trans_9 | The Wrath of Neutro

[Lash curses Anwei and Zouichi mightily for their failure to defeat the heroes while Sakura continues her attempts to escape and snarking. Cowed, Lash’s lieutenants return to the battlefield. Clearly the solution to their previous defeat is mummies! And a giant mechanical spider! This time, however, the rescue team is ready, splitting the enemies up in a labyrinth to deal with them separately.

Dr. Lady Deathtruction NEUTRO™ was not pleased. The heroes were not defeated! That accursed Percival still lived to see another day! Daisy's cage hadn't been vacuumed properly, it was a terrible mess! When the great queen threw a tantrum, even the largest of the creatures assembled had to shrink back from her piercing gaze. She raised her arms to the sky in frustration as music filled the room.

"HE STILL LIVES?!" Never mind all the other time she tried to kill him that had failed. "He must not find out all the details of my plans!" Never mind the fact that Daisy' cage was just behind her. "The Death Ray will speed up all the molecules of any target I point it on causing it to be reduced to dust! ...well either that or blow up the entire world. Either way it's going to be a blast."

The Lady Doctor paced back and forth in a circle massaging her skull. All these things were giving her a headache. She hated these headaches.

"And another thing! Neither Percival nor those three nitwits must arrive here. Stop them! Crush them! They should be shot on sight! Or...skinned! YEAH! SKIN THEM ALIVE! BURN THEM INTO A FIERY ASH!"

Edited 2011-06-06 23:02 (UTC)

Nuon bowed deeply, one hand over his metallic chest. This was his greatest failure! His greatest shame! His hand clenched into a fist of ANGER AND HUMILIATION. Those meddling Earthling interlopers! It was their fault! They would pay for this!

The outsiders had displayed powers far beyond mortal ken, but even they had been no match for Nuon and his clockwork army! At least, until the entrance of that thrice-accursed PERCIVAL PHOENIX!

"It shall be as you order, my Lady," he grated mechanically. Oh, what he wouldn't give to wrap his metallic hands around that Phoenix's throat and wring his perfectly-muscled neck.

The Blood Queen curtsied low, keeping her balance with perfect grace; at her side the robo-jackals groveled on their bellies, whining softly in a tune of self-incrimination.

"I shall exert myself to the utmost to carry out your orders with absolute perfection," she purred. "Despite the poor quality of your - other assistants - I am certain that Percival Phoenix's head will at your feet by sunset."

With or without his body attached.

"And as for his sidekicks," she rose, eyes flaming with fury, "I intend to choke them, burn them, and then sliver them into teeny-tiny fragments and entomb them alive!" And thunder crashed (that sounded suspiciously like someone shaking a sheet of metal behind the nearest canvas scrim).

Nuon scoffed. "I see not even the shame of endless defeat can halt the eternal tides of self-congratulation upon which my Lady's other assistants ride. Enough! It is Nuon who shall defeat Percival Phoenix -- I guarantee it! He shall be roasted alive in the fires of his own heroic hubris, and this time, I shall leave no ashes from which to rise!"

With a roar of laughter, he disappeared in a brilliant bolt of light and sound.

The Blood Queen looked vaguely offended at Nuon's bombastic departure.

"Most powerful Doctor NEUTRO™, it I, your most loyal servant, who shall pluck the life from the faltering Phoenix and his abhorrent hench-creatures. Let all my efforts, all my skill and strength and beauty, only serve as a tribute to your own unstoppable power!"

She vanished with the sinister grace of a horizontal video wipe, leaving behind only the hissing sounds of sand rasping against stone.

A bolt of electricity, and once again, Nuon was outside his Lady's evil lair.

Nuon looked out across the labyrinthine maze of broken walls and rubble that would be his newest battlefield. His enemies were close and getting closer; he could feel it. And though he did not possess the intimate knowledge of these ruins that his rival did, his raw ability should suffice to bring about their most crushing of defeats.

Ah, blessed (though no doubt brief) silence, now that he'd left that dusty old Egyptian relic behind.

