A/N: Notifications:
Italics: Communicators
Chiro was standing on the Super Robot's shoulder, going through his plan in his head once more.
Reaching down, he tapped his communicator.
"Ready for this, Monkey Team?"
"Ready when you are, kid!" Sprx replied.
"Remember, if this gets bad, the Super Robot can take over the Torso Tank." Chiro smiled confidently, reaching over to lay a gentle hand on said giant body of artificial intelligence. "There's only one way this is gonna work, so we have to get this right!"
"No worries, Chiro! We're gonna kick this Formless' butt so hard Skeleton King'll feel it!" Nova swore, and there were cheers of enthusiastic agreement in the background.
Chiro smiled, amused despite their situation. "All right, then! Wish me luck!"
"Always," Antauri assured. "And Chiro," his voice went soft, warm and speaking utmost truth in its vitality, "know that we love you always."
Chiro beamed, choked up. Looking down at his Hyperforce-insignia communicator, it was as if he could feel his family's love. He brought a fist over his heart. "I love you, too. Always have, always will."
These words were the last.
Activating his jetpack, he flew straight toward the Mega Formless, aiming for its middle.
The creature roared as it spotted its main objective flying right for it, and it swung with one massive arm.
Chiro, however, had anticipated this long before and with a little luck avoided the proceeding volley of offensive attacks. "How did I know this wasn't gonna be that easy?" he muttered under his breath.
Flying in circles around the Mega Formless, he was surprised and mildly disgusted when it merely twisted its head the entire three-hundred-and-sixty degrees in order to follow him. "Okay, looks like that method's out…"
Zooming between the blob's legs and upward, the boy flew so high that it couldn't see him anymore. Smirking lightly, Chiro wiped the sweat from his brow as he breathed heavily.
Truly, he could feel his body temperature rising unhealthily, and he was beginning to feel nauseous and slightly dizzy again, but he ignored all of it. This was what he needed to do to save Shuggazoom, and nothing short of death (though he, his family, and so many others prayed day and night it would never come to that) would stop him.
A roar erupted down below.
"Now or never…!"
With that, he rocketed downward, and as soon as he was close enough he locked on target: the head.
He was inside the monster before the Mega Formless knew what hit it.
But that's when things went horribly wrong.
The creature gave a nether-worldly snarl, and there was no denying the threat as it turned a wicked black.
"Chiro, status report!" Antauri ordered. "Are you all right?"
Deathly silence. The monkeys waited on bated breath for something, anything, and after what seemed an eternity they did.
All at once their boy-leader began to hyperventilate and, falling to his knees with arms wrapped tightly around himself, at last came the screams of crushing agony.
"Chiro!" his teammates screeched. "Chiro, what's happening?"
"You're…" Chiro's broken voice comes through the feed, "…you're gone!" He sounded so pained, so utterly torn apart that the monkeys immediately worried for his mental state. "Blood…" he whimpered as though he were experiencing horrific physical pain, "…oil…" his sobs very nearly overtook him, "…parts…" the end of all things loomed, "…bodies…" and here it was, as he dissolved into tears, "…gone…!"
The monkeys froze.
In putting everything together, they had their reckoning.
Somehow, Skeleton King had made this first Mega Formless special, had given it his distinct mark in projecting images into Chiro's mind. The poor boy was being tortured from the inside out, if his bloodcurdling screams were no indication.
Emotionally and mentally, their dearly-loved child-leader was being murdered…
"Enough!"Antauri cried suddenly, slamming the Brain Scrambler's control panel with his fists. He peered up at the screens to see identical expressions of anguish on his brothers' and sister's faces. "This ends now! We must try to reach him telepathically, strive to breach whatever hold Skeleton King has on him!"
"But Antauri, we're not as well-trained in the Power Primate! We'll never make it!" Nova protested.
Antauri sent her and the others a withering smile. "I will help you. Trust me."
"We do, Antauri! Bet on it!" Sprx heartened, and similar agreements came from the rest.
The silver simian nodded and began meditating; the only other time he had been this focused was still and probably always would be a sore subject for the Team.
Opening his eyes, he found himself and the others—wholly intact, thank Shuggazoom—at their destination.
But this did not hold his attention for long.
Before them knelt someone they would have called their leader…had he looked the part.
Unceasing tears flooded Chiro's dirty, bloody face, his uniform so torn and scuffed it was a wonder it was even still of use. The surrounding buildings were demolished, smashed and torched beyond recognition, the tortured corpses of Shuggazoomians were strewn everywhere, and the Super Robot, gutted in more ways than one, lay just beyond it all.
And yet, what managed to top it all, even in the midst of this surrounding chaos, what Chiro cradled in his blood-and-oil-stained arms:
Mechanical limbs, optic lenses, helmets, weapons…bodies…five colorful corpses…that looked just so familiar…
They nearly lost it.
