Biggers City.
Usually, the small city resembled any other. Now, its brick high-rises had their upper windows broken into, the already rustic-looking roads were covered with debris, and its greenery was withering, branches strewn about the bases of their trees. Of course, all of that was without mentioning the terrible red that stained the sky.
A majority of the citizens labored around what might once have been the yard of the mayor's office. Of course, what used to be the municipal building was now a towering castle. It bent in odd places. There were windows where there shouldn't have been. It held bedrooms and belfries that made little structural sense. It was almost as tall as the high-rises surrounding it, though it was built in an ugly purple brick and cast a long, dark shadow over the sky.
To most, the sky was an odd thing to long for. Biggers, however, had been trapped in a glasslike red dome for little over a week now. The workers watched the puffy pink clouds float by in a winedark sky, dreaming of the day it may return to blue and white again.
There was, of course, another reason to look skyward. Despite the miserable state the citizens found themselves in, hope only grew day by day that their hero might return to them. Regardless of the fact that the King had said he'd gone, regardless of the fact he had abandoned his citizens for over a week, and regardless of the rumors being spread that the limitless hero was nothing but a memory.
One day soon, the citizens could pause their work in the long shadow that their King's flying throne cast. They'd be able to look up into the sky, with awe, and say:
"Look - it's a bird."
"It's a plane?"
"It's a frog."
"A frog?!"
Though something flew through the sky, it was not plane, nor bird, nor even frog. Instead, it was a hero—the likes of which the King had never seen before. There was a broken, raspy cry on its lips long before it had landed.
"THERE'S NO NEED TO FEAR - UNDERDOG IS HERE!"
A great cloud of dust exploded from the ground as what seemed like a comet made impact. Dirt sprayed and crumbled all about. Despite the dust, a ragged crowd gathered around the newcomer. The cloud slowly began to disperse and reveal the hero. The crowd cheered between their coughs.
Only one man did not cheer. It was the King, who sputtered and gagged and waved his hand in front of his face as the dust blew around him. It flew into the motor of his flying throne, causing the both of them to stumble. Simon wheezed, his claws digging into the throne's armrest while his throne and the debris finally settled.
From the cloud rose a hero. He looked just like a thousand other people in the town; he had cream-colored fur and floppy black ears, dark freckles dotting his face and bruises so deep they were nearly the same color. His baggy and threadbare sweater was even more frayed, with little bullet holes dotting the hem. The embroidery of his U was ashy and tattered.
Underdog stared up at Simon, his brows furrowed and his fists balled against his sides. He stared up at the miserly old cat, sat atop his throne of cowardice and gunmetal. His oliveish skin was dry and scaly, and his eyes were narrowed into slits. The lapels and hem of his coat were equally as tattered and dirty as Underdog's apparel, and his thick rubber gloves had been cut open at the fingertips. Even now, Underdog could see his claws scratching against the edge of his throne's armrest.
Underdog seldom thought he looked like a king.
Simon sat up straight, pinning his ears as he scoffed. He seldom thought Underdog looked like a hero, either.
"There most certainly is need to fear, you mangy mutt!" Simon snarled, his anger boiling over so forcefully that he lurched forward. It was such an intense motion that his throne lurched, as well. Then, Simon cleared his throat and leaned back as if he hadn't exploded at all. "...I had considered every variable, and concluded that you had a 99.64% chance of dying in that prison I created! You must understand, of course, that I did not know that little JOKE of a supercat would come along and help you!
Underdog felt a fire suddenly blaze in the bottom of his belly. "You leave Bombay out of this!" he barked.
Simon giggled, covering his mouth with a hand as his tail twirled under him. "Ooh, did that strike a nerve? Careful, now - I'd hate to see Polly turn against you."
Underdog began to growl, a low bellow that shook his shoulders. His nails dug into the palms of his hands and his lip curled back over his teeth. He shakily rolled up the sleeve on his right arm. Then, he straightened up and slowly began to approach Simon.
Simon only laughed as Underdog drew nearer, steepling his hands in front of his mouth. "Oh yes, the kicked puppy is so big and scary!" he sneered.
