattered the air. The robot hit Mr. Incredible head-on, the ramming the super into a bus before unleashing a merciless melee of martial arts.
The rodent darted towards the fighters, but it felt as though they were an infinity away as her legs failed to move nearly as quickly as she desired.
"BAYMAX, STOP!" she shouted, in spite of the fact that he wouldn't understand even if he could hear her. "YOU'RE a HERO! This ISN'T what you were made fo-!"
*( ( BOOOM! ) )*
She half-shrieked, half-gasped as Monster Baymax hurtled overhead, knocked across the block by a blow from Mr. Incredible.
The super dislodged himself from the bus a brief moment before a balled up clump of cars rolled into him, courtesy of Hiro's geomagnetic tech. Mr. Incredible met it with open hands, hoisted it into the air, spotted Hiro on a roof and hurled it at the boy. The Big Hero narrowly managed to stop the ball mid-air before sending it back to Mr. Incredible, who shattered it with a fist. Flying hunks of flaming vehicle flew in all directions, the fuel tanks decimated by his mighty strike.
Not a moment later, Baymax crashed into the super, tearing the street in flight as he dragged Mr. Incredible out of sight.
The rat collapsed onto her haunches. Time lost its meaning as she gazed about the battered battlefield in a daze. It seemed she was right back where she started before her adventures began - a doom-laden nightmare for which she was indubitably the cause. At some point, Dash and GoGo rushed by, so caught up in their competition that they failed to digest the gravity of the situation. She could faintly hear them trading taunts, even after they disappeared into the smoke left in the wake of Mr. Incredible and Baymax's battle.
"Ha! Missed me, GoGo!"
"GRR! We'll see about that, Incrediboy!"
"Stop calling me that!"
The rumbling growl of burning cars quickly swallowed up their voices. She was alone. Small. Helpless.
Amid the smoke wafting across the street, she saw Remy scampering toward her, but she was in no state of mind to take note of him.
"This is all my fault ..." she declared, paws on her head in despair.
*p-pat ... p-pat ... p-pat!*
The sound of big paws pattering road was her only warning before being scooped up and carried off by a canine mouth.
At the back of her despondent mind, she heard Remy's shout: "NO!"
Soon, the canine reached an alley, plopped her down and she stared up at him with indifference. Well, what was he going to do? If he was anything like the sharks (and he probably was) his next course of action would involve a painful encounter with teeth. In any event, she was quite sure that she would deserve whatever he did. It seemed about time fate pulled out the ol' 'what goes around comes around' on her. However, instead of teeth, she was met by a tongue that licked ...
And licked ...
And licked ...
And licked ...
After arriving in the alley, Remy got his first look at the white dog responsible for abducting his friend. Though the canine bore traits of an American White Shepherd or a Berger Blanc Suisse, he was smaller than both breeds. However, his medium-sized body boasted a sturdy build. Remy wasn't concerned about the dog's unidentifiable breed so much as he wanted to know what the canine had done with the other rat. He couldn't see her so much as he saw the dog licking away at something already doused in a pool of drool, but it wasn't hard to put two and two together.
"STOP!" Remy demanded. "You're DROWNING her in your SALIVA!"
The dog was startled, but instead of jumping, he stiffened and snapped his ears and eyes towards Remy with almost military alertness.
"Oh! My apologies!" the dog replied as he sheepishly backed off, but even in doing so he carried himself like a soldier.
The canine hastily brushed away the saliva before Remy reached the red rat. She lay there motionless, and Remy promptly performed a series of pumping presses to her unconscious body, applying C.P.R.
"Hands off the beauty you BEAST!" came an unfamiliar voice.
Remy looked around for the source of the sound. "Wha-? Ow!"
Something round had hit him from behind. He looked back to see that the round thing was a transparent, plastic ball housing a brown hamster. Remy could almost swear that the inner surface of the sphere fogged up as the hamster fumed through nostrils flared. What did this guy think he was? Some kind of rhino?
"Yeah! Feel every PIECE o' that ball!" the hamster commanded before attempting to flatten the rat with said ball.
Remy shoved the ball away and tried to focus on resuscitating the red rat.
"Please, give me a little space," Remy requested, attempting to sound civil. "I'm trying to apply C.P.R.!"
"You'll need C.P.R. when I'm done with you!" the hamster declared.
He began to charge again, but found that he could not move. The two rodents looked up to see a black cat with white highlights on her paws, belly, tail tip and muzzle. Despite her light build, she was heavy enough to easily pin down the hamster, and that was exactly what she did by leisurely leaning on his ball, resting her chin on her crossed forelimbs.
"Hey, how ya doin'?" she greeted in a laid-back fashion.
"Uh ... hello?" Remy slowly responded.
The feline's green eyes bore the calm, 'I couldn't worry even if I tried' look for which her kind was famous. Remy knew for a fact that despite their seemingly unflappable attitudes, it didn't take much to spook a feline. However, that didn't change the fact that they were his natural enemy. Normally, he stood a good chance of surviving a cat attack. However, he couldn't deal with one while performing C.P.R. Hopefully, she was friendly.
