Quivering Quasars
Disclaimer: "It's a vicious cycle that never ends, Nadira!" - Frax, Power Rangers Time Force
Chapter 6: Utter Chaos!
Project Pegasus
Chaos had erupted in Project Pegasus. In the midst of some tests of a pair of energy bands, a monster had smashed its way into the lab.
"Ooooooooh..." Pyro grinned widely at the creature. "Hey guys, can we keep it?"
"Pyro, can you please not be stupid for a while?" Pietro groaned.
"Aw, hell..." Lance groaned, pulling out a staff. "It figures that a monster attacks us on a mountaintop. A mountaintop where I can't use my powers."
"It's why we trained you in other ways. Just in case." Shipwreck reassured with a smirk, pulling out a pair of Desert Eagles.
"Never thought I'd see something like this with this gig." Alpine sighed, pulling out an assault rifle.
"And how long have you been a Joe?" Shipwreck remarked. The Joes and the contingent of SHIELD Agents fired on the creature.
"Is this some damned experiment of yours?" Wesley asked the scientists.
"Absolutely not!" Dr. Vaughn snapped.
"I don't think so!" Dr. Reznek shook her head. Unbeknownst to the group, Dr. Zane was attempting to run off.
"RAAARGH!" The creature roared as the bullets seemed to dissolve upon contact with its skin.
"Dammit!" Shipwreck cursed.
"I don't get it!" Alpine blinked.
"The way the bullets reacted to it..." Lila mumbled, narrowing her eyes.
"It's like it dissolved them." Xi blinked.
"That must be it." The British girl realized. "That thing's skin must have some acidic covering over it. A defense mechanism, maybe. It's like this slug-like thing from Agros III. Its skin excretes a sweet-smelling acid that lures insects to it. The insects touch the acid, they die, and the slug has a free lunch."
"Ooh." Pyro grinned. "Did you keep it?"
"No, it's endangered." Lila sighed.
"Fascinating." Xi smiled. "I'd love to hear more about the animals from the worlds you visited, Lila."
"Xi, not now!" Pietro groaned.
"Kids, protect the scientists!" Cover Girl ordered.
"I got the scientists!" Blue Shield countered, running to them. "Keep that thing back!" The creature, noticing the group of scientists, roared and opened its mouth.
"Look out!" Wesley yelled. He commanded the bands around his wrists to form a protective barrier in front of himself and the scientists as Blue Shield activated his forcefield. The creature blasted a stream of acidic spit at the group.
"Oh, God!" Cover Girl gasped as the spit hit the group. The acid dissolved Wesley's barrier, but Blue Shield was unharmed, albeit trapped under the hardened acid.
"Ah, crap! It ate my barrier!" Wesley exclaimed.
"It was able to keep us safe, so that's what matters." Dr. Reznek smiled in reassurance.
"Blue Shield!" Dr. Vaughn yelped, pointing at the statue of solidified acid vomit that was Blue Shield. "He needs help!"
"I have this handled!" Xi reassured, pulling out a dagger.
"Pietro, distract that thing!" Lance ordered. "Give Xi a chance to work!"
"And don't touch it!" Lila warned.
"I got this!" The silver-haired speedster grinned, racing towards the monster. "Hey!" He waved at the monster. "HEY! Big guy!" The creature turned towards him. "Pal, you need to get your ugly face out of here! You got a mug so horrific, they have to warn people that you are arriving somewhere three weeks before you actually arrive. No wait, scratch that, three months."
"RAAAAAAAARGH!" The creature spat its acid at the speedster, only to miss, thanks to the silver-haired young mutant's speed. The beast tried several more times, but it was never able to hit Quicksilver, who was running rings around it.
"Nyeah nyeah! You suck! You can't even hit the broadside of a barn!" The monster roared in rage, showing its frustration.
Chok! Chok! Chok!
Using the dagger as a chisel, and aided by his claws, the Cobra-created mutant manged to chip the substance of the blue-clad security director. In a short time, he managed to free Blue Shield from his prison.