"Do you think they'll run?"

That was the Blood Queen, sitting atop one of the nearly broken pillars, swinging her sandaled feet back and forth like a little girl. The girlish gesture contrasted rather sharply with her over-voluptuous body and sin-smeared eyes. Her robo-jackals sniffed about the pillar, nosing at bits of Styrofoam in the sand.

"They could run - or they could hide, crawling into some deep tomb to try and escape their fate. But no matter where they run or hide, I shall find them. I shall slay them." She rose to her feet in a single swift movement, her garments gleaming like the finest gold plate. "And you, you sham of a man - you'd best run too. It would be such a tragedy if my creatures sent you all to your deaths."

She tittered and jiggled, skipping into the ruins with her beasts trotting loyally after her. The sound of her passage was echoed by the rustlings and scraping of things that ought not to move, but did.

"Hear that?" Sensors may be screwed up here, but good old heightened senses work fine. He might not be able to shift, but he does pick up on the noise of a pack of robo-jackals - the distant giggling might also be a giveaway. "Heads up, we're about to get company."

"Great. Here we go." Jaime rose into the air, quietly debating with Khaji Da over which systems were still working and what would be the most effective way to deal with the incoming robo-jackals.

Nuon scowled at the Blood Queen's garish entrance. Typical; she didn't even have the decency to rematerialize a respectable distance away. But no matter -- he'd made special arrangements for today. He watched as the Blood Queen scampered off, tittering. No doubt muttering to herself as well, but who could know the dusty workings of that ancient, creaking collection of cogs she called a brain?

From the shadows of the ruined labyrinth came the metallic sound of jointed, metal-alloy legs scraping against marble.

He smiled.

Percival kept a hand on his trusty Atomizer Ray, sweeping the ruins. Yes, the dastardly Blood Queen was close, but--

"Do you hear THAT?" he boomed in his commanding baritone, ensuring that no one actually heard anything. "That scraping? By Orion's Belt, it reminds me of the time I faced off against the GREAT GOLDEN COCKROACHES OF CASSIOPEIA! Stay alert, friends, for I fear there is EVIL afoot!"

The Blood Queen was not sending her robo-jackals to the attack; they were too precious to be wasted on such mundane tasks. (Poor Flopsy was never going to be the same!) Instead her beasts moved to lure the heroes deeper into the maze. They appeared and disappeared, snapping and lunging and then backing off, giggling and luring and herding them.

And at an altar to ancient gods, the Blood Queen laid noisome resins on the fire and chanted, "Come, my lost ones, my loved ones. Move your withered limbs, unveil your stony bones, rise and walk and rend and tear!"

Chase eyes Percival. "It reminds me of the time there were all these robotic jackals, you know, before the plot #$&*ing demanded you show up. You know why? Cause its the same $#@&%$# sound."

he has just time to reply, before the feinting attack. Thing is, Chase was born a dog. He knows herding tactics. Figuring out that there's something else going on here doesn't take long.

"Keep backing up, and watch behind us. Got your backs."

Yeah, he really wished all his magic tricks were working right now - but he can improvise.

Percival laughs heartily at this, attempting to give Chase a jovial slap on the back. "HAHAHAHAHA! Not THAT sound, my friend!" he announces, as LOUDLY AS POSSIBLE. "But have not fear, I think I can pl--OOF!"

Yes, that sound is Percival Phoenix tripping over a piece of the ruins and falling flat on his immensely handsome face. The Atomizer Ray goes flying into the herd of robo-jackals.

Oops.

"By Neptune's Nethers, who put this rock here?!"

The robo-jackals do not let this opportunity go to waste; one of them promptly leaps on the fallen weapon, grabbing it in metal-tipped teeth and dragging it away, back to its mistress.

The others continue to menace the would-be heroes, but their giant gold-tipped ears flick again and again at the sounds coming out of the ruins all around them. Sounds that meant that the Queen's spells have succeeded.