"You can keep doing what you're going," the cat declared, before patting the hamster's ball. "Don't worry about him, or me for that matter."
The hamster released a frustrated hybrid between a growl and a whine as he tried to break free. "Lemme go, Cat! Don't fraternise with the rat! Do you honestly trust him to do C.P.R.? Where'd he learn how to do it? A landfill? A gutter? The sewers?"
The feline raised a sceptical eyebrow. "A, refer to me by my real name, will ya, and B, you think you can do a better job?"
"Of course I can!" the hamster argued. "I've seen it on T.V. all the time! It's as easy as one, two, five!"
Remy couldn't help but pause and glance up upon hearing the hamster's ignorant and familiar statement, before returning to the task of reviving the other rat.
"Hey! I am not to be ignored!" the hamster insisted as he threw himself against the side of the ball. "Face me like a man so I can trash talk you to yo' face!"
"I don't have time for shenanigans," Remy dismissed.
"Ha!" the hamster shot back. "Shows what you know! I'm a hamster!"
Suddenly, the red rat coughed out big blobs of saliva that went down the wrong way.
"Ewww ..." she commented as she sat up, frowning at the drool clinging to her arm.
"Sorry," the dog apologised once again.
"Good thing I saved you," the hamster lied. "Well, technically the rat did it, but I instructed him."
"Mm hm, not buying it," the she responded. "I was in that weird zone between consciousness and unconsciousness where you can hear everything but you can't do anything about it."
The cat snickered as the hamster folded his arms with a sour expression.
"You can get off me now," the hamster declared.
"Yeah. I can, can't I?" replied the feline, who didn't budge an inch.
"Anyway, we're just glad you're okay," the dog stated. "Say, mind if I call you 'Penny'? I know that's probably not your name, but you remind me of her, so ..."
The red rat sighed. "I'm sure this 'Penny' means a lot to you, but I'm not her. Just call me-" she paused before shrugging in defeat. "You know what? Call me whatever floats your boat, at least for now."
"Wait a minute, did you say 'Penny'?" asked Remy. "I knew I recognised you from somewhere! You're 'Bolt the Superdog'!"
"Bolt the super-who-now?" asked the clueless red rat.
"What are you doing in Paris?" Remy went on. "Do your humans know you're here?"
"No, as a matter of fact they don't," Bolt stated with a nuance of guilt. "We hitched a ride to Paris on the spur of the moment. Somehow, I feel like Penny had something to do with it - the rodent Penny, not the human, mind you. It's almost like we could smell her from across the planet!"
"So, you're a super hero?" the red rat began. "Here to deescalate the crisis? And not just make it worse, I presume?"
Her questions were actually more like suggestions in hopes that he wouldn't do the opposite. The last thing the city needed was a berserk superdog compounding the chaos.
With a sombre air, the dog looked back at his left side, where his lighting bolt-shaped 'Mark of Power' had been throughout most of his life, or rather 'The Mark of a Good Makeup Artist' as it had once been called. Without said makeup artist, it had faded, somehow taking with it part of his identity.
"It ... turns out I'm not as 'super' as I thought," Bolt declared with a weak smile.
"Are you kidding?" Remy went on. "Your T.V. series is edge-of-your-seat awesome, especially season 1! I've never seen another actor pull off that kind intensity, human or animal!"
"That's just it," Bolt explained. "It wasn't acting! They tricked me into thinking that every, mission, 'episode', or whatever was a matter of life or death."
"Bolt and his owner, Penny, quit after the first season," the hamster explained. "His replacement pales in comparison to the original, and it didn't help that the plots got increasingly ridonculous. Anyway, the name's Rhino."
"Remy," the blue rat responded.
Rhino frowned. "I wasn't talking to you."
The cat rolled her eyes as she finally got off of the hamster.
"And I'm Mittens O'Malley Figaro Schrödinger," the feline introduced.
Both Bolt and Rhino stared at her quizzically.
"What?" she asked. "I can't have a full name?"
"Well, you can. We just didn't know you did," Bolt explained.
"There's a lot you don't know about me," Mittens declared a-matter-of-factly, before turning her attention to the red rat. "So, you got a name? I'm willing to bet it's not 'Penny'."
"Uh oh," the red rat mumbled.
"Uh oh, what?" asked Remy.
"I lost my train of thought," she explained. "It was an important thought, too. You know, you just forget so easily. No matter how hard you try, you just forget, you forget, you forget, and the memory's gone. Sorry, it's one of my quirks. You just forget about it."
Rhino's eyes lit up and he cracked a sneaky smile at the girl.
"Oh, you are clever," he commented. "I see what you did there!"
"What- what are you talking about?" she asked, attempting a poker face and failing.
"That was neuro-linguistic programming, wasn't it?" asked Rhino. "I saw it in a YouTube video. Don't worry your pretty little head, my lips are zipped, and you're good to go. I like a lady with an air of mystery."
"And here I thought your lips were zipped," gibed Mittens.
Rhino chuckled at the deliciousness of the situation. "The joke's on you, Cat. She hustled you good! In fact, I'm the only one who didn't fall for it, 'cause I'm educated!"
