Hi everyone. Didn't expect another update this quickly, huh? Well, I'm trying to be a bit more frequent with my Avengers updates. But don't worry, I'm making sure I get plenty of rest in between each of my stories to make sure I don't burn myself out. That said, let us get straight into the action that is Avengers of the Multiverse!
Part 2
Masters' Blasters, a trio of teenage Ghost Hunters that had become a relatively more recent addition to Amity Park's defense against all ghost-threats, at least compared to Danny Phantom, made their way to the outskirts of the town in their own jet before coming to a stop right at the border of the city as rain began to fall hard.
"Dude, remind me again why we're doing this?" Thrash questioned.
"Phantom's team is supposed to drop in soon, so we gotta hold the line and keep those ghosts from getting to City Hall where all the townsfolk are hiding." Vid informed him.
"But why are we working with Phantom? He got his own team now, and he's almost always outta town!" Download stated. "Maybe he should stay out and leave it to us to handle all the ghosts."
Vid rolled her eyes in annoyance. "Cause 'Mayor Foley' said so. Look guys, I don't like it either, but that guy's keeping us on our payroll, so we gotta do what he says."
"Well sort of team that Phantom dweeb got anyway?" Thrash asked. "Can't be anything special if they're working with him."
"Let's show those guys who's really the best there is." Download said with ambition. "We handled these two ghosts before; we can do it again!"
"Well let's get to work, cause here comes one of them now!" Vid pointed out the window where they saw the rain intensify, accompanied by thunder and lightning as a giant green cloud in the form of a ghost rapidly made its way toward Amity Park. It stopped just above the Blasters' jet, easily dwarfing the small vessel.
Despite that, the Blasters didn't lose their confidence even as they saw the lightning surging around the cloud-skull.
"Lightning again? Try to be more original dude." Download turned on the jet's electrical shield, generating a sphere of electric power around the vessel.
However, they failed to notice the ground beneath them crack open as two large plants, both resembling giant Venus Fly Traps, emerged and quickly shot up from the ground. They made their way to the vessel and bit down on the electrical barrier, quickly draining its power, much to the Blasters' shock.
"Whoa! What happened?!" Vid exclaimed.
"Where's our shield?!" Thrash shouted.
With their shield gone, a bolt of lightning was shot down from the cloud skull's eyes to completely wreck the jet. Fortunately, the auto-eject kicked in just in the nick of time to launch the Blasters to safety just before their jet exploded. However, before their parachutes could deploy, all three of them were quickly ensnared by vines that emerged from the ground, followed by their controller as he loomed over them.
"Foolish insects. Certain plants are capable of absorbing and conducting energy!" Undergrowth stated. "Billions of years of absorbing sunlight through photosynthesis and being struck by natural lightning is vasty superior to anything you pathetic fleshlings can create!"
"Dude, you're a freaking plant! How the hell do you know all this?!"
"Ah, there it is." The cloud skull's mouth opened up as Vortex descended down to meet the trapped Blasters as well. "The arrogance of man, who think that with their so-called advancements that nature is under their control, when in fact it is the other way around."
"And in the case of you three… quite literally." Undergrowth snickered as he unleashed his mind-controlling spores on the defenseless Masters' Blasters.
Meanwhile, at Amity Park's City Hall, a satellite-like tower had been built over the building as it projected the Ghost Shield over the entire city block surrounding City Hall. A majority of Amity Park's residence had been quickly evacuated to the safe zone that was established the second Undergrowth and Vortex were spotted just outside the city, while the rest was evacuated on the other side.
Currently inside the building was Tucker along with Jazz as they monitored the situation inside and outside the safe zone from a security room through multiple monitors.
"Alright, looks like most of the city has been evacuated." Tucker said.
"Let's hope Danny can get the rest of his team here soon." Jazz commented.
"That's the thing about the multiverse and parallel dimensions. It's cool and all, but inter-dimensional travel time makes things a whole lot less convenient." Tucker said in partial annoyance. He contacted the rest of his friends outside. "How's it looking out there everyone?"
