Retrieval Saga
Galvanized Wills
Chapter 5: Aftershock
The two experiments tensed under the revenge droid's malicious glare. Draco extended his aliens appendages as he growled. "Don't bother trying to fly away," said Mantichrome as he sent viral energy into the ground. A few seconds later, cables from the sides of buildings and underground sprang out from their confinements and wove themselves together into a tight-fitting mesh cage of metal. "By the way, the NegaMorph disguise did work at first," said Mantichrome, "but I eventually became suspicious as to why NegaMorph would be here without anyone else when there are no Viral Clones on this planet. After that, it was a simple matter of using my heat detectors to identify you."
"Then why didn't you attack us?" asked Contrinus. "Because I wasn't ready yet," said Mantichrome, "I know you two are going to be a lot more bothersome to kill than that cyborg, even if it will be fun to do so. However, I'd rather not spend more times trying to kill you than necessary, even if it does build up my revenge drive."
"Revenge drive, schmevenge drive," growled Draco, "I'm still going to rip you in half." Mantichrome laughed and said, "If you had the guts for that kind of thing, you'd have done it from the start. I, on the other hand, have no qualms or scruples to hold me back whatsoever. And I wouldn't be denouncing my revenge drive so rapidly if I were you. It's a rather unique part of my configuration. It could be considered an electronic version of a thirst for revenge. It constantly compels me and strengthens with each failure or offense taken. The main difference is that mine can be used as a battery to empower me enough to deal with the source of my hatred, namely you."
"Didn't seem to empower you that much when you digitized Earth," said Draco. "That was when I was just using it to power my attacks," said Mantichrome, "I can channel that hatred for something even more powerful. I just needed to pick up a little something to give me a boost." Mantichrome pulled out a small device that resembled a thumbtack, except it was much more technological-looking, its point resembled a plug, and it gave off a humming sound. "A Galvanic Cyber Booster," explained Mantichrome, "made from the same nanotech as the Mechomorphs and has the similar ability of upgrading machinery to a more advanced stage. Allow me to demonstrate." Mantichrome's levitation disc slid open to reveal the machinery inside. He plugged the Cyber Booster into the central mechanism inside and closed up.
Mantichrome's body crackled with marigold electricity as it went through a metamorphosis. First, the canister-like endings of his limbs shrank into ball shapes while the fingers lengthened into longer and sharper claws. Then the back of his torso extended upward to form a vertebrate-like ridge, with a small cannon on the front end of that. His tail grew much longer and the inner edges of the sting at the end became jagged. The middle of his tail thickened slightly and then four spider-like limbs with rocket boosters for feet sprouted from it. Then his head grew longer and more teeth appeared in his mouth. The spines surrounding his head rearranged themselves near the top, with two overlapping each other and became more detailed. Then a second pair of eyes appeared under his original one and the Eye of XANA appeared on his forehead. Mantichrome was now more organic-looking, scarier, and more draconic-looking than before and was now 9 feet tall. "I am now Mantichrome 8.9!" he said, his voice deeper and more menacing than before.
Draco growled and leapt at Mantichrome. Mantichrome effortlessly backhanded him into the mesh barrier. "I'm a lot more powerful now," said Mantichrome, "which will make it easier to rip you to shreds." Draco ignored what Mantichrome said and leapt at him again. Mantichrome sidestepped him and raked Draco's side with his sharp claws. Draco cried out in pain as the metal tore through his skin. Mantichrome then used two other arms to slam Draco into the ground. Every time Draco tried to get up, Mantichrome would punch him to force him back down. "The game is over," said Mantichrome as he placed his sting over Draco's throat, "you lose."
Then a blast of firelight hit Mantichrome's back. Mantichrome and saw Contrinus fire another ball of firelight at him. "Please," said Mantichrome, "all that's doing is making my armor shine." "Then how about a little tarnish?" said Draco as he lifted his head and breathed fire on Mantichrome. Mantichrome was hardly hurt, but the smoke emitted blocked his vision for a while. This gave Draco enough time to limp towards Contrinus. Suddenly Mantichrome grabbed him by the tail and said, "Uh-uh-uh, can't have you revitalizing before I'm finished." He swung Draco away and he hit the other side of the net with a thud.