He snickered a little more, sliding one hand down his arm until his claws could dance across his keyboards.
"I'm sure you came here expecting to fight the man you've defeated so many times..." now, his voice was almost as low and gravelly as Underdog's own. "But that Simon Barsinister is gone..."
His hand let up from the keyboard just as he cried out the final part of his statement. Underdog's ears pricked as he heard a soft click come from Simon's throne.
"YOU'RE DEALING WITH KING SINISTER!"
Underdog glanced up just in time to see two saw blades flying at him like frisbees. He leapt out of their pathway just in time, a bark exploding from his mouth in an instinctual attempt to warn the crowd. Underdog skidded on his knees as he landed, kicking up another cloud of dust. Quickly he stood and swiped his cape through the air to settle the dirt.
He immediately found the two saw blades, both lodged into a stumpy wall made out of purple brick. A handful of citizens surrounded it, most of which had leapt out of the way like Underdog, and were in various states of laying and kneeling on the ground. Several of the people clutched onto eachother; Underdog could make out their tense whispers just as well as their sobs.
A scarlet ray of sunlight shimmered over the silver saws. Underdog saw a small piece of blue flutter in the wind, stabbed onto one of their teeth. Breathing heavily, he patted at the sides of his cape to locate the damage. Finding nothing, he inspected his own gloves. When he checked his knuckles, he found a perfect slice taken out of his right glove.
Slowly, Underdog turned to face Simon with narrowed eyes. When he spoke, his voice was flat. "Good people — all of you — run back to your homes," he muttered, "It won't be long until this king is dethroned."
The crowd scuffled for a moment, staring up at Underdog with big, wet eyes. Though Underdog heard a confused murmur pass over them, he ignored it. Instead, he again started the long, slow walk to reach Simon.
"It's bad enough," he growled, his voice so full of fury that even Simon might have had trouble recognizing it as his. He stretched his arm out to gesture to the citizens, continuing to stare at Simon with an unwavering gaze as he had before. Underdog's voice only got louder as he continued. "The pain you've brought to this city—"
Underdog took in a deep breath as his arm trembled. He shut his eyes tight and shook his head. His eyes had begun to mist over as the memories of the last week came rushing back to him. His voice cracked as he continued, "My friends—"
Finally, Underdog took another breath and met Simon's cocky gaze. He smiled like the cat who had caught its canary. Underdog bared his teeth and hopped into the air, rolling his shoulder. He shouted so that all of Biggers might hear him:
"I have come to put your 'REIGN' to an END!"
Underdog brought his arms forward, rushing at Simon's throne like a missile. Simon merely laughed and fiddled with his buttons. Soon, his throne was flying higher as well—and lasers were being shot out from its feet. Below, Underdog could hear the people scream in terror as the little bolts of electricity came raining down upon them. He could only hope they could get themselves out. He had to focus on Simon.
Underdog weaved through the lasers being shot at him, unable to avoid them as cleanly as Bombay might have been able to. The awful scent of burning hair wafted to his nose as the shots grazed his ruffled fur and his frayed cape.
Up and around, in zigzags and figure eights the hero and villain flew. Despite the fury that flowed through him, Underdog's injuries were still overwhelming, and he was never able to catch up to Simon's jet engine. Luckily, it seemed that whatever power supply Simon's lasers were connected to were running out; the onslaught steadily became slower and slower.
Grumbling to himself, Simon stopped his throne midair. It shook with the force, but the old cat stayed firm. Simon turned the throne around quickly so that Underdog could only stare at its back.
"Face me, coward!" Underdog shouted. He, too, came to a stop midair, freezing only a few feet away from the back of Simon's throne. "I thought you were a king!"
Simon continued to laugh to himself, but he pressed the final button on his keyboards before Underdog could make another movement. In a few seconds, a great hatch in the throne's backrest emerged with a puff of steam. Underdog heard a low hum emerging from the hatch and pricked his ears to figure it out. Before he could, however, a great red light pieced itself together. A mere second later, out shot a massive laser.