"So far so good." Sam reported as she and Dani in their ghost forms flew around the outside of the Ghost Shield with the armored Valerie. "Aside from the rain, skies are clear for now."
"Ground's looking clear too." Maddie radioed as she and Jack manned the Fenton RV and drove around the perimeter of the shield. "No sign of any ghost activity."
"If those two ghosts wanna mess with my city, they gotta go through us!" Jack stated firmly.
"It's kinda weird though that we got Vortex and Undergrowth together." Dani said. "I didn't think those two would ever work with… well… anyone. Didn't Vlad try to control Vortex one time?"
"Yeah, and it blew up in all our faces." Valerie commented with resentment.
"Not to mention Undergrowth's all about making the world his own personal forest." Sam added. "What's even more weird though, is that weather and forests are actually dependent on each other. So Undergrowth and Vortex together does make sense on paper."
"Except for the fact that they're both a bunch of blowhards." Tucker said but he and Jazz were suddenly alerted as the alarm sounded in their monitoring room. The radar popped up as it picked up two large Ecto-signals incoming.
"Heads up guys! We got company!" Jazz alerted everyone.
True to her word, as the intense rain began to pick up around the area, Vortex descended from the clouds while Undergrowth emerged from the ground with enough force to cause a small earthquake. Sam, Dani, Valerie, and the Fenton RV were ready for battle as both ghosts gave roars and were ready to unleash everything that they had on the insects below.
That is until a large red portal opened up and the Avengers Quinjet flew out, firing multiple lasers at both Undergrowth and Vortex to blast them back slightly. The Quinjet's bay door opened up while airborne as Danny Phantom flew out alongside Rex in his Boogie Pack, Ben in the form of Jetray, Octus, Lance in his Manus armor, Illana in her Corus armor, and Jake in his dragon form.
"Hey, what did we miss?" Danny asked in a joking sense as he flew alongside his girlfriend.
"What is it with you and the dramatic timing?" Sam replied in the same tone.
"Vortex and Undergrowth together, huh?" Danny noted, getting serious. "Yeah, really need the whole team for this one."
Within the Quinjet, Zak was at the controls with Fiskerton, Kim, Ron, who had Rufus on his shoulder, Breach, Zon, and Komodo all sitting behind him. They saw the recovering Undergrowth and Vortex on the monitors.
"So, we got a pair of giant ghosts, one that can control all forms of weather, and the other that can manipulate plant life." Kim noted. "You got quite the rogue's gallery, Danny."
"Tell me about it."Danny said with a sigh of annoyance.
"Guys! We just got a breach in the Ghost Shield!" Tucker alerted everyone.
"I thought ghosts couldn't get through that thing!" Jake questioned.
"It's not ghosts…" Jazz said as she saw who the intruders were that had penetrated the Ghost Shield. "It's the Blasters." She took notice of their green colored eyes. "Looks like Undergrowth got to them."
"If they bring the shield down from the inside, everyone taking shelter will be at risk!" Tucker said.
"That's not gonna happen." Kim stated as she stood from her seat. "Breach, can you get the rest of us inside?"
"Not a problem." Breach assured.
"Alright. I'll stay in the Quinjet." Zak said as he turned to his adoptive brother. "Fisk, I could use my wingman in the gunner's seat."
"Yessir!" Fiskerton saluted as he went in the gunner's seat and gripped the controls with enthusiasm and determination.
"Beam us down, Breach!" Ron grinned.
"Booyah!" Rufus cheered.
Breach giggled at their enthusing. "It's not technically 'beaming', but sure." She opened a portal to send Kim, Ron, Rufus, Zon, and Komodo away. "I'll be heading outside myself to help the others." She told Zak.
"Alright, be careful." Zak said as Breach opened a portal for herself to step outside.
"Okay, here's the plan!" Danny contacted everyone. "Mom, Dad, you guys stick to the ground make sure none of Undergrowth's plants get too close! I'm not taking any chances that he can use any non-ghost plants to get past the shield!"
"Leave it to us, Danny." Maddie replied as the Fenton RV's weapons sprang to life, including a giant buzz-saw on the roof.