The cat shook her head, nose wrinkled as though she smelled something unpleasant. "Educated? You?" she turned to the red rat. "I assume he's spouting nonsense, but on the slight chance that he's not ...?"
"Trust me, it's not worth our time," the rat stated simply.
Mittens rolled her eyes. "It figures. By the way, love your fragrance. I'm usually not like this, and I don't expect you to say 'yes', but I have to ask: mind if I nibble on your tail real quick? I'll leave it intact ... ish."
"Yes," the red rat quickly responded.
Even more quickly, Mittens snapped at her but she pulled her tail away in the nick of time.
"HEY! I said 'NO'!" protested the rat.
"Technically, you said 'yes'," Mittens argued.
"I said 'yes', as in 'yes, I would mind!'" the rat explained.
Mittens shrugged: "To be fair, that was a slightly ambiguous answer. Next time, be a little more specific, 'kay?"
Suddenly, an icy blast passed the alley, followed by roaring flames. Bolt reflexively shielded the others with his body.
"This area is not secure!" he declared. "Hop on!"
The rats climbed onto his back and he shot down the alley, followed by Mittens and Rhino. However, he stopped when he reached a wired fence and stared at it intently.
The rats exchanged confused glances.
"Oh, um, my apologies," Bolt explained, catching himself. "Sometimes I forget that I don't have 'laser eyes'."
Instead of trying to decimate the fence with imaginary eye beams, Bolt quickly found a damaged area and slipped through it.
They had reached the middle of the alley when Mr. Incredible slammed into a streetlight not far beyond it, before tearing the structure from the ground and raising it like a melee weapon as he rushed back out of sight. Bolt stood stock-still, considering his options. It seemed they were in the eye of the storm - a pocket safe from the chaotic battle, but for how long? Was anywhere safe in this city-turned-war zone? Could they even leave the alley without getting caught in the crossfire?
"Why are they even fighting?" asked Mittens. "At this rate, they'll destroy the city! Aren't they supposed to 'protect and serve' or somethin'?"
"It doesn't make sense," the red rat agreed. "The cool-down period should have ended by now! Even so, I didn't design the Omega Aroma to induce such aggression. It's supposed to create positive emotions, but it's turning people, good people, into savages!"
"Well, night howlers do tend to have that effect," Remy commented.
"Wait ... so you're saying you caused this?" asked Bolt.
The red rat hesitated before giving a sober nod. "Yeah ..."
Bolt shrugged. "I guess it's not like you did it on purpose. Making mistakes is just part of life. You gotta forgive yourself and move on."
"Listen to yourself!" the rat countered. "I just told you that I'm responsible for this crisis and you shrugged it off! That's what the Omega Aroma does: it warps your thoughts and feelings so that you'll always see me in a positive light, no matter what I do! Even without the side effect of savagery, I'm not supposed to have that kind of power over people!"
"But you said it yourself," Remy argued. "It's not 'mind control'. That means that the super heroes are choosing to do this, even if your Omega Aroma is contributing to that choice."
"If it's not mind control, it's too close for comfort," she stated. "Besides, anything that makes it so easy to ignore your conscience can't be good."
Remy began to disagree. "But-"
"What if I asked you to risk a lot of lives or never see me again?" she interrupted. "What would you do?"
He paused a little too long, then began opening his mouth to answer.
"You hesitated," she stated before he could get a word out.
"Yeah but, I mean, I know the right choice," Remy argued. "It's just ... it's hard to think about not seeing you again."
"I would NUKE the PLANET for you!" Rhino emphatically declared.
The red rat's jaw dropped, but she quickly collected herself. "Case in point. I'm shutting down the Omega Aroma. You guys, stay safe. It's something I have to do alone."
"No, you don't," Bolt gently but firmly disagreed. "Mind control or not, this city needs all the heroes it can get. I'm not much, but if I can do something to help save it, or even just save you, count me in."
Mittens rolled her eyes. "Yup. Typical dog: loyal, pure, selfless, and you can't help but love 'im for it. I'm coming too."
"Then let's roll!" Rhino declared, accentuating his statement by rolling towards the mouth of the alley ... only to stop short. "Uh ... where again are we rolling, exactly?"
The red rat removed a colourful sphere from her bag, much like the one that she boiled to create the Omega Aroma. "This formula will cancel out the global chemical reaction, but it'll need to oxidise a very thin layer of metal to do it, preferably puddled iron - lots of it."
"'Puddled iron' ... that's the same as 'wrought iron', right?" asked Remy. "I'm sure we'll find some fairly easily, but chances are it'll be painted to prevent rusting. That might be a problem."
"The formula will easily permeate a thin layer of paint," she assured, slipping the chemical sphere back into the bag. "The only question is where are we gonna find that much iron? A tall structure is preferable, so that the formula can work its way down by the force of gravity. I know, I know, that isn't very straightforward, but I deliberately made the Omega Aroma difficult to reverse."
By chance, Rhino spotted a leaflet among the bits of trash scattered about, baring Paris's most famous monument.
