I would just like to note that Roxie is voiced by Alexa PenaVega. If you get the reference, then you know how my childhood was.
On the streets of various cities in the United States, all activity seemed to have entirely ceased. The streets were littered with the unconscious bodies of the citizens, including Noah, Six and Bobo, who appeared to have fallen into a deep slumber.
"The country was infected in three hours," White Knight's voice narrated. "The entire North American continent was asleep in five. All satellites are offline and there's been no communication from overseas."
Holiday was checking on the staff as she drifted off to sleep, before she felt the electric pulses on her temples from the device on her belt.
"The plague hit Providence before quarantine protocols could be established. Dr. Holiday has managed to keep herself awake using electric neural stimulation."
An EVO burst through the window of a store as the others like it hissed in the streets.
"EVOs seem to be immune to the plague. Which leaves us with only two agents left to deal with this mess."
Rex groaned as he and Roxie stood by each other, panting heavily.
"This is gonna be a... long day," Rex groaned.
"You're telling me," Roxie said.
The twins then gave out loud war cries as they punched and sliced through every EVO that got near them by the store.
Down in the subway, things weren't much better as the train was going down the rails with the driver as asleep as his passengers.
Rex and Roxie raced down into the tunnels with a rushed look on their faces.
"It'll be the last route for those commuters if you two don't stop that train," White Knight told them.
"Yeah, we know!" Rex said. "But we gotta find it first."
The twins then froze where they stood as they felt the entire tunnel rumbling as they looked behind them.
"Found it!" Roxie said as she and Rex built up their individual gauntlets and braced themselves as the train slammed into them, causing them to go splat across the windshield like a couple of bugs.
Thinking quickly, Rex built up his Punk Busters and slammed his foot into the ground, kicking up rubble as Roxie grabbed his hand and both of them shouted out in effort as they put all their strength and energy into the fronto fo the train before it finally stopped, causing both of them to fall to the ground as their builds shattered.
"Rex, Roxie, report," White Knight ordered.
"Mission accomplished," Rex said, adjusting his joints. "We're heading back to the lab."
"Oh man, we're gonna be sore for weeks," Roxie groaned out.
The two then built up their Boogie Pack and hoverboard... only for them ot instantly fall apart.
"Oh, this whole being the only ones awake thing is seriously wearing us out," Rex groaned.
"Come on, pull it together," Roxie told herself as the twins tried again, successfully this time, and took off to the surface.
"Dr. Holiday is heading to the initial outbreak area now," White Knight narrated. "She's come up short as to any way of reversing the plague. I'm counting on her solving this before the electric shocks damage her brain beyond usefulness."
Holiday rubbed her sore head before she glanced to see the exhausted twins step out of the elevator and yawn heavily as they sat down in their chairs.
"This is like spitting on a forest fire," Rex said.
"He's right. Things are probably going wrong in every city on Earth," Roxie said. "We're just two kids. What can we do?"
"Every life saved counts, guys," Holiday said.
"Yeah, we know," Rex said. "So how are Six and Bobo?"
"Same as the others," Holiday said as she showed the two agents as asleep as everyone else on Earth. "Asleep. But Bobo's an EVO. He should've been immune like you two. I... I don't have a clue about this thing. And these shocks won't keep me awake forever."
"All the more reason not to waste any more time," White Knight said as he suddenly appeared on a video screen in the lab.
"She's not wasting time, White," Roxie said as she stood up.
"No. He's right. We've got sixty hours at best before people start dying of thirst."
"And a hundred or so will die within the hour if the downtown fire spreads any further."
"Ugh," Rex groaned. "Back to work."
"Something told billions of viruses to evolve into a sleeping plague," Holiday's voice narrated as the twins flew by the burning skyscraper. "The key to solving this is finding Patient Zero."
The twins touched down on the rooftop next to two nearby water tower. They shouted out as Rex built up his BFS and Roxie used her battle axe to slice the supports of the towers, sending gallons of water through the holes in the roof, extinguishing the flames as the twins gave out a satisfied sigh... just before their comm links rang out.
"Get up to the Cayuga Dam now," White Knight said. "The floodgates are closed."