"Dani, Ben, Octus, Illana, Zak, and Valerie, you take care of Vortex!" Danny continued. "Sam, Rex, Jake, Lance, Breach, we'll handle Undergrowth! But watch your backs, literally! Those mind-vines of his are a real pain!"
"Aye-aye captain." Rex said as the groups split off to engage their respective ghosts.
While in the air, the Quinjet opened fire with its lasers at Vortex as Jetray, Illana, Dani, Valerie, and Octus unleashed all their long-ranged attacks of beams and energy bolts. All struck Vortex, which caused him to howl in pain. He growled in anger before he generated a large and powerful tornado around himself to act as a shield from all the attacks before expanding it to push them all back.
Though most of them were able to pick themselves back up, Zak struggled to stabilize the Quinjet with Fiskerton screaming in his seat, but Zak was able to pull up on the controls to steady the airborne vehicle.
"Ah, so you must be the Avengers I've heard so much about." Vortex noted. "So far, I've yet to be impressed."
"Oh yeah? Well, you're not all that big yourself." Jetray mocked. "Weather powers? Seriously? Can you get any lamer than that?"
"What's he doing? Is he trying to piss him off?!" Valerie questioned.
"I think that's exactly what he's trying to do." Illana knew Ben long enough to know that he wouldn't openly mock his enemy unless he was trying to provoke him.
"A little wind and rain, so what?" The hovering Jetray went on. "Where's the oomph? Add a little extra thunder why don't ya?"
Vortex growled. "Insolent pest! You wish for thunder? Then be struck down by my lightning!" Vortex raised his hands to generate a massive sphere of electrical power, one that was about as large as the ghost himself. He threw it down toward Jetray, who sped up directly to it before pressing the Omnitrix symbol on his chest.
In that instant, Ben had transformed from Jetray into Feedback right as the sphere made contact. But rather than explode in a display of intense electricity, Feedback's antennas and fingers extended outward to directly absorb all the lightning from the attack. Vortex could only look in shock as he saw his attack be completely neutralized.
"WHAT?!"
"Thanks for the juice, chump!" Feedback smirked as he thrusted his hands to blast all the absorbed electricity right back at the weather ghost, scoring a direct hit that blasted Vortex out of the sky and sent him crashing along the ground.
"He's down! Get him!" Illana stated as she, Octus, Valerie, and Dani flew down to strike Vortex before he could pull himself up. Illana and Octus fired beams and bolts of energy all across the downed Vortex while Dani threw a series of Ecto-disks as Valerie tossed a handful of her anti-ghost grenades. The resulting explosions all across Vortex's body caused him a great deal of pain.
However, Vortex's entire body had broken apart and dispersed in the form of multiple green clouds before they all ascended above the group as Feedback stood on the roof of the Quinjet and reconverged as Vortex took his natural form again with a look of rage on his face.
"Pitiful bugs!" The weather ghost bellowed. "You think you can defeat a force of nature?! Face the full furry of the maelstrom!" He ascended higher in the air as the clouds around him circled at a rapid rate, lighting and thunder flashing brightly and sounding loudly as Vortex prepared to unleash all the power that he had at his fingertips.
Undergrowth roared as Danny was the first to attack him with a powerful blast of cyan Ecto energy, freezing the upper part of his body. But he was quick to break free before rushing his opponent to slap him back with the back of his hand. However, he glanced up to see Rex in his Boogie Pack hovering above him before Rex withdrew his flying build and formed his Smack Hands, using their weight and gravity to send him crashing and smashing into Undergrowth's face to knock the plant behemoth to the ground. He glared as he saw the smirking Rex standing on a root.
"I got respect for nature. Just not a crappy oversized weed like you." Rex taunted.
Undergrowth roared again as he summoned a trio of giant sentient cacti around Rex, which tried to pound on him, but Rex was quick to form his Block Party to shield himself from their blows. This allowed Lance a chance to come in as he drew a sword from his armor to cut down one of the cacti and swung again to bisect the second before firing his gatling cuffs to tear down the third. Lance then unleashed a volley of missiles from his armor at Undergrowth, creating explosions all over his body.