"How 'bout the Eiffel Tower?" asked the hamster.
"Perfect!" the girl exclaimed.
Rhino turned to Remy. "Ha! Score one for the hamster! Take that, rat!"
The other rat was grinding her teeth. It was a habit of her species, but in this case it indicated her growing frustration with Rhino's antics.
"Honestly, Remy's been nothing but helpful since I created this mess," she declared, attempting to keep her calm, "and he's managed to remain relatively self-controlled in spite of the Omega Aroma, where a lot of other rats failed. He deserves your respect, so lay off the jabs."
"Ha ha HA!" Remy mocked. "Take that, shenanigan! Now roll over in your little ball and play dead!"
She was not amused. "Please don't tempt me to withdraw my praise."
Remy immediately calmed down. "Right ... sorry."
"I don't wanna question your judgement or anything, but look at him!" Rhino argued. "He's a rat! You're too good for him!"
"You know what?!" she snapped. "ENOUGH with the speceisism! I'm a rat!"
Rhino's eyes went wide and he froze when that revelation hit him like a hammer.
"Whaaa-?" he began. "I thought you were a mouse!"
"Shoulda quit while you weren't too far behind, buddy," Mittens commented.
Remembering that they were pressed for time, Remy looked to the mouth of the alley and found Bolt already there. Having slipped away during the conversation, the dog hugged the wall as he stared down the road, presumably checking to see if the coast was clear.
"Is it safe to move out?" asked Remy.
"Relatively," Bolt answered. "There's a little action further down the street, but it's moving away from us. We should be good to go very soon. The Eiffel Tower's a long way off, but I have a few ideas that could get us there in one piece. Then again ... I'm not sure if much of the tactical thinking I learned in my T.V. show applies to real life."
"Actually, it does," Rhino stated. "I watched a behind the scenes featurette on your show. They explained that they had Penny train you with a unique fusion of real K-9 disciplines, military tactics, unorthodox know-how and skills that don't exist in real-life combat. They even went so far as to boast that if you actually had powers, you would probably know exactly how to use them."
"How could they possibly know that?" asked Mittens.
Rhino gave her a deadpan stare. "Must you suck the wonder out of everything, Cat? Moving on. Bolt, did you consider the camouflage technique you used in episode 9?"
"Yes," Bolt confirmed. "But it's not foolproof. We'll need a more reliable means of staying out of sight. There are a lot of abandoned vehicles and I'm pretty sure I can hot-wire one. We can work together to drive it. That'll provide cover as well as transport."
"But the Big Heroes have a means to track me," the red rat stated. "I think Honey Lemon's been using her ChemiCalculator to trace the Omega Aroma."
"Then the sewers are our best bet at keeping you underground, no pun intended," Bolt went on, "but we could get lost down there ..."
"We won't," Rhino stated. "I more or less memorised Paris's sewage layout from a realistic map I saw in a movie."
"Hm," Mittens grunted in approval. "And all this time I thought your obsession with television turned your brain to mush."
"Balancing my education with with war-themed video games and graphic novels helped," Rhino stated, before grinning at the red rat. "See that? I'm worldly and multifaceted. You like guys like that, right? You strike me as the intelligent type."
"Sorry, I don't date outside my species," she responded. "Then again, I don't really date at all, but if I did, I'd stick to my species."
"Give me a chance, I'll grow on ya," Rhino encouraged with a wink.
She rolled her eyes. "Yeah, like fungus."
Bolt trotted to the centre of the alley and the others followed him.
"Remember that camouflage technique Rhino mentioned?" Bolt began. "I think I saw something around here that might help ..."
Suddenly, Violet's force blades scattered across the road beyond the alley, mincing the street and buildings. Two struck a telephone pole, splintering wood and severing power lines. The structure fell towards them, wires spitting sparks as they lashed against the sides of the alley.
"MOVE!" Bolt commanded.
He and his friends rushed across the alley, but when he glanced up and saw the pole practically on top of them, it became clear that they wouldn't make it in time.
"Penny, Remy! On my head, NOW!" urged Bolt.
The rats moved from his back to his skull and he immediately flung them forward with a jerk of the neck, just as the pole came down.
Coming to a stop after tumbling across the ground, the rodents looked back to find that the pole hadn't fallen all the way, held back by the wires that remained intact. However, the broken wires dangled to the ground, snaring Bolt, Mittens and Rhino in a web of electricity. Whatever protection Rhino's ball had afforded was quickly obliterated as the arcs melted through the plastic.
"F-f-f-finish the mission, P-Penny!" Bolt uttered spasmodically before collapsing.
The rats' jaws hung at the horrible sight.
"No ... This can't happen, NO!" th girl shrieked.
"We have to cut the power!" Remy declared.
"Wait ..." she began. "I ... think there's another way! If we cut the power, the damage will be irreversible! We need the electricity to revive them!"
"It's too much, it'll only make the damage worse!" Remy insisted. "We need to cut the power!"
"There IS another way, it's at the tip of my mind!" she repeated before grabbing her head as if to squeeze out the answer. "Come on, brain! You have the answer! THINK! THIIIINK!"
