Spider-Man, and the others, are owned by Marvel and Stan Lee.
Loonatics Unleashed, and the others, are owned by WB.
Chapter 8:
The comet cometh
"Okay, let's see if I can get that 12 ball." Peter said as he aimed his stick in the right spot. He, Ace, and Lexi were playing a game of pool and so far he was trying to knock in one of Ace's 11-15. Slam was gorging himself with three crates of grapefruit, Tech was working on a new blaster, Rev playing one man ping-pong, and Duck was playing an old Weather Report DVD: naturally drooling at his obsession-Misty Breeze.
"Slam, do you mind, I am trying to hear Misty's report." Duck said to the garbage disposal as he chomped down three at once. The only answer he got was an ear to ear grin. "Now I have to start all over again." The mallard complained and started the disk.
"Finally have my Beam-splitter neutron cannon is finished." Tech said after putting the last cover piece on. He admired it for a while before setting it down. "Now time to start on the blasters for Slam." He said and went to work on the one he set down at his feet.
"He's invincible, he's unstoppable, and he's undecidedly the most fantastic ping-pong player ever." The speed one said as he kept pace with the small white ball. The pool was not going in Peter's favor.
"Look's like you're out of it, web-head." Lexi said after she successfully hit the number 3 solid red ball in the upper right corner pocket. This caused him to be a little bit disappointed. "Don't worry, Pete, Ace is about to loose too." She added as she analyzed the field.
"Don't count on it, Lex since you only have a number 7 and 9 ball." Ace said back and got ready to hit one of the two in. He had it aimed right and was about to fire when the doors to the lounge room opened; he looked up and saw that it was the Mayor. "What can we do for ya Ms. Mayor?" The leading rabbit questioned as he walked over to her, the others followed his lead to meet the blue haired woman.
"Don't tell me: Black Velvet is back to try her eternal night stunt again." Spider-Man suggested while glancing at Tech to see his reaction. The fellow genius did a combination of look embarrassed and angered. The mayor shook her head and said to them.
"No, it is nothing like that the city is going to present an award to you in the park for protecting from everything." She said politely to the Loonatics. Peter turned to duck and saw a smirk appear on the mallard's bill.
"Considering I'm not a bonafied Loonatic, I guess I'll stay here." He said and was about to head over to the couch. He thought of the word award and how his ego rivaled Duck's ego after all of that money and such.
"You may not have been affected by the meteor like the rest, but you are still a Loonatic and it would be an honor to have you there." The head woman of the city said to him since she did not feel right of splitting up these seven heroes.
"All right, all right, I'll come." He said to her and then added, "Just hope you have a BIG after speech party planned too." She laughed a little bit and Slam garbled out in happy agreement.
"We do, and it is held around dusk, see you there." The woman said to them and left without another word. The others went back to their business: Tech finishing Slam's blasters, Rev tying with himself, Slam now eating 200 large pizzas with EVERYTHING on them, Lexi winning their three way pool game: after knocking in the 15 ball, and Danger in his room working on his acceptance speech.
"Okay, gang, show time." Ace said after he looked out the lounge room's window. "We'll take our bikes for this award." Ace said as he boarded his motorcycle the others did as well.
"I'm not sure, Ace, I have yet to put on any defenses on these wheels yet." The egghead complained which only was replied by Spider-Man.
"Don't sweat it Tech, there are some bikes that don't need weapons; besides you can do that after we get back." The long eared genius accepted that and they drove off. The seven got there with plenty of time to spare since barely half of the seats were filled. The group dismounted from their bikes and walked over to the big wooden stage in the center of the park. As they were waiting for the seats to be filled the wall-crawler looked up at the still setting sun. 'That is one image that reminds me of home.' He thought of all the times he went to a certain castle before his friends woke up.
'Now that is one beautiful sight.' Lexi thought and somehow thought of an image of her and Spider-Man, both in civilian clothes, having a picnic and enjoying the same sunset as right now. 'Where did that come from?' She thought in alarm before snapping back into reality. She turned and saw that all of the seats were now filled and the mayor was at the podium.
"…which is why we are gathered together on this day; the one year anniversary of the meteor's impact. Adjusting to this new world is difficult for all of us." The mayor began and the Loonatics, from right to left: Tech, Rev, Ace, Spider-Man, Lexi, Slam, and Duck, stood at attention even though the devil was about to fall asleep. Luckily Lexi was there to give him a friendly light elbow to the ribs which caused him to focus. "Fortunately we had help from seven extraordinary individuals." She added, not noticing the hotdog of the team was checking himself out in his mirror.
'I better look good she is about to call on me.' The mallard thought as he adjusted the feathers at the top of his head.
"Who have watched over and protected us." She continued and finished with the sentence Danger had been waiting for, "And now to accept this small token of our appreciation-." She was cut off as she held the plaque in hand because Duck grabbed it and started talking.
"Thank you. Thank you. You know there are so many people in my life who had made this incredible honor possible, but enough about them." Duck said to the crowd while moving to the edge of the stage. "As you know, there's a lot of hard work -." He added while raising the plaque high which was his turn to be interrupted by the mayor who took it away from him and explained to the web-footed ego who it truly belonged to.
"This is for the team's leader: Ace Bunny." She told him and gave it to the male bunny, was calmly walked over to her and it accepted it graciously. The crowd cheered after hearing that name and Duck walked away with a slumped back. He then turned to the audience and gave them a toned down speech then that of Duck's.
"Thank you very much, mayor. Good thing it's not every day that destruction reins down…upon us." The last part of his speech was drifted when the sky showed some strange precipitation; a form of precipitation that not even Weathervane could create.
"A Hailstorm and me without my umbrella." Lexi said as she, the devil, the runner, and the arachnid had their hands out catching the 'hail'. Tech did as the others, but he put a logical spin on things.
"This isn't Hail." He started but was interrupted by the seventh member of the team.