However, any damage that he had sustained was quickly repaired and regrown. "Your metallic weapons are inferior to the green's regenerative power!" Undergrowth bellowed. He tried to bring down his massive arms onto Rex and Lance, only for a red portal to open up in front of them. When his arms sank into the portal, Breach was quick to close it and sever Undergrowth's arms and leave him open.
"Then it's time to turn up the heat!" Jake flew forward alongside Sam, whose eyes were glowing a bright orange. Jake was the first to attack, blasting an inferno from his mouth right at Undergrowth's face, already causing his head and shoulders to light on fire. At the same time, Sam created a large Ecto-spear in her hands, which lit aflame with ghostly fire, right as she used it to pierce into Undergrowth's chest. She then pulled the spear up to drag the flames all across his body, lighting him on fire even more before she pulled back.
Sam and Jake pulled back, as did Rex and Lance, to regroup with Danny over a rooftop that Breach sent herself over to via portal as they observed Undergrowth's body being seemingly burnt to ashes.
That is until the flames quickly died out to reveal Undergrowth was not only still standing, but his entire body was also coated in a dark brown, almost black, armor that resembled like a giant tree.
"Fools! Forest fires only make the green stronger!" The armored plant ghost stated. "The oak is slow to burn and not so easily flammable!" He generated a multitude of massive wooden spikes all over his body and launched them like missiles at the group, which Breach was quick to counter as she brought up a portal to not only act as a shield but redirect all the projectiles at Undergrowth from behind as a portal opened up behind him. However, all the spikes broke and shattered upon impact of his oak-armor.
"That armor of his is too thick! It's gonna be hard to cut through!" Breach informed.
"Can't you go intangible and burn or freeze him from the inside?" Lance asked.
"No can do." Danny shook his head. "His ghost-plants counter our intangibility. We can't phase through his armor."
Sam sighed in annoyance. "Just when this guy couldn't be a bigger pain in the rear."
"Then we'll just have to do this the old-fashioned way." Rex formed his Sky Slyder and Bad Axes and was the first to fly forward and on the attack, followed by the rest of his teammates.
Under the influence of Undergrowth's spores, the brainwashed Masters' Blasters had managed to walk through the Ghost Shield with little issue. They mindlessly walked like zombies straight toward the city hall building and aimed their weapons at the shield projector. However, right before they fired, a red portal had opened up in front of them as Kim suddenly emerged from it with an airborne roundhouse kick to knock all three of them back.
They got back up with growls to see Kim Possible with her Battle Suit humming to life, Ron Stoppable with his blue Mystic Monkey Aura shinning, along with Zon and Komodo and even Rufus who leapt to the ground with a martial arts stance of his own.
"Sorry, I think you three are aiming those things in the wrong direction." Kim said.
"Fancy weapons you guys got." Ron said confidently. "Let's see how well you use em."
"Let's do it!" Rufus said eagerly with Komodo and Zon cawing and growling with just as much excitement.
All three zombified Masters' Blasters opened fire with their Ecto-weapons, causing the group to disperse to avoid them all. Vid gave pursuit of Kim on her weaponized skateboard, firing her energy gun at the young woman, who flipped over each blast with her superior gymnastics. After getting some distance, Kim stood her ground as Vid fired another shot at her, but Kim was able to catch the blast with her gauntlet arm before throwing it back at Vid to blast the weapon out of her hand. When Vid kicked the jet-boosters in her skateboard active, she rocketed straight towards Kim, who leapt toward her while also grabbing Vid by the shoulders to throw her off her ride and send her crashing to the ground. Not taking the chance to wait for her to get up, Kim fell back down to land a solid kick to Vid's gut to knock the wind out of her and knock her unconscious.
"Brainwashed or not, they can still be knocked out!" Kim called out to Ron.
"No problem, KP!" Ron said as he faced Thrash who held a heavy artillery Ecto-weapon and fired an energized net at Ron, who merely flexed his aura to repel it. "Danny said you guys used to work for Vlad, and that you're a bunch of jerks. So, I don't think he'd mind it if we knocked you out too bad?" He smirked as he made a 'come here' gesture with his hand.