Remy half-expected her to shout 'BRAIN BLAST!', but instead her eyes grew distant as she seemed to slip into a trance-like calm.
"What happened?" Remy demanded. "Are you okay!?"
[Accessing archives: DC C0M1CS,] she began in a monotone voice, ignoring him. [Speed Force Equation: 3X2(9YZ)4A. Translating equation to chemical formula. Adapt for D1ZN3Y/P1XAR conditions with A113 principle. Tweak with Chemical X. Unexpected but advantageous side effects are inevitable.]
Her trance broke and she darted off, with Remy hastening to keep up with her.
"We can save them!" she declared as they exited the alley, "but we're going to have to act fast!"
Suddenly, a blur swooped in and they found themselves caught in the crushing grip of a young speedster.
"ACK! My INSIDES!" the red rat shrieked. "Not again! NOT AGAIN!"
"YEAH, BABY! I got the rats, again!" Dash cheered. "Eat your heart out, GoGo! ... Wherever you are. Oh! That's right! You're too busy eating my DUST, ha ha! YEOWCH!"
A bite from Remy persuaded Dash to drop the rats. The moment he hit the ground, Remy scurried up the boy's body until he got to the top of the head.
"Hey! Get off me!" Dash exclaimed.
He tried to reach for the rodent, but his hand stopped short when Remy pulled his hair. Again and again, the boy's attempts to get at the rat were thwarted as he seemed to lose control of his body every time his hair was yanked by Remy. It almost felt as if he were fighting himself!
"Just gotta- get the right- follicle combination!" Remy declared, dodging and hopping Dash's grabs every now and then.
"What are you doing to him?" asked the raspberry rat.
"Everyone has a thing," Remy explained as he continued to grapple with Dash's hair. "Some are double-jointed, others can roll their tongues. Me? I can hijack control of people's bodies by pulling their hair like puppet strings."
Remy gave Dash's hair one last yank and the boy's hands snapped to his side as if he were a soldier standing at attention.
"That was strangely involuntary," commented a confused Dash.
With a few gentle hair pulls, Remy made the boy kneel and extend his hand for the other rat to climb onto it.
"I thought your thing was cooking," she stated as she stepped onto Dash's palm.
"I have multiple 'things'," Remy explained, lifting her to Dash's head with the kid's hand. "That's part of what makes me an eligible bachelor."
"Seriously? We're doing this here? Now?" she asked while hopping from Dash's palm to his head.
Remy took on a whimsical air as he quoted a line he had heard in a movie: "Why not here? Why not now?"
The red rat's response was quick and urgent. "BECAUSE BOLT AND HIS FRIENDS ARE THIS CLOSE TO-!"
"OH, right, right!" Remy replied with renewed urgency. Flinging Dash's hair like a pair of reins, Remy gave the command. "Ride like the wind, Bullseye!"
"Stop! This is child labour!" Dash complained as his arms flailed like a rearing horse's hooves.
With that, the boy rushed down the road against his will.
"So, where are we going?" asked Remy.
"We need to find a lab with advanced chemical facilities," she responded. "This is your city. Do you have any idea where-?"
Both rodents gasped as the same thought popped into their heads.
"Honey Lemon's purse!" they blurted in unison.
"... and when you add baking soda at that exact moment, the chemical composition is enhanced so that it's indistinguishable from gourmet food," Honey Lemon stated.
"So you mean I've been warming up leftovers the wrong way all this time?" asked Mrs. Incredible.
Honey Lemon shrugged. "Don't beat yourself up, everyone does."
"I have got to get more of your tips!" Elastigirl stated. "Is there any way I can follow you online?"
"Just go to the Big Hero 6 blog," Honey Lemon instructed. "There, I go by 'Tall Girl'. Long story."
"Thanks! Will do," the super declared.
"Sooo ..." Honey Lemon ventured. "Now that we're friends-ish, would you mind letting me go?"
"If I do that, you'll just run of and join your teammates, leaving me in this embarrassing position," Elastigirl stated. "You could say 'misery likes company'."
"I could dissolve the hardened chemicals release you!" the Big Hero chirped.
"Will you release me?" the Incredible pressed.
"Yes! ... maybe ... no. Sorry," Honey Lemon answered, unable to bring herself to lie.
Elastigirl tightened her grip. "Well then, there's your answer."
In the next instant, Dash zoomed into the wrecking yard to find his mom and Honey Lemon stuck in the same position he had left them.
"Oh, finally!" Mrs. Incredible sighed in relief. "Sweetie, mommy really needs your help. I think I know how to dissolve the chemicals, but- Wait a minute ... what's that beeping sound? Are you typing chemical combinations into the Big Hero's purse!? Stop that! That thing is not a toy!"
"Yeah, it's really not," Honey Lemon agreed. "You do not want to end up like Globby."
"You're right! I should listen to you!" Dash growled, making a fruitless effort to snatch the rats off of his head. "Grr! Sorry, Mom! The rats somehow took control of my body! I couldn't help you even if I tried!"