"I figured since my hair isn't frizzing up." He said and got a few strange looks, so he added, "What it's been known to happen…I think." Tech shrugged it off and continued with his comment.
"As I said it isn't Hail. These are rock pellets. They aren't even from this planet." He said the last part while making a fist with his right hand, the same one with the small pieces of rock, while looking at the sky. "It's a Meteor Shower." He announced and just like that bigger rocks began to fall.
"And I don't think an umbrella's gonna help much." Ace said as he looked at the falling rock chunks. The people began to flea while screaming their heads off. "Hit it Loonatics, we got people to save." Ace gave the command and the seven went to work: Ace with optic blasts, Slam and Spider used strength to smash the big rocks, Lexi Brain Blasted.
"Oh. Ah. Ahh." The mayor shouted in surprise since she had yet to leave the podium, and feared that she would accidentally get hit by Ace's beams.
"I thought the weather only called for partly rocky." Ace said while blasting with optic blast. Even while using his webbing to repel some of the rocks Spider was still able to chat with him.
"Looks like Misty Breeze called it wrong again." If it were not for the falling rocks or his ideas of impressing the mayor he would have given the arachnid one shell of a tar-egg. Tech decided to use his powers in a different way.
"Rev, fetch my Neutron Cannon." He ordered the red one after creating a big green shell for defense. The speed member rushed home, by foot, and came back with a heap of guns in his arms.
"You didn't say if you wanted the refracting Neutron Cannon, the Beam-Splitter Neutron Cannon, or the one that goes 'Dah-dah-dah-dah.'." He said as he looked at the arsenal that he brought. The canine simply grabbed one of the guns and started blasting the small meteors. The others were dealing with the airborne attack with some mild complaining from the mallard.
"Ha, ha. How's that for mind over matter." Lexi questioned after a display of her agility and her brain blasting powers. The lead bunny decided to go with an easy solution since they were starting to run down.
"Slam, set your spin cycle on suction." He suggested to the member to his left while still blasting. The devil did so and created a HUGE cyclone which diverted the rocks. The faster bird chose that as his opening to help the civilians.
"Rev Runner express coming through." Rev said while making a zigzag pattern and added while picking up a few more, "All right ladies and gents no need to pack your bags. We're all traveling light." The mayor saw that and wondered if she was going to be next, but that thought was dashed when she saw a big rock coming at her; fortunately Duck saved her.
"Have no fear." He said while jogging up beside her before activating his quacking powers, and appeared on a tree branch. He set her down and stood up beside her, "Mayor, your life has been officially saved by Danger Duck." He said proudly not noticing the cracking sound.
"Gee thanks. Unh!" The woman said after succumbing to the now broken tree branch and gravity. The mallard heard the thud and looked down to see if she was uninjured.
"Kinda." He said a bit embarrassed over what just happened and added, 'That will probably hurt me of getting an award.' In thought form; he and the others saw that the park was in disrepair, but they were concerned over that attack.
"Okay Tech, time to make with the big words." Ace said after they used their bikes to get back to base, and meet up in their conference room. The first thing that the coyote did was activate one of the various screens showing the first meteor attack.
"The meteor that hit Acmetropolis a year ago was only a trial run." He said before displaying a size comparison of Slam, then the first meteor, and finally a BIG meteor. "This one is 500 times the original." He added and slid the picture down to show a real time picture.
"Kinda makes ya miss the good ol` days, huh?" Ace questioned the group which Peter took the wrong way.
'Not really.' He thought darkly, thinking that these guys seemed like a family to him, and he didn't want to think before that. Those thoughts were cancelled when he heard the mallard's latest complaint.
"Oh great! When the next one hits EVERYONE will have superpowers! Ha! I don't need that kind of competition." He said, worried that there would be someone like Ace or Spider-Man: hogging his limelight. The pink fighter, who was to the duck's left stepped forward and voiced the truth to him.
"After this one hits there won't be anyone, Period." She said with what the lone hero could see was fear and concern in her eyes.
'Worried about everyone on the planet, that I like…about any hero ready to put up the good fight.' He thought, making that last part to set him straight of not letting his heart rule him. About that time, the founder of the team's voice was heard.
"Your absolutely right, Lexi." She said before emerging in holo-mode and continued, "Which is why you have to journey into space before that meteor hits Acmetropolis." As soon as she said that Danger decided to impress her with his courage.
"Well, don't worry your wealthy little head, boss lady. We laugh at danger: ha, ha, ha, ha, ha." He added the laugh for good effect and then added a comment that he knew that he was going to regret, "Besides, what's so scary about a little space voyage." His answer came in the form of the other bird, who sped over to his side.
"Well there's: cosmic rays, air lose, engine failure, zero gravity, deadly aliens, black holes, supernovas." Rev stopped his list when he heard a sigh come from the mallard who was looking down in defeat.
"See? Laughing already." Duck said dismally after a sigh. Seeing no other reason for being there the blond woman decided to go about her own business.
"Zadavia, out." She said before deactivating the hologram. The others did what they could to prepare for this big mission. Tech: design a way to get up there, Rev running on the treadmill, Duck in the conference room to watch the sky, Slam eating, Ace and Spider-Man training, and Lexi walking around seeing if the others were ready.
"Coming your way, Ace." Peter said after attaching a web-line to the back of one of the training robot's back and flung it at the yellow hare who kicked it down. The two of them then stood back to back firing impact webbing, and optic blasts: taking down a few. As that was happening Lexi saw them, and opened a panel outside the doorway which housed there towels and got a couple before hearing the AI voice.
"Engaging anti-gravity sensors." The voice said before Ace grabbed a red and black pole and slammed it through one of the robots. Spider-Man on the other hand was spinning one of the robots: his idea was to create a domino explosion, but that didn't happen.
"Couldn't sleep, huh?" Lexi said, deciding to make herself known to the two men. As she said that she pressed a couple of buttons: turning off the holograms, and causing the web-head to land on his butt. "I usually count sheep, but that's just me." She said to the two.