The twins flew down to the dam as the water started leaking doown the sides of the dam.
"The dam will crack if you two don't relieve the pressure."
Rex and Roxie rushed into the dam's control room and turned the valves to open the floodgates, letting the excess water out and relieving the pressure.
"So how do we find Patient Zero?" Rex asked.
"That's not going to be so easy," Holiday said.
That was when the twins felt a heavy thud and looked out the window to see a large catfish EVO stuck between the dam's opened floodgates, causing the dam to begin to crack.
"Oh, come on!" Roxie shouted out as she and her brother flew out to face it.
"Hope you like fish sticks, Doc," Rex said as he and Roxie dove into the waters of the dam.
"If we can find the frequency that connected Patient Zero to the nanites, we can trace it back to him," Holiday said as the twins looked down to see that the Catfish EVO had a second head on its posterior and it gave out a roar to them.
They tried to swim away but were swiftly gobbled up. Then, they started pounding on the teeth of the EVO, causing it to spit them back out again and both gave a wicked punch outwards that sent the EVO flying out of the dam into the river below, where it promptly swam away as the twins flew away back to the lab.
"Fantastic," Roxie said with a tired groan.
"So we find Patient Zero, shut him down and boom. Everybody wakes up ready for breakfast," Rex said as Holiday finished up her work on some kind fo device.
"Yes," Holiday said as she was shocked again and she tore the paddles off her temples. "No. I mean maybe. Ugh, I'm so tired. I can't think. Argh! And these stupid shocks! I don't know what I'm doing anymore. Maybe I should be studying Bobo instead."
"Take it easy, Doc. Deep breaths," Roxie said. "Is there anything we can do?"
Holiday gave out a sigh. "Almost lost it there. I modified this scanner to find the nanite control frequency. But it could take hours."
"Dr. Holiday, where's my update?" White Knight asked, appearing on the screens.
"Do you really think she'd keep it a secret if she found anything?" Rex asked. "She's been working around the clock!"
"And that's the way it's going to be until we figure this out."
"Just give me a second. I can find the..."
Holiday then finally gave out and fell unconscious into Roxie's arms.
"Doc!" she said as she patted her cheeks softly, to no avail.
"Well, that's just great. She couldn't stay awake an hour or two more?"
"Hey, at least she was working on the problem," Roxie said, setting Holiday down on a chair as she and Rex took the scanner and walked away.
"She was doing her job, which is what I expect from all three of you. Where are you going?!"
"To follow Doc's plan," Rex said, showing the scanner before they closed the door behind them.
"So you can just stay on those screens and decide if you're good for anything besides yelling at people," Roxie said.
"We're down to eighteen hours before we start losing people," White Knight told the twins as they raced through the city as Rex glanced at his scanner.
"You think we don't know that, dude?" Rex asked.
Rex activated his Rex Ride that instantly fell apart at the seems.
"What's the holdup?"
"We just need a second," Roxie said, breathing heavily.
"If you two can't handle this..."
"What are you going to do, shuffle some papers at us?!" Rex asked. "We're the only resources you've got, so back off!"
Roxie summoned her motorcycle as Rex rebuilt his Rex Ride and both zoomed off.
"You are not that special, kids. And there is way too much at stake now."
With that, White Knight placed his palm on a hand scanner on his desk.
"Activate White Knight protocols. Code designation: Iron Mace Alpha. Commence systems check. Confirm nanite shielding integrity."
Rex and Roxie still raced through the streets as White Knight chimed in their ears once again.
"Put a hustle on, hot shots. Once it's dark, it'll be harder to find anything."
"Fine!" Roxie shouted. "You want speed?!"
The twins then twisted the accelerators and sped even faster through the streets, only to see a roadblock of cars up ahead and gasped as they hit the brakes and their rides instantly fell apart, causing them to launch up onto the top of the truck at the head of the roadblock with a grunt of pain.
This also caught the attention of an EVO, who growled as he ran towards them.
"Man, I'm getting tired," Roxie said as she and Rex struggled to get up. "And not because of the plague."
"I know how you feel," Rex said.
They then gasped as the EVO ripped the door off a truck and then lifted the driver to its maw, attempting to swallow him whole.