Throwing away his net-gun, Thrash had quipped a pair of Ecto-gauntlets and rushed Ron to throw a punch, but Ron parried it with a chop of his hand and kicked Thrash in the chest to knock him back. Getting back up, Thrash threw a few grenades at Ron, who easily gave a backflip kick to knock them into the air before they even detonated. Growling even further, the brainwashed Thrash tried to rush Ron again, but when he tried to punch him, Ron swerved and delivered a chop with his hands to shatter the right gauntlet. When Thrash tried to punch with the other one, Ron chopped that one to pieces too.
"Mystic Monkey Kung Fu, bro." Ron gloated before he dodged another blunt punch from Thrash and gave a chop to the back of his neck to knock him out. "Beats muscle-headed brute strength every time."
Download dual-wielded a pair of Ecto guns and fired at the flying Zon, who gave a caw to keep the brainwashed teen focused on her. With Download distracted, it left him vulnerable for the invisible Komodo to sneak up behind him and pounce on him, pinning him to the ground with his claws on his back. Komodo then used his claws and fangs to tear out Download's electrical wiring and his suit's built-in-technology. However, Download was able to push Komodo off and get back up, only to find that his entire suit was in tears and all his weapons were now inoperable. This allowed Zon a chance to swoop in and grab him by the shoulders with her talons to hoist him up and throw him back toward the ground, where Rufus was waiting.
"Heyaaa!" Rufus called out as he jumped from the ground with super-naked-mole-rat strength and landed a punch at the falling Download's jaw to knock him unconscious.
"Booyah!" The naked mole rat cheered as Zon flew down and they exchanged a paw-to-claw high five. Komodo came up and offered his tail to Rufus, who smacked it with his own, their own equivalent to a fist bump.
"Danny, the Masters' Blasters are down!" Kim reported over their comms channel. "How are you guys holding up?"
"Kinda just trying to stay in one piece!" Danny replied, throwing a ring of Ecto energy to slice through a multitude of vines shot at him by the oak-armored Undergrowth. As he seemed to focus more on Danny, Undergrowth didn't seem to notice Jake flying up behind him to let loose a stream of fire from his mouth, trailing up Undergrowth's back to his head. However, Undergrowth did feel the heat and responded with by shooting out spikes of oak-wood from his back at Jake, the force of it sent the American Dragon flying into a nearby building. The spikes bent over the residual flames to suppress and extinguish them, as well as regenerate any injuries done to the armored plant ghost.
Lance and Rex both gunned straight for the front of Undergrowth as Rex continued to ride his Sky-Sled and used his dual Bad Axes to cut down all the spiked wooden balls that Undergrowth grew from his shoulders and shot at them. With Rex appearing at the front and getting closer, Undergrowth raised his armored and massive fist to try and slam down on him. Though Rex quickly brought up his Block Party to shield himself, he was still sent crashing to the ground, creating a crater upon impact. But that also allowed Lance to bring out a javelin from one of his armor's canisters on its side, which he used to fly forward and pierce through Undergrowth's whole head, armor and all. Lance flew backwards just as the javelin and head exploded. But that didn't even seem to stop Undergrowth as countless vines and root tendrils shot up from the ground at rapid speed to bind and ensnare the Manus armor and forcibly pull it down to the ground just as Undergrowth regenerated his whole head, and quickly reformed his armor.
Sam flew alongside Danny, both looking and nodding to each other as they activated their respective powers of fire and ice. Danny concentrated his power and split himself into four copies as they flew at Undergrowth's base to encircle him before blasting as much cyan-Ecto energy as they could to begin freezing him from the bottom, making it as cold as possible. At the same time, Sam enveloped herself in an aura of ghostly flames and created an Ecto-construct of jet-boosters on her back to provide her an extra boost of speed, which she used to fly literal circles around Undergrowth, generating a ring of fire, the flames extending downward to encompass the armored ghost. The frozen parts met the descending flames as the resulting conflict of temperatures began to ignite. Danny retracted his copies and flew back along with Sam just as Undergrowth appeared to be engulfed in a massive explosion.
