*pant, pant* FINALLY I BRING THIS OUT! THAT TOOK SO LONG!
DISCLAIMER: I own Derrick Bolris. The Misfitverse this takes place in belongs to Red Witch, the characters of G.I. Joe belong to Hasbro, and everything else belongs to Marvel.
Chapter 28: Wilder Things!
"I heard you were a child prodigy, Alex!" Victor cried, defending both the Nicos from the Runaways' former leader. "Killing everything on Earth doesn't seem that smart, does it?"
"So…Victor, was it?" Alex said to the cyborg Latino as the latter attempted to shock Alex with electricity. "Can I ask you a question?'
"Depends on what it is!" Victor snapped, firing another electrical blast, only for Alex to deflect the bolt using his Fistigons.
"Tell me," Alex continued, "if God could make a sandwich so big that even He couldn't finish it."
"What kind of question is that?" Victor cried.
"So, you don't know?" Alex smirked. "I thought you were raised by a devoutly Catholic mother and programmed for logic by Ultron."
"Okay, fine!" Victor snapped. "If God made a sandwich…uh…so big that..."
Victor suddenly collapsed, his body bursting with sparks as if he had been electrocuted. He began babbling in binary, twitching on the ground slightly.
"Victor!" Karolina cried, blasting away Alex's mother. "What did you do to him?"
"Funny thing," Alex said. "Apparently, Mr. Roboto here can't answer a question that requires both logic and faith. If he tries, he basically goes into overload, like so."
He gestured to Victor's jerking body.
"As for the rest of you," Alex continued, "you'll have to go down with a little more difficulty…and a little more pain, too."
He released a wave of flame from his Fistigons, which Xavin and Karolina blocked by combining their energies into a single force field. With all of the Runaways underneath the barrier, enduring Alex's fire and his parents' bullets, there were obviously some concerns.
"What do we do now?" Chase cried. "We can't just sit here and get shot!
"I don't think we can maintain this field for long, either!" Xavin added.
"And with Victor explaining why any non-Mac computers are evil, we're down one!" cried Gert.
"This isn't going as well as I'd hoped," Alternate Nico muttered.
"You think?" Chase yelled.
"We need a plan," Derrick said, "and we need it so badly it isn't funny."
At that moment, however, the Wilders' combined assault forced down Xavin and Karolina's shield.
"Know what, Der?" Gert said. "I completely agree."
"So, this is how it ends," Mr. Wilder smirked. "Seems we're also ridding another dimension of its brats."
"The less resistance, the better," Mrs. Wilder said. "Alex, I think you've earned the honor of finishing off these pests."
"Alex, please," Alternate Nico begged. "Don't do this."
"You're still trying reason after seeing how freaking loony he is?" Derrick asked. "Seriously?"
"Loony, huh?" Alex said. "This coming from the mentally-fragile mutant? The one whose family was nowhere near as decent as mine?"
Derrick's eyes grew cold.
"Don't even think about it, Wilder," he growled.
"I mean," Alex continued, ignoring Derrick's threat, "my parents were working to save the world from itself. Yours? They were just a couple of anti-mutant supporters gone wild. And, thanks to their lack of actual love and general insanity, they made you nothing more than an angst-filled…hydrophobic…monster."
"I wasn't the monster," Derrick quietly growled. "They were the monsters."
"Must run in the family," Alex smirked. "How are you any different from the X-Men, anyway? You're running around and saving the day, just like Bayville's resident mutant heroes. And what's more—hang on…"
Alex paused, swiftly striking Old Lace in the mouth, the latter having attempted a charge at him.
"Anyway, where was I?" Alex asked of no one in particular.
"You were about to get your %*& kicked, Wilder," Chase snapped, firing off a blast of flame. Alex, however, simply redirected the flame and used it to do something truly callous and cold-hearted.
He sent the fire at Nico.
Nico was quickly caught in the blaze, screaming from the pain. Her staff slipped out of her hand instantly as she fell to the ground, rolling around in an attempt to put out the fire.
"NICO!" Derrick yelled, rushing to her side along with the other Runaways.
"Oh, I remember where I was now," Alex said. "Bolris, you're just a street urchin like your new friends. You're a great big nobody, you know that?"
"I don't give a damn what you have to say, Wilder," Derrick spat as Xavin managed to use Mr. Fantastic's powers to smother the fire. "Does torturing people, especially the ones you're supposed to care about, give you some sick thrill?"