They had been murdered, had died in the heat of battle at Skeleton King's hands, and Chiro, quaking under the weight of all that had befallen Shuggazoom and his everything-and-all family, had shattered.
They understood now, more than ever, how dire of a situation this really was.
Walking carefully toward the traumatized child, the simians found their voices lost, their eyes instead zoning in on the mess which lay in Chiro's lap. If this were what the future held…let them all be slaughtered as witless animals at this very moment, together in death as in life.
Very cautiously, Antauri inched forward to place a gentle hand on Chiro's shoulder. The fourteen-year-old, too far gone to be in his right mind, screamed and reflexively punched outward, making electricity crackle where Antauri's head had just been.
"Chiro, it's us!" Nova cried, desperate tears causing her voice to quake.
"This is an illusion, my boy, all part of Skeleton King's reprehensible plot! You must wake!" Gibson shouted, pleading with him to hear the truth in their words and the life emanating from their surrounding bodies.
"No!" Chiro screeched, sounding so monkey-like it frightened even them. Clapping his black-and-red-covered hands over his ears, he threw his head back. "No more lies! You're—you're all—!"
He shut his eyes to the swarming tears and howled, everything felt within breaking down into a sound of love and loss, of loneliness, of undeniable defeat.
The monkeys nearly broke right along with him.
They knew they meant everything, absolutely everything, to the young child, their leader known as Chiro. They'd known that all along, ever since they'd met.
But they hadn't quite imagined his connection to them was this strong, that the prodigy-warrior they knew and loved with everything they were and had ever been would break this severely with them gone…
They swore their hearts were on fire. Skeleton King would pay.
"Chiro," Otto started, tears forming in his own eyes, "you gotta wake up, buddy. We—we need you."
"We're alive, kid!" Sprx pressed. "We'd never lie about that! The only one lyin' around here is Skeleton King! He's pullin' the wool over your eyes right now!"
"You gotta believe us, Chiro. Please," Nova begged softly. "You have to fight Skeleton King. We'll help you, I promise, but you have to trust us."
The boy was shaking by now, the tears cascading as he pressed his hands tighter over his ears. "No… You're just figments… You're not real… I'm—I'm going insane…" His voice quiets, expressing his weariness. "I must be…"
"That is where you're wrong, Chiro," Antauri said gently. "You are merely a victim of Skeleton King."
His eyes narrowed as he abruptly pounced at Chiro and pinned him down by his shoulders, only to have his limbs thrash wildly. The others joined in to help, at which point the boy tried to use his powers, but Antauri was keeping them restrained via the Power Primate.
"Think we're just your imagination now, kid?" Sprx asked quietly as he kept one arm pinned down.
"This is for your own good, Chiro," Nova called from her place at the boy's right leg.
"Let me go!" Chiro growled, though with notably less ferociousness than before. This gave the monkeys hope.
"Don't think we wanna hurt you, Chiro. This hurts us more than it hurts you," Otto admitted, sniffling as he forced Chiro's left arm to stay put.
"Indeed, my boy. If there were an alternative, we would do all in our power to know it," Gibson proclaimed, the left leg beneath him twitching.
The boy's tears had lessened by now, his cries mere whimpers and his movements hardly any threat.
"Truly, dear one, we are not lost, but alive and well." Antauri, still perched atop the boy's chest, pushed for the warmest of smiles. "Open your eyes and see for yourself."
And just like that, all at once the struggling stopped completely.
And Chiro, sitting up as the monkeys removed themselves from his now-calm body, opened his clear blue eyes, and saw.
His monkeys, his Team, his best friends, his family, were alive.
Living, breathing, with blood flowing, with hearts pumping, wearing beams fit to split faces.
He hugged them so tightly they thought they might explode; he laughed and cried so hard at having made it through such an ordeal that the monkeys thought he might never stop; and he could not contain his joy when the horridly lucid nightmare-come-true their enemy had concocted melted down around them.
Chiro was free.
A/N: Either next chapter or the one after will be the last. As it's just past 3 A.M. (I was determined to finish this for your guys...I'm so sorry about not getting the chapter up the other day!), be aware that I haven't edited this yet, so please alert me if you find any glaring issues.
Also, Antauri uses the Power Primate to project his and the others' consciousnesses into Chiro's head, even though their bodies never leave the Super Robot. And the 'restraining Chiro's powers' thing...? Made it up. Since Antauri's so powerful in wielding the Power Primate, I figured it might be something he could do. 'Dear one' is an endearing phrase Antauri might use for Chiro, should a situation ever call for it.
The 'sore subject' for the Team is Antauri's death.
The Mega Formless' ultimate power, implanted by Skeleton King, is to make Chiro's worst nightmare come to life: losing they monkeys that have become his family.
Thanks for reading, as always! (Now, off to bed for me!)