"This is our biggest mission ever. Got to be ready for anything." Ace explained to her while doing a few stunts with his staff. By this time Peter had gotten off of his butt and headed over to the other two. Lexi tossed a light purple towel to Ace and was about to give Peter the one she draped around her neck, but he had another idea.
"Don't worry, I have my own." He then was able to create a web-towel, but as soon as he placed it on his face: it hardened. The two looked at him: highly amused as he tried to pull it off his face. Having a feeling the other two just wanted to laugh at him he took out some web-solvent from his uniform's belt area. "A little help?" He questioned them with a muffled voice, Lexi helped and dripped the solvent on the webbing. He pulled it off pretty easily and looked at the others who, just as he thought, had big smiles. "Okay, so maybe that wasn't my greatest idea." He said to them.
"Here." The female one said and tossed him a blue towel. He used it on his face, not noticing the blush on the towel-girl's face. She shook off those butterflies and turned to Ace. "Like I was about to say you two always land on your feet."
"I've had a lot of practice." Ace said to them in a serious tone while knowing the arachnid knew how to bounce back. The yellow triangle began to glow as he remembered what his life was like before his upgrade:
"No!" A blonde girl shouted as she was being backed into a corner with a big robot stomping right at her.
"Destroy humanity, destroy." The machine said in a stereo-typed robot voice as it inched. For a moment it stopped and analyzed its prey but was interrupted when a while gloved hand tapped its shoulder. It turned and saw a bald man, which Peter guessed was their worlds Vin Diesel when he last heard it, stood there in average street clothes.
"Sorry, bucket boy, not today." He said once his enemy was turned. While he said that he did a combination of getting into a fighting stance and a two fingered taunt.
"Destroy humanity, destroy." The bot said as he walked closer to him. It then lunged its pincer claws at the human before something strange happened.
"And…cut." A new voice said, causing the robot to stop. The voice was that of the director of the movie that they were making. The red hat wearer walked over to the actor who was standing straight and looking at his current boss. "Oh ho, ho! Van, babe! Faboo! Ha, ha, ha. Take a break while we shoot the fight scene, hmm? Ha, ha!" He said to the actor in a humorous way before quickly turning angry to the rest of his crew. "Where's that stunt rabbit?!" He yelled out so the whole city could hear.
"Yeah, that's stunt bunny." The gray hare as he walked over, wearing the same outfit, but only holding a mask of the man he was stepping in for.
"Whatever." The director said, not really caring what his underlings called themselves. "Now like we rehearsed, hmm?" He said as he stared at the rabbit.
"Whoa! Slow down there, doc. You see, I have some ideas that you're gonna love." Ace said as he dropped his mask and showed off his moves, that the rest of the Loonatics were used to seeing, after saying, "Now you see when the robot comes at me how about I do some of these Hyah! Some of those, hyah, and some of these." As he showed off his moves the other stage hands were in awe over what he could do, but the director had to prove that he was superior to the backup cast.
"No!" He said flatly before adding a small chuckle. "You see, I am the director, which makes me the BOSS which means YOU do the scene the way I tell you to do the scene." He said to the rabbit rather smugly with his face mere inches from Ace's face. He then picks up the mask and shoves it at him before yelling, "And…action!" The robot was reactivated and it grabbed the rabbit by the ears, before he could put on the mask.
"Oh! Ow! Oh!" Ace said aloud as the robot was beating the stuffing out of him. Eventually he was released, from the mechanical prop, with a tattered costume and bent ears. When he collapsed from being beaten up, he the rock slam down which gave him his new life. "It's show time." He said seriously to the others. Lexi left the two and went back to see if Duck was doing his job.
"Any sign of any more meteor showers, duck?" She questioned as she walked closer to the mallard. The duck was still looking out the big window, still on his surveillance task.
"Nope, but the fit and handsome superhero stands calm, yet focused, confident that should danger arise he is ready to protect the lives of his-." Duck answered her in a dramatic way, but Peter thought it sounded like a superhero from the 1980's: since he followed her.
"A simple "no" would have done, duck." She said with handled anger as she held her arms across her chest. The female bunny then released her anger, and her arms down before asking a question she had often wondered, "Have you always been like this?"
"Stoic and resolve to be the best superhero ever. Why yes." He said to her with a thumbs-up. He then added a cliché line, "Seems like just yesterday." He then told her, and the hidden spider, his tale.
"The bronzed and handsome lifeguard sits calm yet focused, confident that should danger arise he is ready to protect the lives of his-." His past self said and just like before was interrupted, but by the real lifeguard of the pool that got frozen over by the Vikings.
"Yo, Duck! Get out of my chair and do your job!" A male human said, startling him from his speech. "Pool boy! Oh, and make sure you use a net." The man said after grabbing the duck by the back of his yellow shirt and giving him a net with a long handle. He shoved the duck to one of the corners of the pool.
"Use the net! Use the net!" He said in a mocking fashion before adding in a serious tone, "Talk about a waste of talent." As he was muttering to himself he was moving the net around the corner and then found something; he pulled it up and it was the 345th diaper he fished. "Egh. Another treasure from the deep." He said sarcastically, before seeing a woman with a crying baby came over.
"Mama!" The baby said while crying and when the two got to the mallard the partially mummified baby added, "Mine!" The red-haired woman took the soggy diaper and walked off.
"Ugh! Just put me out of my misery!" He said as he watched the woman take what he fished out. He then saw something streak across the sky, "Huh?" He said as he watched it pass by the buildings. "I was kidding! I was kidding!" He said before the waves hit him and when they did all he could do was scream.
"Well, I got to hand it to you duck. You've come a long way since diaper duty." She said with her hands to her waist and watching him shake his head back to reality.
"You got that right toots. You got to be fearless when you step into the spotlight like me." Duck said to her while pointing to her at first and thumbing himself at the end. He then crossed his arms, out of confidence.
"I know what's it's like to be in the spotlight." She said, which was Peter's mental note to scram, since when he heard the tale from her: she actually let a tear fall. She thought of the high school she attended and of the BIG gym that it held along with the tryouts.