Mantichrome turned to Contrinus and said, "I suppose I'll have to kill you first. Your healing powers could get very annoying very quickly. Plus, it'll be fun killing his little girlfriend before his eyes." "My healing powers work just as well on myself," said Contrinus. "I know that, I'm from the future, remember?" said Mantichrome, "And records indicate that your power has considerable difficulty in self-recovery from frostbite. And fortunately, I have all of my father's monsters data programmed into me, including a Blok's ice attack." He lowered his neck to reveal the cannon on his spine. The cannon started glowing an icy blue as it started to charge up.
Contrinus was unsure of what to do. Mantichrome was right about the frostbite and she knew Mantichrome could quickly change direction to wherever she tried to flee to. But then Draco got up and ran over behind Contrinus. He brandished his four wings and held them in front of Contrinus like a shield. "Draco, don't!" called Contrinus but it was too late. Mantichrome fired the ice beam and it hit Draco's wings. Draco cried out in pain as the wings were frozen solid. The coldness from the attack spread to the other parts of Draco's body, which was particularly painful on his cold-blooded system.
"How touching," said Mantichrome, "Two lovebirds in a cage, the male shielding the female from the winter cold. I could freeze you both now, but I think I'll find it more satisfying if I kill you with my own bare hands." As Mantichrome walked over to them, Draco muttered to Contrinus, "You can still escape, I bet there's somewhere between those wires you could squeeze through. Save yourself, now." "I'm not going to leave you," said Contrinus as she wrapped her wings around Draco. The two of them closed their eyes and waited for Mantichrome to deliver the killing blow.
Suddenly there was a crackle of electricity, the clang of metal hitting metal, and a cry of astonishment and rage from Mantichrome. Draco and Contrinus opened their eyes to see what happened. Mantichrome was currently grappling with a new opponent who was holding Mantichrome's six hands in his own. It looked a lot like Chip, except he was all black with indigo circuitry lines all over his body. "Chip?" asked Draco and Contrinus. Chip rotated his head to face them and said, "The one and only." "How can you be here?" said Draco. "Well, I couldn't let Mantichrome kill my future sister-in-law, now could I?" Draco blushed slightly and said to Contrinus, "I think you should work on healing me real quickly."
Mantichrome soon recovered from his shock and snarled, "I don't know how you survived, but this time, I will make doubly sure that you are dead when I leave." "Not gonna happen," said Chip, "I'm stronger, better, faster, and stronger. Not to mention, this has become rather personal." "It definitely has," said Mantichrome as he picked Chip up. This turned out to be a mistake because now Chip could spin his legs in a helicopter fashion, kicking Mantichrome repeatedly in the neck and chest. Mantichrome let go of Chip, who landed back on the ground.
Then Chip extended his hands and the fingers on them lengthened into long pitchfork-sized claws. "Since when could you do that?" asked Contrinus, who had nearly finished healing Draco. "Since now," said Chip and he slashed Mantichrome's levitation disc, which disabled his ability to hover and caused him significant pain.
By now, Draco was now fully healed and ready to battle. "Let's send this psychopath to the scrap heap," said Draco. "I couldn't agree more," said Chip. The two experiment hit Mantichrome with everything they've got, both physical and energy attacks. Mantichrome was fairly battered and his surface quickly grew dented and marred. But he wasn't beaten yet and still proved a threat. "Let's give him the Rainbow Wave," said Draco. "I'm ready when you are," said Chip, converting his hands into energy cannons. Draco spat out all his breath attacks and shot lasers from his eyes. Chip fired multiple blasts of viral energy from his energy cannons. Draco then used his telekinesis to merge all the attacks into a large rainbow-colored energy blast that flew straight at Mantichrome.