"Hey, freak face!" Roxie shouted as she and Rex stood up, both breathing heavily. "The buffet is closed for business!"
The two then built up two weapons that instantly fell apart as they hit their knees in exhaustion. The EVO leaped down towards them as Roxie built up her warhammer and then swung forwards, hitting the EVO, which instantly caused the hammer to break and the EVO recovered, getting to its feet.
"That's it," Rex said. "We're screwed."
"We can't... we can't do all of this by ourselves anymore," Roxie said as she attempted to conjure a wepaon and nothing appeared to her.
"You don't have to," White Knight's voice sounded as the twins gasped and looked behind them to see a white mech suit drop down from the sky in front of them.
"Whoa," Roxie said. "Nice suit."
The cockpit of the mech opened and the twins gaped at the sight of White Knight in a suit of armor as its pilot.
"Thrill me," White Knight said.
The EVO snarled and charged forwards, only to be instantly swatted away by White Knight's massive mech hand. It then charged again and White Knight ran up and flipped over it. White Knight smirked as he shot the mech's hands forwards as they were attached to two grappling lines that grabbed the EVO's legs and dragged him towards him and then popped the right wrist open to shoot out a rocket that shocked the EVO where it stood.
"White Knight out of the office?" Rex asked, equally as confused as his sister.
"I guess this really is the end of the world."
"I'm trying to prevent that," White Knight said, shocking the EVO again.
"This whole thing isn't exactly a desk job," Roxie said. "Think you can keep up with us?"
"I'll manage."
"Okay, but as our sidekick, you need to have a cool name," Rex said as he and Roxie built their flying machines and took to the skies. "How about Gizmodude?!"
"No, that's lame. How about... Robopants?!"
The twins activated Holiday's scanner and looked over the city on a cliff on the outskirts of town.
White Knight then touched down beside them.
"Anything?" he asked. "Before they went offline, the satellites showed that the plague started in this area. Patient Zero is somewhere around there."
"What do you want us to do?" Roxie asked. "Go knocking from door to door looking for him like a little lost puppy?"
"If we don't find and neutralize the source of the plague, we'll need to take drastic measures."
"The 'make you glow in the dark' kind?" Rex asked, folding his arms. "Pass. Maybe we can narrow our search down."
"He's Patient Zero, right?" Roxie asked, cracking her joints. "The first one sick. So maybe he was already at a doctor's office or a hospital."
"The Keep's records show eight clinics, two major hospitals and 82 general practitioners."
"See?" Rex asked as he and Roxie lowered their goggles over their eyes. "Now we're getting somewhere."
"Try and keep up."
The twins shouted out and leaped off the building, taking off into the sky.
"...I don't know how Six does it," White Knight sighed as his mech suit took off after the twins.
As they flew through the city, Rex and Roxie began to doze off. Not because of the plague, but just from general exhaustion. They fought to stay awake, but then the twins finally lost the fight as they fell asleep, falling down to Earth.
White Knight took notice of this and then sprang into action, firing his mech's claws downwards and catching the pair just before they hit the ground as they were startled awake as White let go of them and they fell into a garbage can.
"Sorry, won't happen again," a very tired Rex said.
"Take five," White said. "You're useless to me as zombies."
"Yeah," Roxie said. "We've been so busy staying awake for everyone else that we forgot we need sleep too."
"We don't want to slow things... up," Rex said.
That was when a loud beeping noise startled them awake, garbage flying everywhere.
"Okay, okay! We're awake! Make up your mind, man," Roxie said.
"Actually, that's not me."
Rex reached into his jacket and produced the scanner, which was the source of the noise.
"Okay, it found the frequency," he said. "Let's roll."
Upon arriving at the hospital that Patient Zero's frequency originated from, the twins entered the hospital doors easily before looking back at White Knight's massive suit and chuckled slightly.
"Oh, it looks like a tight fit," Roxie chuckled.
"Someone need to lay off the milkshakes," Rex said. "We got this covered."
White Knight groaned as he stepped off as the twins stepped into the hospital... and then shifted hte rocket launcher to fire out several hooks that stabbed into the doorframe, which he then pulled out of the wall, easily making room for him.