"Welcome everyone to this year's Acmetropolis University cheer squad. As you know the competition is particularly hard this year, so super good luck to you all." A blonde woman, the head cheerleader said to the small group while waving her pink pompoms in the air for the last part. A young boy over to her right was in charge of the clipboard showed her the first one. "First up Lexi ,uh…Bunny?" She and the other woman to her left were caught off guard.
'Geez, I am one of her closest friends and she didn't fill me in on this.' The girl to the left, who looked like a relation to: Paula Haze, thought as she looked at the stage.
'Don't mess up, Lexi. Don't mess up.' The orange rabbit thought to herself as she stepped into the light. Like most frightened creatures her eyes showed how completely nervous she was about this.
"Anytime your ready." The head leader said in irritation. 'This creature does not think she belongs to a cheerleading squad, does she? She is better off as a substitute mascot.' The blonde girl thought as she watched the rabbit move. Lexi's moves were great: handstand, to front flip, to small moonwalk, to spinning counter clockwise on one foot, to moving both fists diagonally to either side of the position of her feet, to a standing stance of sorts, to another flip, and finishing with splits and raised arms. That alone won over the other combatants and two out of three of the table people.
"Wow! I've never seen anything like it! She's even better than you!" The boy, who looked like he could be related to the cameraman of Misty Breeze, said while pointing at the perturbed girl.
'Ata girl.' The girl to the left thought as she began to clap her hands. The head girl there did not like how everyone was cheering for this: freak, so she decided to use her powers of being the decision maker.
"That was such a cute routine, Lexi. But I'm afraid you don't have what it takes." She said which surprised the other two, but not by much, and received plenty of booing and hissing from the other girls. The chosen rabbit was truly depressed, she didn't know what she did wrong, and that was when fate gave her a chance at something new. The meteor rushed over: causing the building to shake.
"What's that?" The boy questioned before pieces of the roof began to fall apart, and while everyone was fearing the worst when the doors were flung open and Lexi who was on her back, also in fear, felt something new added to her body.
"I'm ready for this mission…" She began and then looked at the duck and added, "And I know I'll be as brave as you, Duck."
"Dare to dream, Lexi, dare to dream." He said back and the two parted ways: Duck still looking and Lexi walked out of the room.
"She probably couldn't handle sharing the light with someone that is more beautiful than she was." Peter said, getting Lexi's attention. The pink bunny turned and saw Spider-Man leaning against the wall, near the door.
"Was that a compliment, Spider?" She questioned him, this was one big mystery: he often slipped her those comments and then pretended that he didn't. She understood the why he was distant, but why was he trying so hard to deny what his heart was telling him.
"No, of course it wasn't. Just saying the facts." He answered back with his head, still away from her. She walked closer and saw some purple, knowing that he was blushing, but she also saw fear in those eyes.
"Honestly, what's wrong, Peter." She said with her voice in complete concern for her friend. He turned away from her and decided to tell her a brief summery over a group of his friends.
"Back home there is a group that call themselves the Fantastic 4. Just like you guys they got there powers by cosmic rays, only they were in space, and just like you they were given powers through those rays: one became a psychic of sorts, one became a rubber-band, one became a walking forest fire, but the fourth one became a monster; at least in his own opinion.
"Nothing like that is going to happen to us." Lexi said, while holding and turning his face to her and understood that it was the fourth member he was freaked out about.
"I'm sorry, I'm just scared for you guys' safety." He said to her and thought of only on thing, 'If these cosmic rays mess with me will it trigger HIM again.' After he thought that an image of: Man-Spider appeared. The bunny wanted to know what he was thinking, but was interrupted by their com-links.
"What is it, Tech?" Lexi said into her speaker and got an answer just like that.
"I have it done, come on up." He answered and the others got to the chosen location and saw the invention he built.
"So, uh, Tech how you gonna get us up to that space rock?" The field leader questioned once they all got up to the top. The canine, who loved to toot his own horn, grabbed the rope that was connected to the tarp.
"Presenting the Tech E. Coyote Space Stream 9000." He said before pulling the rope. All of them saw a replica of the old spaceships that were on black and white alien movies.
"Kind of Retro, don't you think." Duck criticized as he looked at it. The coyote on the other hand twiddled his two index fingers.
"No." He said calmly after stopping his fingers before continuing, "In fact it's just what we need to destroy that meteor." He proved his point by showing all of them the blueprints to that device. They were all seated, and got ready to head out. "Oh, if only the fellows at the Acme Institute could see me now." Tech said and began to think back to that day.
"Tech, your keeping us from lunch, now are you going to show us your senior thesis or not." A man in a triangle shaped building said in an annoyed fashion.
"And you won't be disappointed, sir. Just one last adjustment-." The young genius said and turned to his tool, but that was one of the worst things to tell the older professor.
"Oh, for crying out loud step aside, son; I'll turn it on myself." The man said while pulling the canine away from the machine and began pressing buttons. Tech saw his button pushing and decided to warn him.
"Be careful! I installed a self-destruct mode for extra credit!" The warning went unheard and the room went: boom. The brown coyote, in tattered research clothes came out while holding a broken remote. "My baby!" He said while tiredly pressing a few buttons.
"I used to think you were a mad genius, but now a think your just…mad." The man, that Tech was trying to prove, said after coughing up some smoke. As he walked off the long-eared genius fell onto the stairs.
"It does work." He said after he fell and added while looking at the device, "If only could see that." He then saw some small pieces of ruble begin to shake, he stood up and saw the meteor, and then was hit by the rays with a, "Uhh!"
"It'll work." He said aloud before looking down at his console and pressed a big red button, but as he did that he added, "I know it." Spider-Man, saw that the panels were opening it reminded him of the batmobile's, from the first movie, shield mode. "Perfect take off." Tech said after they took flight. Then he received props from the others.
"Nice work, Tech." Ace said, being the first to congratulate him.