Mantichrome was engulfed by the attack and was completely hidden by the multicolored burst of light. When the light faded, Mantichrome's body was nearly completely wrecked. With a groan of mechanical joints, he collapsed down onto the ground. "I will have my revenge," groaned the revenge droid and his eyes went dim. Then what looked like electrical smoke came out of his body and quickly floated away. After it left, the wire cage around them dispersed and went back into the ground and buildings.
"What was that?" asked Contrinus. "Mantichrome's mind in specter form," said Chip, "No doubt something he inherited from his father." "So, are you going to make us wait or are you going to tell us how you got here?" asked Draco. "Ok, but this is going to take a while so you guys might want to sit down." Draco and Contrinus seated themselves comfortably on Mantichrome's vacant body while Chip recounted his adventure:
"Well, when Mantichrome threw me onto Galvan B, I thought my goose was cooked. I tried every computer virus I could think of, but the moon didn't respond. In despiration, I tried this wire-tapping virus and it detected something. I sent an SOS virus to it and that caught its attention. And before I knew it, I was before the core of consciousness in Galvan B."
"Wait a minute," interupted Draco, "You're telling me you met the moon's brain?" "Actually, it's more like a central processing unit," said Chip, "In any case, it turns out that Galvan B is nearly completely ignorant of the outside universe. That was one reason it pulled in everything that landed on it, to learn more. I told it about how I got there and it was very fascinated by what I told it."
"So how did you get back here?" asked Contrinus. "I'm getting to that," said Chip, "So I made a deal with Galvan B; if it sent me back to Galva Prime, I would arrange it so that it would see everything the Galvanic Mechamorphs saw. Fortunately it assimilated a fair number of transmitters so it was a simple matter of converting myself to data so it could beam me back."
"So what's with the paint job?" asked Draco. Chip looked at himself and said, "Oh, right, I haven't introduced you guys yet." The black and indigo covering slid off of Chip and gathered together into a small blob at his feet. It had two stubby legs and a thick tail which made it look somewhat like a seal. Of course, normal seals don't have indigo circuit lines on their bodies with a similiar ring for an eye. "Galvan B created this for me using data it had collected on the Mechomorphs. He isn't very sophisticated, but he has all their powers. I call him V-Quip." "Veeee-Quip," chirped the small Mechomorph. After that, they started back to the North Star.
Everyone was delighted to have Draco and Contrinus return safely and they all were happy to have Chip back. V-Quip was the center of much interest, particularly to Techo. Chupy was also curious about V-Quip and sniffed him over. He tried to latch on, but soon found V-Quip to be inedible. A small plasma blast from V-Quip discouraged any further attempts of consumption.
With Mantichrome's defeat, the viruses in the North Star died and the ship became much easier to repair. In no time, the North Star was once again heading out of Galva Prime's atmosphere. Chip was currently reading a book in his and Draco's room. Draco and Contrinus were twining their necks in the same room and no one dared to make fun of it under pain of viral tasering from Chip. Then Morph walked in and said, "Boy, did I need that nap." He noticed Draco and Contrinus and said to Chip, "Can you make them stop that?" "Probably," said Chip without looking away from his book. "Will you make them stop?" asked Morph. "Absolutely not," said Chip as he flipped the page. Morph scratched his head and said, "I wonder what all I missed during my nap." He walked out of the room and was soon heard saying, "Oh boy! A metal putty seal, can we keep him? Ow! He zapped me!"
There's the final chapter. I hope you guys didn't mind me keeping Chip's status indeterminable for the last two chapters. I just wanted to see how many people cared about Chip. Not that much apparently. Perhaps I'd get a bigger reaction if I put Draco's life in jeopardy. *Draco gives me scathing look* Kidding, just kidding. Mantichrome's 8.9 mode is based on the picture that demongirl99 did of him for me on deviantART. The only differences is that Mantichrome 8.9's tail is longer and has those spider legs with rocket boosters for feet in the middle. V-Quip's pretty much like Ship from Alien Force except his circuit lines are indigo-colored. I'll put a picture up of Chip + V-Quip on deviantART soon. The next story will also have the return of a relatively new enemy so you won't want to miss it. Please review for this chapter.