The sarcophagi have opened. The dust pits have given up their dead. And now, the mummies walk. Wrappings brown and fragile with time, grinning mouths that stream beetles and the stench of time, skeletal fingers that seek living, supple, strangulable throats. They are moving through the ruins, crowding shoulder to rotted shoulder, and their numbers are past counting.

Percival, you suck.

"Yo, Howard, need my #@$& gun back." Chase calls, slinging the hammer back over his back to have a hand free to catch his weapon, using the other to drag Percival back from the pack.

"My magic ain't working, but I bet this plot will let heavy firepower work just fine."

"What, you're going to leave me with no weapons except my razor wit?" Of course, given the genre, that might be all Howard needs. He hands Chase Kickass back, then takes a step back, seeing the mummies approaching. "You all we me so many sodas. Think we can set them on fire?"

"Precisely why I needed this back." Chase coments, swapping out the shells for dragonsbreath. Most of his magic is @$%%ed here, but so far, firepower is as dependable as ever.

He lets go of Percival, and tosses Howard Bubblegun instead - .50mm Desert Eagle... plenty of firepower there... and opens fire with an explosion of blue flame from the sawed off.

"Suck fireball, you ancient sons of &%$#@&$."

Ah, freed from Chase's rather beefy grasp, Percival was now free to retrieve his Atomizer. Charming fellow, but he just didn't understand the heroic way of going about things. He ran after the jackal that had stolen his gun, wrestling it into submission and holding it triumphantly above his head.

"Ha HA! Better luck next time, pup!" he said, grinning to all who might be watching.

And oh, dear. Chase was already busy setting the mummies on fire. "Hmm."

Mummies are flammable! They burn brightly and crisply, letting off the cheery smell of Christmas wreaths and scorched bone and herbs from black and unnamable shores.

Unfortunately, being on fire does not seem to stop the mummies. In fact, as they advance, they are spraying pitch in front of them in arcs, flaming, smoking (and undoubtedly priceless, considering the age of the delicate linen wrappings, the possible extinction of the herbs involved, and the overall historical import of the mummies) droplets of fiery resin.

And they are still coming, flaming arms spread as though to embrace...

"Oh. Great. I bet this is what the welcome gates to Hell look like," Howard says, backing up behind Chase again and shooting one of the mummies in the chest, to no effect. He stuffs the Desert Eagle back in Chase's holster, looking instead for something they can use as a barricade.

That strange scraping sound Percival had been remarking ever-so-loudly upon before? Had been steadily growing louder, closer, more insistent -- until with an immense uprooting of ancient stone and mortar, a hulking shape emerged from below the floor of the ruins, sending a great plume of dust and sand into the air.

The mechanical spider was sleek, silver, and as big as a house. A mobile, semi-intelligent, angry SPIDER HOUSE. Eight ruby-like lenses appeared to serve as its eyes; in its steel mandibles, it held a single marble pillar.

It surveyed the heroes for a moment, pincering its mandibles closed. The pillar cracked into two, impacting the ground with a sound like dull thunder. Its eight eyes glinted briefly.

Without no further warning, bright crimson lasers fired out of each of its scarlet 'eyes', casting the beam in a swift, curved arc that carved across the battlefield, targeting allies and enemies alike.

Howard hides behind Chase with good reason - as soon as the spider appears, Chase is moving, no hesitation. His first instinct is the hammer slam, catching himself, reminding himself that that particular enchantment isn't working. Instead, he manages, through sheer reflex, to do one of those things that should only be possible in the movies - as the laser sweeps past him, he brings the oversized hammer up, and deflects the shot, the magic weapon unscathed. Its no lightsaber, he can't send it back towards the spider, but that clears a path for him to charge right at the mechanical giant.

"Huh, none of the giant spiders back home had lasers. Nice trick."

"Giant spiders. With lasers. This just keeps getting better." Jaime ducks in front of the others, activating an energy shield in order to give Chase a hand and ensuring that no one loses something useful like a limb. Or a head. He retaliates, one arm forming itself into an energy cannon which fires off a blast at the gargantuan pest. How much damage it'll do is really up in the air, unfortunately.

The Wrath of Neutro

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