Mrs. Incredible paused ... before unleashing her motherly wrath. "LOOK, BOY! THAT'S THE STUPIDEST EXCUSE I'VE HEARD SINCE THIS MORNING! I'm CRAMPED and I'm MISERABLE and I will GROUND. YOU. TO. DUST IF YOU DON'T GET ME OUT OF HERE YESTERDAY!"
Dash whimpered while Honey Lemon yelped.
"Ow! Your arm is CONSTRICTING!" the Big Hero exclaimed. "My FLESH! My BONES! My ORGANS!"
Elastigirl loosened her grip. "Sorry."
Remy took a moment to glance between Honey Lemon and the other rodent.
"Yup, I screamed more or less the same thing not half an hour ago," the red rat stated, predicting his thoughts. "Hey, I said that Honey Lemon was my role model. It's kind of spooky how well I mimicked some of her thought processes."
Honey Lemon examined Dash. "Um, Elastigirl? in your son's defense, it really does look like the rats are controlling him which, frankly, is not the weirdest thing I've seen as a super hero. The red one appears to be giving the blue one instructions, and she's wearing a crossbody bag like a little person! I don't know, maybe there's more going on-"
The Big Hero paused as Dash punched in the last digit in her purse, causing it to produce a chem ball which made her eyes pop.
"-More going on than we think ..." Honey Lemon finished, trailing off in wonder.
Dash held and beheld the golden chem ball, his mouth ajar as bolts of amber lightning rushed around it in a never-ending race. At first, he was afraid to touch it, but curiously the apparent electricity didn't zap his fingers on contact.
"Incredible!" the boy commented.
That was all he could say before he found himself zooming from the wrecking yard at Remy's command.
"Was that a 'whoosh'?" asked Elastigirl.
"No! I mean yes! I mean it's just wind!" Honey Lemon half-lied.
"I can't see much from this angle," Elastigirl stated. "Is that boy merely beyond my vision, or is he gone?"
Honey Lemon was rightly afraid to give the answer. "Um ... he's gone. Sorry- Too tight! ACK! My INSIDES! Not again! NOT AGAIN!"
Lacking Dash's speedster brain, Remy didn't trust himself to pilot the boy at optimum speed. As such, he limited Dash to a steady 70mph which, for the boy, was like a light jog. Remy only hoped that it was fast enough.
In a minute or so, Dash had returned to the alley where Bolt, Mittens and Rhino lay. He had never actually entered the alley on his first arrival. Thus, he hadn't quite caught sight of the shock victims until his second visit. Now that he had, their dire predicament drew a gasp from his lungs. At Remy's command, he hurled the chem ball into the tangle of electricity that claimed them. That ball burst into a cloud of gold that hung on the air, but didn't seem to improve the situation.
The rats quietly observed Bolt and company. Dash made no further attempts to struggle, mostly on account of wanting to see what would happen next.
Remy attempted to break the tension with a question. "So, I heard you say something about the 'Speed Force'. What is it, exactly?"
"Just one of those crazy things my brain spits out under pressure," responded the red rat. "I'm not totally sure what it is, but I think it allows lifeforms to metabolise electricity, or something to that effect. In this case, initial exposure should bring about a miraculous recovery."
"Mm," Remy grunted in acknowledgement, attempting keep his mind (and eyes) off of the horrific sight of Bolt and his friends. "Sounds a bit like something from 'The Flash' T.V. series."
"It's as real as we are," she answered, repeating her statement about the Flubber Formula.
Suddenly, the electricity turned gold before developing three distinct hues: amber, green and red, the separate colours gravitating towards Bolt, Mittens and Rhino respectively. Their bodies seemed to drink the unique hues with insatiable thirst, but despite that thirst, the electricity only grew in intensity. Dash instinctively began to step back, and Remy had no desire to interfere with the boy's unauthorised movement. Finally, the swarm of dancing light reached a climax and blasted into the telephone pole above the animals, reducing it to a splintered husk of ash and cutting the power for good.
All was silent, but Bolt and company remained completely still.
"Heh, maybe they'll develop super powers," Remy joked.
The red rat's face fell as she sighed. "It's been so long since they first got zapped. More than likely, they're just super dead."
Suddenly, Bolt sprang to his feet with a loud gasp and not a hint of injury. The rats screamed in surprise, but Dash's shriek was by far the most frantic. After sneaking a few late-night horror movies, his imagination was running wild once he saw the dog seemingly return to life. The boy began to run away, only for Remy to reel him back to the mouth of the alley with a few hair tugs.
Remembering what had happened before he lost consciousness, Bolt examined Rhino and Mittens, sniffing them. They remained unconscious, but they were breathing steadily and he couldn't identify any sign of bodily damage. Good. But how were they still breathing? The last thing he remembered was the telephone pole hanging overhead and ... and, it was still there, he quickly discovered - what was left of it, anyway. His mind drew a blank. What on Earth could have happened to it? Why had it been barbecued while he felt like a million bucks? He had a lot of questions, but decided to settle for that which was most pressing at the moment.
"Penny? Remy? You okay?" asked the dog.
"Aside from the fact that I almost wet myself, I'm good," the red rat declared.