"...You have serious control issues," Rex said.
The twins ran into the hospital past all the sleeping doctors and took notice of the several vein-like markings all across the walls.
"Yep. This is definitely the right place," Roxie said as White smashed into the foyer.
"Don't be surprised if you get a bill for that," Rex said. "Although you clearly can afford it."
Rex then took notice of the brown roots on the walls. "I think this is the virus."
"Viruses are too small to see," White Knight said.
"That's normally the case," Roxie admitted. "But this is an EVO virus. I'd say we got the right place."
The twins parted some white curtains to show the hospital's quarantine area and timidly walked inside as Roxie conjured a katana and they looked to see Patient Zero inside, a clear parasite growing from his head with a long tentacle growing from the right arm as the patient's ears grew upwards.
"It's still changing," Rex said. "I don't think it's finished going EVO."
"Alright, get to it you two," White Knight said.
"Let's at least hope this guy is curable," Roxie said, placing her hands outwards.
She and her brother both winced as they placed their hands onto the unconscious EVO's chest and started to absorb Patient Zero's nanites as his absolutely grotesque features started to pulsate in and out. The twins put all their effort into it... but they gave out as they pulled back as Patient Zero's tentacle arm reformed.
"What?" Rex asked, confused. "I don't get it. It's working but it's not at the same time."
"Whatever we do, he just heals it right back."
The twins looked up at a crash as the twins saw White Knight's mech suit crash into the room.
"What are you doing?" Rex asked.
"We're out of options," White Knight said as he aimed his rocket launcher straight at Patient Zero.
"No! We're trying to cure him!" Roxie shouted.
"And failing miserably. Back up."
"But Dr. Holiday-" Rex began.
"Is not here. She said he was the key. You two tried your way. It didn't work."
"We're not gonna let you do this, boss!" Roxie shouted.
"It's not up for debate," White Knight said as he fired his rocket outwards, much to the twins' shock and horror.
Rex built up his Smack Hand to destroy the rocket before it could hit its target as Roxie conjured her warhammer upwards and she shouted out as she swung her it outwards as she slammed White Knight's Mech in the head and sent it crashing outwards.
"We can't take any risks here!" Roxie said.
"If you vaporize him and it doesn't work, then we have absolutely no chance to reverse this plague," Rex agreed.
"And you two are suddenly the geniuses who are going to figure it out? We have only hours before people start dying. Now move aside."
"Not gonna happen," Roxie said as she rested her warhammer on her shoulder while her brother rose his Smack Hands up.
White Knight fired a rocket towards the twins, who scattered to dodge it. Rex picked up a piece of rubble and tossed it towards White Knight, who built up his gatling gun to shoot it into little pebbles. This was a distraction, however, as Roxie knocked a gas canister towards him that slammed right into the mech.
As the brawl was going on, no one noticed as Patient Zero's body started bloating outwards while still strapped to his stretcher.
Rex looked to see an unconscious doctor in the halls.
"Stop it, Knight! Before these people get hurt!" Rex ordered as White Knight extinguished the flames on his mech.
"Just as soon as you two step away."
Rex and Roxie flew up to avoid the rockets as they caused more collateral damage in the halls a Patient Zero's body started growing armored plating around it like a protective shell.
Rex tossed Roxie towards their commanding officer as she dive kicked Knight out of the hospital building as Rex followed her while Knight sent his grappling hook outwards that hooked around the letter H in the hospital sign that allowed him to reel back into the hospital as the twins were sent sprawling into the parking lot as they avoided more rockets.
Rex built up his Punk Busters as he ran forwards and White Knight hooked his grapple arm around Rex's leg and pulled him in.
As they looked on, Patient Zero's encased body retracted all of hte tendrils spreading throughout the hospital walls.
Rex shouted out as Roxie cut the line and he built his BFS up and began slicing out his blade towards White Knight's mech and cut off his mech's rocket launcher as White glared towards the twins as Roxie gave a kick downwards and the twins gasped in realization.
"That thing wasn't made to fight EVOs," Roxie said. "It was built to fight us!"
"It's for our own protection."
"Let's see how well it works," Rex said as he and Roxie took off into the air and White blasted his gatling gun upwards and the twins shouted out as they were sent hurtling back down to Earth.