"It may be retro, but it's cool." Lexi said to the canine.
"Yeah cool…for a flying dinner plate." Duck said insultingly, but Peter had the fellow genius' back.
"Your just soar because you couldn't think of anything old school to use for flight." That angered the bird for a moment, and he was about to say something, but was interrupted by the man of the moment.
"It should be a smooth ride from here." He said as they flew through the atmosphere. "Brace yourselves, approaching light meteor shower." Tech said to the others, but as he said that Parker sensed something amiss.
'Spider sense, but where, I see no danger.' He thought until he felt the machine begin to shake.
"Is this your idea of a smooth ride?" Duck stated while they were shaking and then they all heard a bad sound; which their leader was the first to question about it.
"Uh, Tech, why does it sound like the engines just stopped?" He questioned and got his answer from the comic relief.
"Maybe you were hearing things." He said, hoping that he was right.
"Uh, well, that would be because the engines just stopped." He answered back to the two. This caused the arachnid to think of something different.
'Do you always have to state the reality of the problem.' He thought before looking at the bunny.
"Oh." He said to the coyote with a slight raised head. The saucer was sent back onto the planet's surface.
"I think I just threw up in my bill." Duck said, and naturally that caused the seventh member to open his big mouth.
"That's were the scent of Chili fries is coming from." He and the others began to scream in worry over this minor problem.
"We're doomed! Completely and utterly doomed!" Duck said while looking out of his section of window.
"Rev, log into the lab. Upload a copy of the control system software so we can reboot the system." The canine genius said to the red one, calmly.
"Done, done, and wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute…done." Rev said while typing at the keys of his console at a fast but steady pace. The lab back home went active with words appearing on it, 'uploading system copy' and, 'download complete'. The information was instantly put into the ship, which gave it power again. Before they could become one with the concrete the ship went back up.
"Ahh!" He screamed before they pulled up, but Duck still thought they were in danger so he added, "Doomed!"
"Okay! It's smooth sailing from here on out." Tech said, swiveling his chair to see the others. The duck was skeptical and he did not fear voicing his concern.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah. I hope this is the good smooth as opposed to the bad smooth." The coyote did not seem to really listen to that last part. He then decided to calm the others down, in case they were still fearful too.
"Ounce we get through the asteroid belt: we should see our target." He said to them, and as they were passing by the space belt Ace looked out his window looking around.
"If our target doesn't see us foist." He said while still looking around. The speed bird on the other hand decided to defend the canine by that negative comment.
"Hey. You don't have to worry about that, Ace. Because Tech has plotted us a course that allows us to avoid any contact with any large object and if anyone can do that, it's my man Tech." The runner saw that they were currently in the thick of the stationary meteor shower so he added casually, "And besides the statistical probability of an impact of even here in the asteroid belt is fairly minute-." He was interrupted when they were being pelted by those space boulders.
"You want to recheck those numbers." Ace suggested to his comrade after a series of shakes. A few more hit them and that was when the duck looked at his monitor.
"Then, uh, recheck why those rocks are using us for a punching bag?" He said and saw on his monitor several red blips coming at them.
"Well, we do have a big red dot on the center of our ship, maybe the rocks are playing darts." Peter said to them, trying to use his sense of humor to ease Duck's already worried mind.
"Everyone, into your inter-cosmic spacesuits." He said after turning to the others. Lexi decided to try her luck of being a comedian before Peter could say anything.
"Do we get our choice of colors?" She questioned, hoping that he may say 'yes' to that.
"Well, uh, no, but it will keep you from imploding." He said as he stood up, revealing that a section of their seats could double as a pack. He walked over to the center of the ship which a light covered him, and that light laminated him in a sense. "Voila." He said after it was done then with his hands to his chest he added, "And it locks in freshness." The others followed his lead in this order: Ace, Lexi, Spider-Man, Duck, Slam, and Rev.
"Well, I now know what leftovers feel like." Peter said in his comical style after the others were fitted. The yellow member scanned the small cockpit and did not see the violet muscle of the team.
"Wait a sec. Where's Slam?" The leader questioned to the others. Lexi who was sitting at the wall-crawlers seat (which was in between her and Rev's seat) saw the member in question.
"Ha. He's already outside: slamming away." She said to the slightly nervous rabbit. Slam stood outside of the ship, holding a club made of stone.
"Fore!" He said before hitting one of the meteors away. He then laughed a bit before hitting another rock only saying the next number, "Five." As the female rabbit saw this action she decided to tell the others what it reminded her of.
"I haven't seen Slam have this much fun since his old days in the Wrestling." She said to them and watched as one outside used another sports reference.
"Batter, batter, batter. Swing batter!" He was having so much fun beating on the rocks in front of him he failed to see the powered up boulder coming from behind.
"Heads up, Slam." Ace tried to warn the fellow male, but his pleas feel short as the rock from behind hit him. As the devil was floating there he remembered how his life before the big boom.
"And now this nights ragin' fight night of the millennium." The official said after the bell dings and added, "Your favorite Carlos the Conqueror." A man with a blue, yellow, and red wrestling outfit, and with a robotically based left arm stood with both fists raised high while standing in one corner. People cheered once they heard his name; the ref then pointed to the other corner. "Versus the Terror from somewhere: Twisted Spinner." Slam, who was sitting on the ropes: leapt up, slammed onto the mat and gave off a growl of determination. The black and white outfitted man motioned the two to come closer with his arms landing to both sides.
"Remember, fuzzball, MAKE it look good when YOU loose." Carlos said, in a French accent, once the two were close enough. Naturally this champ got away with all of his other matches when his paid them to take a nosedive.
"I'm gonna win!" The Tasmanian argued to the man, he vowed that he would play the game honorably; taking a dive was not the honorable, it was shallow.