The smoke faded as it seemed much of Undergrowth's armored body was blown away, appearing only in hanging chunks. But those chunks and body parts were quickly being resewn and regenerated.
"You cannot stop nature, fools!" Undergrowth exclaimed as he continued to heal himself. "I will not..!" Suddenly, a massive portal opened up above him before a literal building was dropped on top of him to crush him and burry him underneath the rubble.
Danny and Sam looked only wide-eyed as Breach dusted her hands on the rooftop closest to him.
"Uh… what exactly did you do?" Danny asked her.
"Remember how I said that I had my hometown of Greensville in my own pocket dimension?" Breach reminded. "Well, I just grabbed one of their largest buildings and dropped it."
"You literally dropped a building on top of him?" Sam asked for clarification.
"Yep." Breach confirmed with a cheery smile.
An impressed smirk fell on Sam's face. "Oh yeah, I really like her." She said to her boyfriend.
Back on the ground, with Undergrowth temporarily immobilized, Lance was forced to deactivate his armor to escape from the vines that had ensnared it. He rolled on the ground a bit away before reactivating his Manus armor and flew up to regroup with the others, along with the recovered Rex and Jake. Once they were all together however, they saw the pile of rubble being blown away as Undergrowth once more began to reform.
"Are you kidding me?!" Jake complained. "How many times do we gotta chop down this tree?!"
"Breach, can't you just port him to the center of the sun or something?" Rex asked.
"She can't." Danny shook his head. "Undergrowth's roots are probably thoroughly spread throughout the city by now. Even if she does it for his whole upper body, he'll just regrow back from the roots."
"Yeah, I had a feeling that would be the case." Breach seemed to agree as that was the reason, she didn't do it before. "And I can't use my portals on the roots without doing too much damage to the city itself. I may even cripple the natural grand and unintentionally create a massive sinkhole!"
"I'm beginning to understand why you had such a hard time with this one." Lance narrowed his eyes at Undergrowth as he fully regenerated himself and roared to the sky.
Speaking of the sky, it continued to light up with bolts of lightning and the sound of thunder, with rain pouring down hard as Vortex continued to battle against the young heroes that flew around him.
Feedback continued to stand on the Quinjet that Zak piloted as Fiskerton manned the weapons, firing a barrage of missiles and laser guns all over Vortex, who attempted to retaliate with bolts of lightning from the sky, which Feedback would absorb through his antennae and redirect from his fingertips back at Vortex, striking him with his own electrical attack, much to his furry. But it was not just Feedback, for Octus had flown at him to blast bolts of his own to strike Vortex in the face, but the weather-ghost retaliated with beams of heat from his eyes, forcing Octus to convert his outer body into a bubble and shield himself, but the force of the blast still pushed him away.
Illana flew in close as well, using her Corus armor's electrostatic forcefield to shield herself from Vortex's razor winds and lightning bolts as Dani and Valerie flew behind her. Once all three were close enough they attacked: Illana blasted a repulsor ray from her heart-shaped chest piece, Dani brought her hands together to generate a sphere of Ecto-energy that she converted into a powerful beam and fired forward, and Valerie fired both her armor's wrist canons. All three beams struck the central area in Vortex's chest, creating a large explosion that blew a hole clear through Vortex. However, that didn't last long as his body broke apart into clouds and ascended higher into the sky above his flying areas and reformed, no damage done to his body at all.
"Worms! The sky is my domain! Fall back to the ground where you belong!" Vortex hollered before raising his hands to create an enormous black cloud over himself and the entire area. Suddenly, massive crystals of hail fell from the clouds and rained over the group.
"Incoming!" Illana warned as she, Dani, and Valerie tried to dodge the falling crystals as best as they could, blasting any that they couldn't dodge.
"Crap! Can't absorb that!" Feedback cursed as the hail fell toward the Quinjet, which Zak tried to steer, only for one crystal to strike the Quinjet's wing, sending it spiraling out of control and knocking Feedback over.