"Me too," Remy added. "Although the 'wetting' part is still a possibility."
Bolt nodded. "Okay. Fill me in once we've finished the mission," suddenly, he stared into the heavens. "Wait ... up in the sky, what is that?"
Remy followed his gaze. "I think it's a bird."
"Or a plane," suggested the red rat, before she squinted as the object drew exponentially closer. "It's ... Baymax! He's coming for me!"
The concern in her voice was all Bolt needed to hear before darting in front of Dash and the rats.
"Stay behind me and duck!" he commanded as the robot swooped towards them.
Dash was ducking by instinct before Remy had the chance to make him do it.
Though Bolt's body probably provided little protection, he did the only thing he knew to do when an inevitable collision threatened someone he cared about: he lowered his head and prepared to take the impact. However, speed was a funny thing. It was intrinsic to motion, and motion was intrinsic to everything. What did you get when molecules refused to move when faced with shattering impact? Something that could easily be mistaken for invulnerability. The forces behind speed were also akin to the forces responsible for power.
What did that mean for Bolt?
It meant that when Monster Baymax crashed into him with staggering force, Bolt's body had the integrity to hold itself together, and the strength to stand its ground.
The robot spun out of control as if hitting a speed bump at a hundred miles per hour.
{I'll be back,} declared Monster Baymax, striking a wall and falling into a dumpster.
Dash and the rats stared in dumbfounded silence. At first, Bolt was simply thrilled to have defended them and stayed in one piece. Understandably, that thrill quickly germinated confusion.
"Did ... did you SEE that?" Bolt gushed. "Something like that hasn't happened since I was on T.V., but this ISN'T T.V.! I mean, the collision kinda hurt, but how am I even still alive?"
"I ... think it has something to do with how I saved you from electrocution ..." the red rodent slowly stated.
"What'd you DO?" asked Bolt. "Douse me with radioactive chemicals?"
"Close enough," she answered.
They jumped as Monster Baymax emerged from the dumpster.
{I'm back, hairy babies,} the robot declared.
Bolt bared his teeth as he glared daggers at the robot. However, instead of daggers, monstrous bolts of amber lightning erupted from his eyes like writhing serpents, straight from the heart of the Speed Force. They struck Monster Baymax with staggering impact and the robot's servos convulsed in spasm.
{System error,} Baymax mumbled before flopping back into the dumpster.
Great. The robot was down. Now how was Bolt supposed to switch off the lightning? He squeezed his eyes shut in an attempt to hold it in, but the electricity stung the lids until he was forced to open them once again.
Panicking, Bolt shook his head, tearing searing gashes into the alley's walls and scarcely missing Dash and the rats in the process. Power surges rippled across the block, super charging electronics until many exploded in bursts of sparks. Realising the danger he posed, Bolt angled his lightning into the sky where it could do no harm.
The Incredibles and Big Hero 6 could not help but pause their skirmish and gawk at the sight of the tremendous power unleashed into the heavens.
"Come on, Bolty! Focus!" the dog yelled, coaching himself.
Splitting the clouds, his lightning narrowed into a jagged stream. Finally, it dissipated and Bolt was able to close his eyes, panting in both emotional and physical fatigue.
"It's ... it's not exactly 'laser eyes' ..." Bolt commented between breaths.
"Now I know what the kid on the tricycle felt like ..." Dash muttered, before scrunching his eyebrows. "Wait ... why's my hair wet?"
All eyes darted to the walls as the entire alley began to rumble. With key structures annihilated by Bolt's lightning, there was nothing left for the buildings to do but collapse.
"I'm out!" Dash declared before zipping from the alley to the sidewalk on the opposite side of the street. Much to his surprise, Bolt was right beside him when he stopped.
Having carried Mittens' limp form, the dog quickly set the feline down.
"Stay clear!" he commanded as he dashed back to the alley. "I'm going back for Rhino!"
Unfortunately, he wasn't quite sure how to reactivate his speed. It came in sputtering bursts, propelling him forward in brief flashes of lightning. However, by the time he reached Rhino, he was well aware that the walls had practically fallen apart around him. The good news was that his speed had finally kicked in full-time, allowing him to process the world with such swiftness that it might as well have been moving in slow motion. The bad news was that when he looked up, he almost bumped his head on the collapsing buildings. The path he had taken had already been buried, leaving him with nowhere to go and little time to think, even with his speed. Luckily, the yellow lightning crackling around him lit the cramped up pocket he occupied after the buildings blocked out the Sun. Well, it was time to see if his new slew of powers included some form of his mightiest, most famous ability.
Rhino briefly opened his eyes as Bolt bent back his head and braced himself. The cramped up space had diminished to the point where a piece of building brushed against the dog's nose, but hopefully not for long.
*( ( (( ARF! )) ) )*
His bark pulverised a path through the falling structures directly above him. He grabbed Rhino's partially melted ball and leaped through the concrete-turned-dust, erupting from the top several storeys up before landing on the street with the shattered structure shrouded in a cloud of powder behind him.