"Just take the fall, you furry fathead." The conqueror said angrily, but still with that French accent. The future Loonatic member garbled out an answer which was close to a, 'hell no.' The man seemed sorry for what he said and offered a hand shake while saying, "Oh, excuse me: Mr. Fathead." Slam accepted the hand but was caught off guard when the guy began spinning while holding his hand. The devil grumbled in surprise, but stopped when he hit the ropes and fell forward.
"That's the way you want to play it." Slam garbled in anger as he saw Carlos absorb the praise of the crowd. He jumped up and landed on the opponents shoulders which they stumbled after that for a while.
"Crush him! Crush him!" Some fellow wrestlers said, hoping that their idol: Carlos the conqueror would win. The bad thing was that Slam flipped his enemy right out of the ring: landing into his wrestling cheer squad. Pretty soon after that the Tasmanian heard a boom and then something strange in the sky.
"Huh?" After he, and the others heard the boom. Pretty." He said as he saw the strange assortment of colors. Back to the present Slam saw that Duck to his right and Spider-Man to his left were helping him out.
"Nice going, Slugger. Yeah. You saved the day." Duck congratulated to the big member who wiggled his fingers, in the hello fashion, as an answer. He then saw that Rev, Lexi, and Ace were there as well.
"Let's get him back in the ship." The male bunny said to them before all of them flew into the open door. When they were all inside the stationary aircraft, they took off their spacesuits, and went back to tracking their target.
"Meteor: dead ahead." Lexi informed once she saw something coming into view on her radar. All of them looked out the window and saw the BIG rock.
"Yeah, and it's BIG!" He said to them before they were hit by one of the jagged rocks at the bottom of it. Instead of damaging anything it simply made their vehicle spin topsy-turvy.
"Are you sure we can destroy that thing?" Duck questioned once they stabilized the ship.
"Yes, to insure destruction before it reaches Acmetropolis, I designed this device which will amplify Ace's Laser by a full factor of, you guessed it, googol." Tech said while bringing up specs of a periscope, which was at the base of the ship.
"A goo what?" Danger questioned, not knowing what the member to his right was talking about. His answer came from the master of tongue twisters.
"A googol is a numeral one followed by 100 zeros which was invented by American Mathematician Edward Kasner, born 1878, died 1955. And the reason why they called it a Gogol was because Edward asked his nephew, who was eight years old at the time, what name he would give a REALLY big number." Rev said to him while rocking back and forth on his chair, grateful that he reads any trivia sheets. He was about to continue when Danger, who was board out of his mind by the first word, wanted him to stop talking.
"Ok! Yawn! Really bored now, stop!" Duck said to the other bird. It did make him stop, but Rev was a little mad that the Duck cut him off like that. The team flew up to where they all could see the surface of the enemy space rock and activated the periscope. Ace moved his chair to the scope.
"Here's goes nuttin`." He said as he gripped the bars on both sides of the scope. He then waited a while and launched one of the strongest blasts he ever made through the pole. Outside of the ship the blast continued all the way out of the periscope and hit the edge of the rock; causing an explosion instantly.
"Whoa! Ace, you did it." Lexi said immediately after seeing the explosion. Duck looked at his monitor, but did not see anything good when the smoke cleared.
"Whoa! Ace…you didn't do it." Danger corrected, this caused the whole team to look at their monitors. All of them did not like how the rock survived the blast. Tech looked at it, seeing if his invention did any damage at all.
"That blast only peeled off a layer of atmospheric dust. Impossible!" Tech said to them, and he knew that there was no rock known could handle that kind of punishment.
"Maybe Tech, maybe. But if we don't find another way to stop that thing: Acmetropolis is going to be nothing but a BIG pile of atmospheric dust." Ace said, after adjusting himself away from the scope.
"Guys we got to take out that meteor before it hits Acmetropolis." Lexi said to the others, worried that if they should fail, all of their loved ones will be gone. Duck who was looking through the periscope heard that and used his acting skills.
"No more Acmetropolis? No more gloomy purple skies! Oh, sadness, oh, woe." He said while changing his facial expression from surprise into sorrow; he wept loudly after that, but he grew bored with that. "So what planet do we move to next?" He questioned casually. Spider-Man walked over and gently placed his hand on the duck's shoulder.
"We're not scrap, yet." He said before walking over to the window, and gazing at their enemy. 'Low-life, his folks are probably still down there and he's willing to turn tail.' He thought angrily about the vain member of his team.
"Uh, Tech, something screwy out here…" Ace said to the genius while standing to the left of the green one's chair before adding, "Besides him." And thumbed over to duck; who was still at the scope, which went back into the floor. "First the saucer conked out. Then those asteroids came after us. And now that hunk of rock turns out to be laser-proof." The bunny said while counting it on his fingers and motioning over to the rock the arachnid was looking at. The coyote looked up at him, thinking he had a plan which he did. "Time for plan 'B'." He said with a raised right index finger.
"Next time let's start with plan B." Lexi commented as they all began to stand from their chairs.
"If we do that, then it would be plan 'A', and if that happens then what do we call plan 'A'." Peter said in his comical style, but was ignored.
"We land on the meteor, plant some charges at precise stress points, and then escape before the big kaboom." Ace said to them of his plan while several charges, which looked like upgraded pieces of dynamite when Spider-Man first saw them, came from the same spot as the periscope.
"So, that's what plan 'B' means – plan bomb." Peter said to them, somehow feeling he used a line from a Disney movie. The speed creature decided for his friends to get prepared before sharing the explosives.
"Okay, everyone in your inter-cosmic spacesuits, come on." He said, and they all did. All of them grabbed spare bags from one of the various compartments and started stuffing the bags. Ace was soon done filling one bag to the point of burst before walking over to the only true flyer of the team.
"Okey-dokey, Rev, baby. You're the fastest, so we're counting on you to plant most of the charges." He said with a generous look on his face as he handed the runner the load of charges to him.
"You can count on me, Ace. They don't call me the speed demon of Acmetropolis. But of course I haven't always been the fastest, but that's a different story it happened a long, long, long, long, long, long, long, long, long time ago." He said and thought of his old job.