"Fisk! We're ejecting!" Zak exclaimed as he slammed the eject button, causing his seat and Fiskerton's to eject from the Quinjet's canopy as it opened. The two watched as their mode of transportation fell, rear boosters in their seat helping to slow their own descent.
Fiskerton gave a scream as he saw one particularly large hail crystal about to strike them, but Octus flew into not only blast away that crystal with his energy bolts, but also use his outer body to envelop Zak and Fiskerton to keep them both safe.
While falling, Feedback used some of his absorbed energy to shoot bolts from his fingertips and halt his fall. He saw all his teammates in trouble and growled before pressing on the Omnitrix symbol on his chest to transform into Heatblast. He then propelled himself straight upward with a raging inferno from his hands and feet, shooting up like a missile.
Valerie shot down one crystal but saw a bigger one about to strike her, only for Heatblast to shoot past her and blast his way through that crystal, obliterating it right then and there as he moved forward.
"Whoa! What was that?!" She exclaimed.
"Ben, hopefully to put an end to this." Illana said.
Heatblast gunned straight for Vortex, who then took notice of his presence as he re-directed his hailstorm to focus solely him. However, Heatblast generated as much heat as he possibly could and extended it outward in all directions to rapidly melt and evaporate any crystals that got too close to him. Vortex was unable to stop him as Heatblast pierced through his chest. Once he was in the center of the weather ghost, Heatblast gave a mighty yell as he generated a massive fireball from his body with temperatures as hot as that it felt like a sun was forming.
*BOOM!*
Vortex gave a scream as his whole body exploded in the artificially created inferno, the fireball clearing away much of the stormy cloud cover in the area and lighting up the sky.
The attack subsided as most of Heatblast's power had been exhausted, the flames around his body grown considerably weaker as he fell from the sky.
Fortunately, Octus was able to catch him just like he did with Zak and Fiskerton, whom he still held both inside.
"Ben, you okay?" Zak asked. The second he saw Heatblast's weakened state, Zak grabbed Heatblast's charcoal arm, fortunately most of his heat had been exhausted so he didn't have to worry about getting any serious burns and helped him press his own hand on the Omnitrix to turn him back to Ben.
"Yeah… just a little tired." Ben said. With him back to normal, his own stamina should recover a bit more quickly.
"Is that it?" Dani asked as she, Illana, and Valerie met up with Octus and his passengers inside. "Did that do it?"
"I don't think so." Octus said. "I'm still detecting Vortex's unique Ecto-energy signature. It was dispersed, but it's still there, and it's reforming as we speak."
Just as the Galalunian robot said, Vortex's body slowly began to reform as green clouds were forming and slowly began to come back together and form the slightly humanoid shape that would soon be Vortex once more.
"Uh oh." Fiskerton winced.
"You said it. This is gonna take a while." Valerie commented in annoyance.
Back on the ground, despite Undergrowth and Vortex being engaged in battle, multiple walking trees tried to make their way towards the Ghost Shield in an attempt to get past it, only for said trees to get sliced to ribbons by the speeding Fenton RV with its enormous buzz-saw extending from the rooftop.
"No citizen of Amity Park is gonna get vegetized on Jack Fenton's watch!" The father of the Fenton family declared as he drove the RV in literal circles around the ghost shield as fast as he could to keep up the defenses.
As he drove, Maddie looked on the screen to see how her children and their friends were doing, shifting between the two titanic battles. "The kids are stuck in a bind!" She said as she contacted City Hall. "Tucker, Jazz, I hope you two have a plan because we're all caught between a rock and a hard place out here!"
"We'll let you know the second we have on, Mom!" Jazz called back as Tucker also watched the battles unfold from the control room.
"This is nuts! If it were Undergrowth or Vortex, Danny and his whole team would have taken em out by now!" Tucker stated. "But both of them?!"
"Well, there's gotta be something we can do!" Jazz said. "We gotta…" She then noticed a light flickering on and off on the side of Tucker's backpack. "Hey, what's that?"
Tucker noticed the flashing light himself and reached into his bag to pull out his trusty PDA to see the screen flashing with the words 'TUCK-BUG ALERT!'