"Gah!" He gasped. "Thanks, scales!"
"My pleasure!" Xi smiled. "We must hurry! I have no idea how long Pietro can draw that thing's attention."
"Guys, do something!" Pietro yelled out.
"Our guns can't hurt that thing." Alpine grumbled, glaring at his gun.
"I think we can provide some bigger weaponry." Blue Shield remarked with a smile.
"Really?" Shipwreck answered. Blue Shield turned to the brown-haired female agent Pietro tried to chat up earlier.
"Agent Runciter..."
"You got it." She remarked. She whistled. A pair of agents rolled a box up to her. She opened the box, and pulled out a large futuristic rifle. The agents who rolled up the box also pulled out similar rifles from it. She also handed one to Blue Shield.
"Nice rifles." Alpine remarked.
"Thanks!" Agent Runciter nodded. "SHIELD's tech boys like to make sure we're equipped for any situation."
"Mind if we borrow some of these?" Shipwreck grinned, holding up one of the rifles.
"Help yourself." Blue Shield shrugged. "We could use all the help we can get."
"Hey..." Dr. Reznek noticed someone was missing. "Where's Stanley?"
"Indeed." Dr. Vaughn also noticed Zane was missing. "Dr. Zane has vanished."
"We don't have time to find him!" Blue Shield fired his rifle at the creature. The rifle fired a burst of blue energy at the creature. It roared when the energy burst hit it. "I think we managed to hurt it!" Meanwhile, Doctor Zane had managed to flee the scene.
"Aw, great!" He grumbled, pulling out his communicator to AIM. "I'd better let AIM know about this." Unbeknownst to him, a neglectful person had left a banana peel on the floor earlier. "Waugh!"
Thud!
"Ohhhh..." The scientist groaned, holding his neck. He grunted as he got up. Zane glared at the banana peel as he picked it up. "You know, I hate this. I really hate this." He scowled as he stared at the discarded peel. "There are garbage cans all over this place. They just can't take five frickin' steps to the can and put the peel in it. They can't hold on to the peel for a couple of minutes until they get to a garbage can. This is ridiculous! It's really that much of an inconvenience for someone?! This is so-!" e then shook his head. He remembered he had more important things to worry about. "Where'd I put my..." The scientist looked around and saw his signaler on the ground. "Oh, good." He sighed in relief. "Better get that out of sight before anyone sees-! What?"
Beep...beep...beep...
A green light on the device blinked. Zane's jaw dropped.
"No. No no no no no no nonononono..." Zane mumbled, grabbing the device.
The AIM craft
On the bridge of AIM's craft, the communications officer noticed a light blinking on his console.
"Huh?" He blinked under his yellow helmet. "Sir!"
"Yes?" Lyle Getz asked.
"We got the signal!" The AIM officer announced. "Zane's called for the pickup!"
"Excellent!" Getz grinned widely. "I knew Zane would come through! Alright! Set a course for Project: Pegasus! We got us a couple of energy bands to collect!"
Inside Project: Pegasus
The scene had devolved into utter chaos. A gigantic metal monster, origins unknown, had burst its way into the laboratory, its motivations just as unknown. However, there were a group of heroes that had stood in a valiant attempt to stop the creature.
This group included five members of the Misfits: The geokinetic Avalanche/Lance Alvers, the interstellar teleporter Starway/Lila Cheney, the vain speedster Quicksilver/Pietro Maximoff, the insance Australian pyrokinetic Pyro/St. John Allerdyce, and the Cobra-created reptilian warrior known as Xi. Three members of GI Joe were also there: The sailor Shipwreck, the tank driver Cover Girl, and the mountain combat expert Alpine.
"Dammit!" Shipwreck cursed as he blasted at the creature with a SHIELD-provided laser rifle. "Can anything kill this thing?"
"I don't know if we're even scratching it!" Alpine admitted.
"Too bad we're on a mountain." Lance grumbled, aiming his own blaster at the creature. "I could open a fissure and bury this ugly mother."