White Knight tossed a car outwards that collided into Roxie, sending her sprawling into a bench with a groan as Rex tried to sneak up on him, only for his mech to whirl around to send him crashing into the hospital wall.
"You never trusted us at all, did you?" Roxie asked as she jumped back to her feet.
"I don't trust anything with nanites."
White Knight aimed his gattling gun straight at Roxie, only for her to swiftly conjure her shield up to block the bullets as she shouted out in effort.
"EVERYTHING HAS NANITES!" Rex shouted as he ran up and built his Smack Hands up and punched outwards as it the giant fist was caught by the mech suit's arm as White Knight glared sternly.
"Everything but me."
He lifted Rex upwards and tossed him straight into the street, where he then kicked him straight into his sister, both of them crashing into the barrier of the parking lot roof.
"Didn't you two ever wonder why I live in a sterilized box?"
White Knight fired his gatling gun, causing the twins to run for cover.
"That's why I run Providence. I can't be corrupted. I'll never evolve into some freak that betrays his team."
The twins held their heads for cover until the gattling gun ran out of bullets and then they nodded to each other.
"I'm the only one that can be trusted."
The mech suit was suddenly blasted back with a rubble ball as he looked to see Rex had his Slam Cannon out as Roxie had a large blaster in her hands that she blasted out, knocking his mech back and blasting his other arm off as they both blasted at one of the legs, rendering White Knight now helpless.
"Well, here's the update, White," Roxie said. "Everybody on the planet has nanites."
"Everybody but you," Rex said. "That makes us normal."
"YOU"RE the freak!" the twins chorused.
As the twins turned to walk away, the hatch of the back of the mech burst off and White Knight emerged with a scowl on his face.
"You are unbelievable, you know that?" Roxie asked.
The three aimed their weapons at each other... and then were startled as the wall of the hospital burst open as Patient Zero had mutated into some kind of large tentacled parasitic monstrosity.
"I'm ready to hear your theories, doctors," White Knight said.
As Patient Zero ascended the walls of the hospital, the twins flew upwards to assess the damage and then got onto his back as Roxie winced in disgust as she put her hand to the skin.
"Ew, ew, ew, ew, ew, ew," she said as she activated her nanites, creating a massive hole in the EVO's skin, only to see it seal itself right back up.
"Still? What, we gotta do this a piece at a time?" Rex asked.
The twins rapidly used their nanites to produce multiple holes in the creature's hide, but of course, they all healed right back up again.
Suddenly, Patient Zero lashed his tentacles around the twins, causing them to yelp as he tried to form a cocoon around them, only for them to burst out with a wave of nanite energy as Rex activated his Punk Busters and Roxie summoned her swords.
They landed beside White Knight, who blasted the creature with a laser from his wrist that created an incision in his slimy skin, which of course sealed instantly, causing it to roar in anger.
"Okay, this isn't working," Roxie said.
"No shit!" Rex shouted.
White Knight tossed an ambulance out at the creature, only for it to spray a spurt of acid that melted the medical vehicle down into a molten puddle.
"Should've let me take him out while I still could," White Knight said.
"Yeah, well maybe if we dissolve enough pieces of his armor, you can get a good shot in," Rex said.
"Get to it."
"Hmm..." the twins pondered.
"Wait, pieces," Roxie said. "It's lots of pieces. What we're doing is working, but on the wrong EVO!"
"That's not Patient Zero, that's the virus!" Rex shouted. "Patient Zero was under all that gross stuff. The outside part is mutating to defend him."
"He's commanding the viruses to protect him," Roxie said. "The plague was his first defense."
"How does this help us?" White Knight asked.
"It's just like Holiday said," Rex said. "Patient Zero is the key. We get his nanites to send out a wake up call, and then we cure him."
"And how are you two going to get to him under all that?"
"...We need that thing to eat us," Roxie groaned in dismay.
"Yeah, we know," Rex said as he and Roxie activated their flying gear. "The crazy thing is that this is the second time we've done this today."
"Do it!" Roxie ordered.