"Not really, actually," Alex shrugged, "but I know what's going to happen next."
"What's that?" Molly asked.
"This," Alex said, pointing his hands at the Runaways and firing off a colossal blast of flame, a blast that would have killed them had it not been for one person.
Alternate Nico.
"Circle backwards!" Alternate Nico yelled, her own Staff of One sending out a wave of energy that repelled the flames of Alex's Fistigons. Alex quickly compressed the flames into a small cube that he easily dispatched with a flick of his fingers.
"Showing your true colors, are you?" Alex said.
"We should have known you weren't right for Alex," Mrs. Wilder said.
"That makes two of us," Alternate Nico spat. "I let my feelings for you blind me. I've let you kill all of my only friends because of that blindness. Now, I think I just got my sight back."
"Good," Alex said. "Then that means I won't feel bad about killing you."
"The feeling is completely mutual," Xavin snarled, her arms becoming rock-like.
"I really wanna kick your butt!" Molly cried.
"Don't we all?" Gert added, Old Lace joining her.
"Then let's finish this," Alex smirked.
"I think I will," Alternate Nico growled, coming to the front of the group. "So, Alex, mind if I show off a little something I picked up from my parents before I found out you killed them?"
Without waiting for an answer, she raised her staff high into the air.
"Prodigium effodio!" she cried.
From the ground burst the massive energy-like form of a red beast with pointy ears and a wide, smirking mouth. The beast decimated the floor in mere seconds, somehow while not moving an inch, and quickly crushed the Wilders under a pile of debris. Noticing the water beginning to pour in (and Derrick's shivering of fear), Nico raised her own staff into the air.
"Get us to safety!" Nico yelled, and all the Runaways—plus Alternate Nico—disappeared in a flash.
Just as had happened in the Runaways' normal reality, the underwater Vivarium was crushed into pieces, with Alex and his parents inside.
Finding themselves back on the beach, the Runaways and Alternate Nico all released a collective sigh of relief, realizing the end of their long adventure.
"Thank you all for your help," Alternate Nico said. "I guess I should get used to being the last person in the world."
"You sure about that?" Derrick asked.
"What do you mean?" Alternate Nico asked.
"Hey, I can't summon a huge monster like you did," Nico said. "If you can do that, you can probably find a way to turn back time or something and fix everything that you messed up."
"First, though, a couple favors," Gert said. "Number one, how do we get Victor to stop spazzing?"
Indeed, Victor was still jerking about uncontrollably and spewing sparks everywhere.
"Hang on, I think there was something in the Abstract about that," said Alternate Nico, scratching her head. "Oh, yeah…yes, Victor, God could make a sandwich so big that even He couldn't finish it. And then He would finish it."
"Ugh…what?" Victor sputtered as he got up. "What happened?"
"That's it?" Chase asked.
"There's two more questions along those lines," Alternate Nico said. "Might want to be careful."
"Noted," Gert said. "And as for the second favor…how about sending us back?"
"Can do," Alternate Nico smiled. "Back you go."
The Runaways then disappeared, leaving Alternate Nico alone. For a moment, she paused to collect herself. And then, she performed another spell.
"Let me start over," she said.
Having no idea what the spell would accomplish, Alternate Nico felt uneasy when the world seemed to begin to blur around her. In seconds, however, she found something she never thought she would see again.
Alex Wilder was alive, and so were his parents. Beside them were her own parents, garbed in red robes complete with hoods. But behind her was the sight that she wished to see most of all.
Her version of the Runaways—though Victor, Derrick, and Xavin were not present—was completely alive. Chase, Molly, Gert and Karolina were all alive, albeit unconscious.
"Nico, we can make this world better…together," Alex said, offering his hand to her. "What do you say? Maybe we could even tell this story to, well…our children."
Alternate Nico paused for a moment. Knowing of what had happened when she accepted, she knew exactly what she was to do.
She punched Alex in the face, following up with a quick kick to his stomach.
"Not even if you really were the last boy on Earth," she spat.
In her mind, however, she added one more thing.
"Thank you all," she thought, hoping her experiences with her counterparts would help her further.
Her team rose and came to her aid. To the Runaways who had helped her, this was just another daily occurrence. To Alternate Nico, however, it was almost heaven.
"Okay, guys," she said to her team as she prepared her staff. "Try not to die."
Sorry this took so long...but now that our adventures in the second alternate dimension are FINALLY finished, we can move on to other thrills! FINALLY! FIIINNNAAAAALLLLYYYY!