"We guarantee a free lunch in 30 minutes." The boss said while dropping the bag with the order inside on the pick-up counter. "You have 5 minutes to get there otherwise I take it out of your pay." The fat man with an apron, working as a cook at a sandwich shop said and pointed to the worst of his employees: Rev Runner. Rev saw the clock, and saluted to his boss once he was done talking.
"Don't you worry cookie, I'm on it." He said before turning to the exit. He was soon outside and that was when he added, "Rocket blades don't fail me now!" He sped at their top speed; he even grinded on a passing elevated train for a while. However he may have lost some speed when he ran past some men who were working on a section of the street, but he didn't seem to mind. The bird ran up about 22 steps to get to a man wearing a security uniform. "Quick wrap Sandwich shack, we deliver in 30 minutes or your meal is-." Rev said to the customer, but the human finished it for him.
"For free. My watch says one minute past 12: you're late." The man said while glancing at his watch. Trying to deny that the man may be right the runner tried a different tactic.
"Well, your watch must be fast because-." He was cut off by the same person.
"Better move faster next time." He said while snatching his lunch and going into the building. The speed creature was soon crushed at what just happened.
"But…" He said before turning away and continuing, "But I won't get paid." Just like the others he saw the meteor and was hit by its power, while still at the top of the stairs.
'I'm faster now, and I can't fail.' Modern Rev thought before saying something, thinking that he was still back in time, "You won't have to dock my pay this time Cookie." He then heard a familiar voice.
"Who's Cookie?" Ace questioned, the still space-out bird. After hearing the voice the bird was taken back into reality.
"What? Who? I mean Ace." He said which freaked Danger out a little bit, but only humored the rabbits about him being caught up in his past. The arachnid held an expression of understanding.
"I had the same problems with my pizza delivery job." He muttered remembering of all the late deliveries or the smoothie looking pizzas he delivered. He then felt the craft land onto the surface, the doors opened soon after.
"All right team you know what to do." Ace said as all of them took flight: to different places on the rock. The mallard did not like being there so he just felt like describing his dislike of being there.
"Is it too late for plan 'C'?" He questioned before flying over to his location. The duck landed and checked his radar, to see if he was in the right spot. The one thing that he did not notice was that a wave of cosmic energy was heading straight at him. "'X' marks the spot for the big kaboom." He said after seeing that he was at the right spot, he put the radar away and knelt down. He took out one of the charges and began one of his speeches, "Now the brave space ranger positions his charges if he's off by one micron the entire mission will fail." He said as he shoved one of many of the charges into the ground; not knowing that the cosmic energy was right behind him; the only time he realized something was behind him was when he turned and saw a stone tendril. "Yipes!" Danger said after he turned and saw with surprise at his obstacle. "Oh. Oh. Missed me!" He said as he evaded the tendrils attacks. He then added, "I'm quacking out of here." When he was caught by that rock, but there was a flaw in that plan which he was going to learn the old fashioned way: living it. "Ok! No air! Bad idea." He said in alarm as his body instantly inflated to hot-air balloon size, he then ported back to his suit; which was hanging at the edge since the rock released its grip. "Now, where was I?" He said, and saw that he was in the same spot. "Oh, right." He said and then endured when the tendril slammed him this way and that while he added, "Let go of my suit."
"Ok, let's get these babies planted." Ace said to the purple one who chuckled as an answer. The two were in a big, shallow crater on the asteroid, with their share of explosives. Just like Duck, who did not have time to set his charge, they were attacked by the cosmic energy too. "It's that cosmic energy stuff again." The yellow hare said in alarm after the two of them saw an aura glow pass them by, but this time it turned the ground into quicksand which stopped at their waists. At first, they started to struggle, but Ace decided to make it a bit easier. "Don't move! I'll save ya." He said and shot his optic blast at the rock around Slam's body which freed the devil.
'Time to return the favor.' Slam thought as he jumped high and created a cyclone above the male bunny. The cyclone was powerful enough to free him, and right after that the two flew back to the ship.
"According to our map, we go 20 paces to the East." Spider said as he and Lexi flew into a small mouthed cave. After flying a little ways in they stopped, Lexi double checked: making sure the wall-crawler wasn't messing with her.
"Time to blow you out of orbit." She said and got out a charge. As she was putting it into place Peter wanted to make a reference to one of his old shows.
"Nice one, but I would have said: time to blast you to Infinity and beyond." He said and did the hands on his hips pose. She only shook her head despite that she thought it was pretty funny. That's when his radar detected something, 'Spider sense: again. That means another quake.' He thought and sure enough there was a shaking, but there was also a bright light.
"What was that?" Lexi questioned, this time the cosmic rays made an intense cave in. The two of them used their agility skills and got out, or al least one of them did: Lexi after doing some cartwheels and front flips. "Yeah." She said in praise over what she just did. "Web-head?" She questioned after turning around and saw nothing. "Peter, are you okay?" She added, this time with more fear.
"Calm down, cottontail, I'm alright." Spider-Man said after leaving the caved in cave. He did not have a scratch on him, just dust. "One good thing about spider reflexes: I can even handle a cave-in." He explained as he looked at her, and that was when he was able to see the fear in her eyes. "You all right, Lexi?" He questioned after walking closer to her. The fear in the female fighter's eyes was changed into anger.
"Don't scare me like that, again?!" She yelled out after punching him in the right shoulder. The spider creature rubbed that offended piece of his body and could understand why she would be angry in a teammate sense, but was there another meaning.
"Come on, the others are probably done with their bombs. I think I know how to get there fast." He said to her, and got a raised eyebrow from her, so he went a bit deeper. "Voice code override on pack, access code: Spider-Man." He said to his com-link, and he got a response.
"Jetpack safety's disabled. Warning: circuits will overheat within one hour." The voice said to him, and he had to admit that did care him.