White Knight nodded and used his wrist gauntlets to fire out tons of rockets outwards to blast into the virus, causing it to roar in anger as the twins swooped down to fly into its open maw.
White Knight gasped in shock as he ran off as the virus monster shot out its acid from its tentacles, which he ran off to avoid, but was sent crashing a bit forwards in the process.
"Suit integrity compromised," White Knight's armor said as he stood up. "Nanite breach imminent."
White took off the damaged shoulder from his armor that instantly reformed.
"Suit integrity re-established."
White was then swatted off of the roof by the creature's tentacle and was of course sent sprawling into the parking lot.
"What's going on out there?" Rex asked over the radio.
"You have to keep it still!" Roxie shouted.
The twins flew around the monster's innards, avoiding every strike of the layers of disgusting-looking veins that the virus creature shot at them.
"Right. Next time I'll let it kill me."
Taking out the scanner, the twins landed and stood up as they tore apart the thin layer of skin in front of them to advance forwards as Roxie built up her swords.
"There," she said as she pointed ahead to see Patient Zero floating suspended in a large pocket filled with fluid.
"Okay. This shouldn't be too hard," Rex said. "But I've said that before."
Roxie stuck her hand out to use her nanites on the wall of the pocket, only to instantly get doused with disgusting bodily fluid.
"Why does this always happen to me?!"
They looked beside them to see Patient Zero fall to the ground in front of them with a loud thwump. He stood up and gasped at the sight of the twins and placed hsi hands to his temples, sending out tons of tendrils that wrapped around the twins limbs.
"Stop! We're not trying to hurt you," Rex said.
Outside, White Knight ran for his life... and his humanity... as the parasitic monster tried stabbing down at him before swatting him into a nearby delivery truck. White Knight braced himself as his armor's entire form was doused with the creature's acid spurts, causing his eyes to widen in horror.
"Suit integrity compromised. Nanite breach imminent."
Patient Zero recoiled as the twins reached for him.
"Please! Just calm down!" Rex said.
"Nobody's going to hurt you," Roxie said as they both managed to lay a finger on his forehead, sending out their nanites to shut his down, causing Patient Zero to calm down as the tendrils retracted themselves.
They looked as Patient Zero's mutated features instantly retracted, revealing a rather handsome young man beneath it.
"Time to wake them up," Rex said.
Once that was over, all around the world, the people affected by the virus woke up from their long slumber, instantly standing up and looking confused on their whereabouts.
White Knight struggled as he crawled forwards as the acid ate away at his armor.
"Suit integrity compromised. Nanite breach imminent. Suit integrity compromised. Nanite breach imminent."
White Knight looked behind him to see the virus monster loom over him... before instantly dissolving to dust that was swept away by the wind. Out of the cloud came the approaching forms of Rex, Roxie and Patient Zero. White groaned as he slowly lost consciousness as the twins smirked over him.
After White Knight was placed back in his office a few weeks later, he called Dr. Holiday again.
"Doctor, where's my update?"
"Still waiting on casualty reports. Of course there would have been a lot more if it hadn't been for the twins."
"It's his job, isn't it? What about the monkey?"
"Still asleep," Holiday said from the lab.
"Get on that. If this gives us a viral weapon against EVOs, we can put this week in the plus column."
As White Knight ended the call, Holiday looked off to see the twins standing by with a nod.
"You got him in time. Still 100% nanite-free. I'm surprised you two decided to save him."
"Well, in a weird way, the two of us and White Knight are kind of alike," Rex said. "We're both one of a kind and that's worth something."
"I'm proud of you two. Not just for this, but for figuring everything out."
"Eh, sure," Roxie said, brushing her hair back. "I mean, it was pretty obvious."
"Now, if we could only figure out what went wrong with Bobo," Holiday said as she and the twins walked into the hospital wing. "I'm worried the virus may have triggered a permanent reaction."
It was that moment that Bobo gave out a loud yawn as he sat up.
"Boy, those guys in the motor room sure know how to party," the chimpanzee EVO said. "Whoa, how long was I out?"
The twins and Holiday's jaws dropped as they looked at each other in shock.
"And I'm sorry, who's up for breakfast?"
"Good night, Bobo," Rex said as he and the girls left the room, turning out the lights.