"Hey, don't worry about it, Rockhead." Pietro laughed, zipping to avoid a swipe from the creature's arm. "We're the Misfits! We got style, attitude, and me! We'll beat this thing!"
"If we could weaponize your bloody ego, we'd have killed this thing already!" Lila grumbled, putting an arrow in her crossbow and firing it. The arrow sailed through the air and hit the creature in the face.
Paf! The creature roared in rage and swiped at its head as a cloud of smoke covered it.
The group were also aided by a brave team of SHIELD Agents, including a brave test pilot named William Wesley. Wesley was testing out a pair of energy bands that the laboratory was given by the Fantastic Four after a battle with a villain that used the bands as a weapon. He had discovered that he could make constructs with light from the bands, which he was trying to use on the creature, but the monster's metal skin ate the constructs. He deftly flew around the creature, desperately trying to attack it.
"Wesley!" Blue Shield, Project Pegasus's blue-costumed forcefield-generating Chief of Security, yelled out as he fired his own blaster at the creature. "Fall back and protect the scientists! Your constructs can't hurt that thing!"
"Sorry, Shield!" Wesley apologized as he used a fist construct to punch the creature in the face. "I ain't gonna stand by when this damned thing is raisin' hell all over this place!" He then whacked the creature in the mouth again.
"RARRRRRGH!" The creature roared, spitting acid at Wesley.
"YEOW!" The brave Texan yelped, dodging the stream. The stream ended up heading up towards one of the scientists.
"Dad!" Wendell Vaughn yelled, racing towards the elder bespectacled blond man. The young SHIELD agent, with one brave flying leap, managed to tackle himself and Gilbert out of the way, the acid stream passing behind them harmlessly.
"Ughn!" The elder man grunted.
"Gilbert!" Dr. Reznek ran to him. "Are you alright?"
"Yes." He looked at Wendell. "Son?" Wendell looked up at his father. "...thank you."
"...no problem, Dad." Wendell smiled gratefully.
"I don't want to interrupt this father-son moment, but where is Stanley?" Dr. Reznek wondered. "H up and disappeared."
"I don't know." Wendell admitted as he helped Gilbert up. "I didn't see him in all the confusion."
"Must've fled." Gilbert frowned. "We'll probably find him hiding in a closet or something like that." Meanwhile, Blue Shield had just dodged a stream of acid from the creature's mouth, and fired his laser rifle at it. The blast hit the creature in the face.
"Got you!" The Security Chief smirked.
"Is there any way to kill this thing?" Lila grumbled as she raced to Blue Shield's side, Cover Girl behind her.
"I may have an idea..." Blue Shield remembered. "This facility has a geothermal plant at the bottom of the mountain. The lava there can incinerate just about anything."
"Is there a way to get this thing into the lava?" Cover Girl asked.
"Yeah." Blue Shield nodded. "What we have to do is-!" He heard a beeping from an internal communicator in his cowl. "Talk to me!"
"We got a problem!"
"I'm looking at it!" Blue Shield replied.
"No, another problem! There's an aircraft heading towards us! It's-!" Blue Shield then heard static.
"Hello? Hello! Dammit!"
"What is it, Shield?" Cover Girl inquired.
"I was just informed there was an aircraft heading towards us-!"
KABOOM!
A large black craft with yellow highlights burst into the lab area.
"Oh, crap." Shipwreck's jaw dropped.
"Advanced Idea Mechanics?" Alpine identified the craft. "The hell they're doing here?"
"Oh, this isn't good..." Cover Girl winced.
"They must be after the bands!" Gilbert realized. Zane kept himself out of sight as he watched the chaos.
"Aw, man. Looks like Hawaii is not the only thing I can kiss goodbye..."
Well, well, well! Looks like business is picking up! What insanity will happen next? Can our heroes fight off the creatures and AIM? Will the bands be safe? What kind of carnage would the creature cause? Find out in the next chapter! Suggestions needed badly!