"An experimental analyzing chip Tech put into my suit; have to take it out after this." He explained to her after getting another confused look from her. "Anyways, jets online." He said and that was when the pack gave off blue flames, but instead of taking off he stayed there beside Lexi. "I know that you have a pack too, but this might be faster. The problem is that…" He drifted – unable to complete it.
"Ok." She said with a sigh and got into his arms. "I swear you'd try anything for me to get close to you." She said which made that blue skin of his turn purple. He shook off that warm feeling in his heart, not wanting ANY female to end up like MJ.
"Right then. Jets: maximum burn." He then took flight, heading back to the ship. On another part of the asteroid Tech, stood there ready to put his charges in, but that did not do so well since another dose of comic energy affected the stick he was about to use.
"Uh-oh! That energy field triggered the countdown." The coyote said after hearing beeping from the device. He picked up the now green glowing charge, but it was snatched away by the speed creature of the team, who was done with his bag.
"Be right back." He informed as he sped and grabbed the active charge. Tech looked at his com-link, which showed the time limit, and he did not like what he saw.
"Rev, get rid of that, it's set to blow!" He warned the bird, and the speedy fowl listened up him. Rev made a u-turn and in the arch of that turn he got rid of it.
"You got it." Before tossing it, but the same energy that was giving them problems on the surface was also above them too; since as soon as the charge was in the air it was bounced back by that same strange energy.
"Oh, dear." Tech said in a surprised/dull fashion after he caught it. When the device exploded, it was the inter-cosmic spacesuit that almost kept his form. Rev ran up beside the scientist soon after and decided to talk to him.
"Whoa! Did you see that? It stopped in mid-air, man, Tech, it was that strange cosmic energy. It somehow knocked the charge off course. How do you explain that? But really Tech, thank you for saving my life." Rev said to heap of insulated ashes, which looked at his direction.
"A pleasure as always." He said despite the enormous pain he was in. After hearing that explosion: the bunnies, the devil, and the spider adjusted course and landed over to the coyote and runner.
"Tech, you put the boom in 'kaboom'." Lexi said after letting go of the web-spinner's neck and standing on her own. Ace looked around and saw that they were still one short, so he activated the com-link and used the communicator option.
"Uh, Duck, care to join us?" He questioned with a humorous tone in his voice. Despite what was going down on his end, the mallard could answer the field commander.
"Ha, ha, ha, ha. I'll be right there." He said while still being flopped around. Near at the top of the swing Danger launched an egg at one of his bombs with a, "Yeeehaaaaa!" It exploded on impact, causing the tendril to be destroyed at the same time. He then started a dead-run back to their ship while the others were starting to go off.
"The other charges are about to blow." Tech informed the rest of the team who were already inside their ride home, Ace's orders to fall back and wait for duck, but that did not lessen the team's worry after hearing that news.
"Duck!" Ace said in alarm as they saw the chosen fowl approaching them. Thankfully before his feathers could become one with space he used his jetpack and got inside before the automatic door shut. "Hit it, Tech!" Ace said and they took flight just before the explosion. The explosion created a thick cloud of dust, which they flew through with ease. Ace looked out the window and at his monitor before turning to the others, who were also turned, and said to the others, "Well, what do you know, it worked." He shrugged for the last part, but the canine wiz-kid did not like the tone of his leader's voice.
"You say that like your surprised." He said, his voice sounding totally offended by that lack of faith. Luckily, the team had Spider-Man to try to make any comment funnier.
"That wasn't surprise, Tech ol` pal, it was the sound of relief." He said to his fellow big-brain which he accepted as an answer. In the center of their vehicle a hologram of Zadavia from shoulders to hair appeared.
"Congratulations, team. Acmetropolis is breathing a big sigh of relief right now." After she said that to the group, Danger decided to try to gain some brownie points with her.
"Hey there, boss lady. Didn't think we could do it, huh?" He questioned, wondering if she would praise him on destroying the meteor.
"Oh Duck! I've always have faith in the team. Well most of the team." She answered him, and that was when Peter wanted to add one of his usual annoy lines in there too.
"Was that comment aimed at him or me?" He questioned the founder of the team. She seemed reluctant at first to answer and then she gave a copped out answer.
"You don't want to know." Ace then brought something else up, something that had been bugging him since he first the start of this mission.
"Huh, mission may be accomplished…" He said, looking away from Zadavia before looking at her direction and adding, "But this whole thing has got me thinkin': what was that cosmic energy? There's something big going on, something really, REALLY big." Unknown to the seven, eight counting Zadavia's holo-feed, was a big red and black ship rounding a planet in their sector of space. The pilot of the craft, a cyborg with purple hair, saw the Loonatic's ship on his monitor.
"Twice, I have attempted to destroy Acmetropolis. The first time: I misjudged the meteors affect. The second attempt was just demolished by those so called Acme heroes, but the third time: the third time will be the charm." He said aloud, banging on his console when describing the second attempt and closing his left hand when talking of the third time; he added an evil laugh for his future glory.
"Feel's good to be back home." Ace said once they were all out of the craft. They went about their usual business. "Hey, Pete, hows about a one on one pool game?" The male hare questioned to the arachnid, but he didn't feel up to it.
"Maybe some other time, I think I'll just head to bed after a grab something from the fridge." He answered back and did just that. He did not seem to notice that he asked Lexi the same question and she accepted. 'One of the few burgers from that burger shack survived Slam's feeding frenzy last week.' He thought as he took one and headed to bed. He did see them playing together but he had other thoughts.
'I hope he's okay?' Lexi thought before adding to that, 'He did say something about a monster.' She became worried, 'I'll see about it: AFTER this game.'
"The last time we had an intergalactic visitor we had to deal with Galactis." He said after the door to his room shut. "What if who ever created that cosmic energy is just as dangerous?" He questioned as he took off his outfit. After his suit was off he looked at the window and thought of something peaceful, 'At least Man-Spider didn't happen…yet.' After he wolfed down the burger he thought of one other thing, 'I really should tell the others about EVERYTHING back home.' He then fell asleep on that note.