Underdog shrieked as the beam struck him. It retreated back into the throne a few seconds after it was deployed, but even the momentary attack was enough to stun the hero. He briefly continued to hang in the air as small bolts of hot electricity danced around him. Below, the citizens held their breath, unable to tell if the hero was merely stunned or defeated.
The outcome soon became obvious. Underdog fell to the ground in a spiral, landing onto the cold earth with a grunt and another explosion of soil. For a while he laid there as the static rolled off him.
Finally, the dust settled again. Underdog sucked in a sharp breath through his teeth. He pulled quivering arms under himself and just barely managed to get to his hands and knees. He turned over his shoulder as he heard the mechanical hum of Simon's throne approach his backside.
"You've prepared many tricks, but I am no fool," the hero strained, "I give you one last chance to stop... or I will end your rule."
"Stop?" the word came out of Simon almost like a yelp with how giggly he was. "My old slobbering friend, you can hardly defeat me now! And I'm only getting started!"
Underdog's body shuddered with every wheezy breath he took. Still, despite the hot pain of his injuries and the staticky heat within his fur, he got back onto his feet with little more than a grunt. As he stood back up, Simon's bony fingers went back to dancing across his keyboards.
In a few more puffs of steam, several mechanical components emerged from Simon's throne. There were too many to see what was happening clearly. Underdog pricked his ears as little buzzes and whirrs and drills sounded through the area. Simon began to rant.
"You've gotten the better of me many times, Underdog, but you seem to forget—I'm a scientist! I take notes! Every invention you've ever defeated? Those were my experiments!"
The color and cushion of Simon's throne seemed to disappear as mechanical tentacles coiled around his extremities.
"Everything I've made in your image?" Simon continued, his voice getting higher and louder with each question, "Every ray I've ever used on you? Every sample of blood and fur you've left in my laboratory? ALL OF IT! Experiments!"
The machinery continued to wrap around Simon until he was a mass of indistinguishable cords and steel. The mass flew higher in the sky as more and more pieces grew atop the others. When the heart was formed, the coils seemed to wrap over and over each other to create massive arms and legs.
Simon was shouting now, his voice amplified by some sort of speaker tucked within the mechanics. "Do you ever wonder why you've seen so little of my assistant, Veronica? Because while I've been out here, trying to make something of this miserable little city, she's been double-checking my notes... cross-referencing..."
The great mass of cords finally began to smooth out. Little pebbles seemed to emerge atop the circuitry, though each piece quickly expanded into solid sheets of steel. Both arms clacked together their freshly-formed pincers. Underdog could already feel the strain within his tendons.
"And we've come up with quite the hypothesis! It's not brains that will win this fight, is it, Underdog?"
The steel that lined the robot's head bloomed into a sickly olive color, a near match for the tone of Simon's own skin. It coated the cords of the head like paint, leaving gaps for angry, glowing eyes that flashed red and yellow. The steel jutted out of the front to form a pointy incline. As it curled beneath the robot's head, it twisted and turned into layers upon layers of sharp saw blades. Underdog craned his neck. A spear seemed to grow from its head, and two vents like earmuffs blew out hot steam. Whatever this robot was meant to be, it looked oddly familiar...
"It's POWER!" Simon shouted.
The beast finally stomped its foot, kicking up a cloud of dust so massive that it covered everything in the area. Underdog covered his face with his arms as he heard the particles fly past him and into the airways of the civilians.
Underdog felt a cold drop like ice water flow through his veins as Simon's robot was revealed. He had to stare nearly straight up to take in the entirety of its boxy form. It rose high into the sky, taller than the nearby buildings—if Underdog had to place it, he'd guess about ten stories. He could almost hear Polly's frantic voice in the back of his mind as he realized what, exactly, this creation was.
A mechanical monster.
Simon peered down at Underdog from a window right at the monster's heart. He still had cords wrapped around his appendages, including his brain. As he lifted his arms, so to did the arms of the monster. His voice rang out from the robot's speaker, shrill with his volume and crackling with static:
"I'M GOING TO DESTROY YOU!"