Using a broken section of Rhino's ball as a mouth-hold, he trotted to the sidewalk where Dash stood and gently placed the hamster on the ground. Funny. He could almost swear he heard Rhino mutter the word "awesome ..."
"You're BOLT the SUPERDOG!" Dash squealed. "My family is SO adopting ALL of you!"
"And thank you so much for drawing attention to yourself!" the red rat chirped, secure in the knowledge that he had no idea what she was saying. "Remy, could you hold your breath, please?"
The blue rat nodded, sucked in a lung full of air and she leaned over Dash's forehead, throwing a Blue Berry into his face. It exploded into a cloud of fumes and the super shook his head in surprise.
"What was that?" he asked, more confused than concerned.
The excited gleam in his eyes quickly faded as the lids fluttered and his muscles began to go limp.
"That's it. Ease him down, Remy," she instructed.
The blue rat made sure that Dash's descent to the ground was as soft as possible before the boy was out like a light and was snoring to boot.
"There, now he can't follow us," she stated, dusting her paws.
"Care for a lift?" asked Bolt. "I think Rhino and Mittens will be fine for now if we leave for a quick trip to the Eiffel Tower."
"Oh, you're too kind," the red rat replied.
The moment they mounted him, his ears shifted and he froze on high alert ... then ducked as an open hand came speeding by, narrowly missing the rats. It was none other than GoGo Tomago. By the time she made a U turn to swoop in a second time, Bolt was already running in the opposite direction. Though his speed was considerable by dog standards, it was not nearly swiftly enough to outrun GoGo.
"Penny, say 'zoom zoom'," Bolt instructed, cracking an excited grin.
"Why?" asked the red rat.
"Come on, you'll love it!" Bolt insisted with growing enthusiasm. "I've always wanted to do this for real! Say 'Bolt, zoom zoom!'."
"Okay," she conceded. "Bolt, zoom zoo-!"
She didn't even have to finish that command.
Remy had seen his share of sci-fi flicks, and he knew what it looked like when a star ship went into 'hyperdrive'. Everything, no matter how far or near, became an incomprehensible blur as it tore by with staggering speed. The red rat hadn't watched such sci-fi flicks, but even so they boasted nothing more than special effects on a rectangular screen. When Bolt turned her 'zoom zoom' command into action, there was nothing that could fully prepare them for the dizzying G-forces; the raging, pounding wind; backlashing turns and mind-numbing blurs of his terrifying, terrifying, blazing speed.
If GoGo's jaw hung when she saw Dash in action, it flat out hit the ground when Bolt vanished into the distance, leaving a stream of yellow lightning cracking in his wake.
Meanwhile, Dash's speedster physiology quickly eliminated the knock-out gas in his system. He awoke with a yelp, not quite knowing where the animals had gone, but one thing was certain: if he wanted to find them, far less catch them, he needed help.
Yeah, I know it may seem a bit of a stretch to make the Speed Force responsible for Bolt's powers, but hear me out. Throughout The Flash's history, the Speed Force has been used for a LOT of things other than merely running fast. Applications include: lightning projection; enhanced durability; accelerated healing; infinite mass punches; phasing through walls; enhanced strength (through muscle growth acceleration); wind manipulation, and I'm not talking about simply running in a circle to create a cyclone; cloning; energy constructs; time travel; speed stealing; enhanced intelligence (Speed Mind); weird transformations via DNA vibration and the list goes on. In addition, there are three other fundamental forces in the DC universe that exist directly alongside the Speed Force, and yet the Speed Force, at various points in history, is shown to be capable of replicating aspects of them all. Did I mention there are multiple forms of exotic matter in the Speed Force, which have resulted in powers that have no apparent relation to speed? Needless to say, it's SHOCKINGLY versatile.
Here they are the Easter eggs and references for this chapter. Do you think you can identify their sources?
1. Rhino: "Yeah! Feel every PIECE o' that ball!"
2. Mitten's middle names (her last name is significant too, but I'll explain it below).
3. Rhino: "Give me a chance, maybe I'll grow on ya,"
Red rat: "Yeah, like fungus."
4. Remy half-expected her to shout 'BRAIN BLAST!',
5. Dash: "That was strangely involuntary."
6. Dash: "You're right! I should listen to you!"
7. Bolt: "Wait ... up in the sky, what is that?"
Remy: "I think it's a bird."
Red rat: "Or a plane."
8. Monster Baymax: {I'll be back.}
9. The phrase "terrifying, terrifying blazing speed."
On a related note, I've read that Mittens is (apparently) of German descent. The last name I gave her, 'Schrödinger', is based on that of Erwin Schrödinger, a scientist from Austria (which is close to Germany). Why is that important? Because that scientist came up with an experiment called 'Schrödinger's Cat'. I won't go into the details, but that experiment involves quantum mechanics and a cat that, in theory, can be both fully dead and fully alive at the same time. It can be referred to as a paradox. That name is a nod to three things: her heritage, the simple fact that she's a cat, and the unique relationship she will soon have with potential death. You'll find out what I mean in later chapters.
By the way, who, or what, do you think the red rat is?
Thanks for reading!