"An alert? Now?" Tucker asked as he turned on his PDA to see what was going on.
"What's up?" Jazz asked.
"Ya know all those little spy drones that Vlad had when he was mayor?" Tucker explained. "Well after he left, I found all the ones he left behind and reprogramed them. I had one sent to the GIW headquarters to keep an eye on them if they caused any trouble. But it looks like one of em found something."
Tucker tuned in the PDA to the source of the alert as he and Jazz both saw from the bug's POV something that made them both look with wide and circular eyes.
"Oh boy." Jazz winced.
Danny blasted Undergrowth for the umpteenth time but was forced back to avoid the spikey tendrils that were sent his way. As they tried to ensnare him, Danny generated his ice powers to create any icy sword in his hands to cut them down.
"Hey Danny, we got a problem!" Tucker alerted.
"Now?! We already got two major ones going on right now!" Danny complained.
"They might be connected, because it looks like those Cabal guys are the Guys in White Headquarters!" Tucker stated.
"What?!" Danny exclaimed before flying back to find cover behind a building as he patched through to the rest of his team and allies. "Say that again, Tuck?"
"Three of the Cabal are at the GIW base just outside of town, and one of em is Vlad!" Tucker clarified as he hooked his PDA to the computer so that he could see on one of the monitors the live feed of Vlad, Drakken, and Van Kleiss inside the Guys in White's laboratory.
"It also looks like that's where Undergrowth and Vortex struck first, because they got all the GIW zombified!" Jazz added. "They're all outside the base!"
"Meaning this whole fight is just one giant distraction!" Ben stated.
"We have to stop them!" Illana exclaimed.
"But we can't leave these two behemoths, or they'll wreck all of Amity Park!" Sam countered.
"We don't have to send the whole team." Kim said as she, Ron, Zon, Komodo, and Rufus remained just inside the Ghost Shield, having tied up the unconscious Masters' Blasters to make sure they stayed down. "Ron and I can't exactly do much against Vortex or Undergrowth, but we can punch out the Cabal's lights."
A series of growls from Zon and Komodo drew their attention as they stood at the ready. "And it looks like we got some volunteers." Ron smirked as Rufus climbed up to stand on Komodo's head and salute, indicating he was ready to go too.
"The Quinjet's totaled, so Fisk and I can't do anything more out here either." Zak added. "We'll go too." They also heard Fiskerton's affirmed and agreed grunt on the other end.
"Alright. Breach, send them to the GIW base. Take care of all the agents too." Danny instructed. "But you come right back here and help us finish these guys. We need all the raw power we can get."
"Understood." Breach responded.
"Kim, you and the others find out exactly what the Cabal is up to. If they're willing to use Undergrowth and Vortex as a freaking distraction, then their real goal's gotta be something big." Danny said seriously.
"Leave it to us." Kim said in understanding. She, Ron, Rufus, Zon, and Komodo all stood together as a red portal opened up in front of them, allowing them to step inside.
In the sky, just as Vortex was about to reform, another one of Breach's portals opened up inside Octus' bubble-form as Breach herself appeared half-way through, extending two of her hands to Zak and Fiskerton, which they each took as she pulled them into the portal before it closed.
Octus then opened himself up to allow Ben to jump out before he activated the Omnitrix again to transform into Chromastone, who hovered along with Octus, Valerie, Dani, and Illana as they saw Vortex completely reform with a howling bellow.
"If your friends manage to find something that can shut these two down, they'd better." Valerie said. "Otherwise, we're in for a long night."
"Then you'd better buckle down, sister." Chromastone stated before being the first to fly forward with everyone else right behind just as the roaring Vortex brought his arms together to unleash a massive tornado upon them.
Done.
How's that for an action-filled chapter? Even with the full roster of Avengers and their Amity Park allies, the heroes can only battle the Undergrowth and Vortex to a standstill. Though it seems like they've also caught onto the Cabal's hidden objective and have sent the group they think is best to deal with them.
I had a lot of fun writing this chapter and I'm looking forward to writing the rest as the action is only to get amped up from here. Until then, stay safe and stay healthy out there.