trans_9 | Percival Phoenix and the Promise of Tomorrow

Uh. Was that Sakura strapped to that Death Ray? And where was Lash?

Zouichi ducked out of the way as Percival wound up and threw the ham at one of the guards. When had he even had time to buy the ham and core it out in the exact shape of the Atomizer Ray? Or had he prepared it ahead of time for the sole purpose of using it as a prop should the situation allow? And where had that one redshirt fallen to?

It was like a nightmarish hellscape of plotholes from which there was no escape. A guard ran towards him, screaming; Zouichi punched him almost absently in the face.

Anwei had almost been hoping that breaking the mind-control on herself and Zouichi had also brought Sakura and Lash back to themselves, but apparently not. Certainly Sakura weeping while tied to a Death Ray seemed extremely out of character for her.

A guard fired at her; her brassiere deflected it (of course) and she caught him by the shirt and favored him with a sound PG-rated head butt (forehead to forehead, rather than forehead to teeth). He slumped at her feet, a smile blooming on his face at his last memory of her cleavage surging like the sea.

Sakura could barely make a sound anymore -- she'd worn herself hoarse, which had prompted a large toad down on the ground to continue croaking when she no longer could -- as she continued severely chafing her wrists against her restraining bonds.

Tears sparkled like the diamonds you could have had if your man was the Old Spice man as she mouthed things that absolutely no one could hear, though if they could, it would be a toss up between, "I can't believe it's not butter," or, "Percival and assorted friends, you've finally come, stop the Doctor!" or, "I'm tired, hungry, nearly-nude, and I wanna go home!"

She did manage to wiggle with her dress clinging in torn shreds to all the right places. Look at her! Look at her!

Wait, don't look at her! She's trying to say something about the Doctor!

Too bad she still couldn't make a sound worth hearing!

Howard's long since resigned himself to one of the many wisecracking sidekick roles, so he's only sort of surprised when, while skirting the edges of the battle, his back collides with the back of an equally short, non-warrior-looking guard. Similarly, he's hardly surprised that no one else in the fight seems to be noticing.

Guard Boy puts his fists up, looking incredibly unsure of this. Howard would back up a step, but he feels like it's probably outside the realm of predictable movie narratives to just run away from a clearly matched-by-the-screenwriters fight with an expy.

He waits about thirty seconds, hoping that Guard Boy's actually revving up to fight Chase, who could theoretically be standing riiiight behind him. And then gives up.

"We're not seriously going to do this, are we?"

Guard Boy blinks. Howard uses this opportunity to kick him between the legs and sprint in the other direction. No one said sidekicks have to play fair.

This was too weird. But at the same time it was almost like being home again. Except without the deadly seriousness that often accompanied the penetration of evil lairs. So he found himself locked in what might be termed deadly combat with a few of the guards, except it was really just him ducking under the wild haymakers they threw and then giving them a one-two in the gut and chin to knock them flat. It was simple, easy, even. He didn't even have to pay attention. Khaji would just let him know what he needed to do.

So he spent a good portion of his time staring at Percival as he battled his own way through the guards.

"This is too weird," he muttered.

"Huh?" asked a guard, right before he was flattened by a brisk punch to the jaw.

The lady returned just in time to witness the destruction.

"WHO DARES?!" she yelled out, shaking her left leg to remove that pesky piece of paper that had followed her all the way here. How embarrassing...

She pushed off one of her own guards and took his gun, shooting near someone's elbow. "You fools! No one can stop me now! No one!" And she laughed for good measure. Still shaking her leg and...okay there we go.

"The DEATH RAY only needs a few more minutes! And then...the UNIVERSE WILL BE MINE! GWAHAAH HAAA HAAA HAAAAAAA!"

Edited 2011-06-23 06:52 (UTC)

Chase isn't right behind Howard, no. In fact, he doesn't even seem to be with the heroes. See, someone mentioned stealth, and the veteran of a thousand black ops missions took that to actually mean, you know, sneak.

Somewhere along the way, he mugged the props guy, who is tied up in a janitor's closet while Chase has gone about making sure the special effects budget gets its due, wiring the entire place to explode in epically dramatic fashion in a chain reaction - explosives were usually his wife's job, but he can handle Hollywood pyrotechnics... and make sure that, no matter how bad the plot is, there will be a giant explosion eventually.

Of course, first they need to get out of here.

As soon as he's done, he wades through the ninjas... where did they come from? There's a gratuitous martial arts brawl where he gets to show off against the minions, who neatly line up to take him on one or two at a time. Finally, as he reaches the ninja master, who does a dozen flips and swings his sword around a lot... Chase just draws his gun and shoots him. It was all getting old anyhow.

He returns from the expedition of high explosives and high action just in time to hear the Lady's speech.

"You really think you have a few minutes?"

Percival wasn't about to let Chase steal his thunder. Not only was it inconsiderate of him to try (who was the hero of this story, huh?), but STEALING WAS WRONG AND BAD AND IF YOU DID IT YOU WERE ALSO PROBABLY WRONG AND BAD.

He politely ignored the piece of paper that had fallen off of his nefarious nemesis's foot, gesturing wildly with his ray gun. "A few minutes, a few parsecs!" he cried, forgetting that a parsec was not, actually, a unit of time. "Either way, Dr. Lady Deathtruction NEUTRO™, the gig's up! You'll be taking that Death Ray home in pieces if I've got anything to say about it!"

"And now, if you please, I'll have an Iced Caramel Macchiato! With extra ice!" Even as he said so, he booted another guard off the set and into a conveniently placed endless pit of doom. Dr. Lady Deathtruction NEUTRO™'s evil lair was not OSHA standards-compliant, obviously.

"We discontinued that prograaaaaaaaaam," the man shouted as he fell. Percival stolidly ignored him, fixing his piercing Phoenix Gaze™ on the evil doctor.

"WE DISCONTINUED THAT PROGRAM!" Lady Deathtruction NEUTRO™ replied, as if her words meant a lot more than that dumb redshirt (hint: they did, also because he was dead.)

"Nuon! Blood Queen!" she looked at her two minions, not knowing they were not her minions anymore, and then dramatically pointed towards Jamie and Howard. "End these fools!" She moved her cape dramatically at Chase and Percival. "As for you two..."

The ground shook from the fire and the destruction. She took out a large, black colored sphere.

"Gamera! I choose you!"

"Gamera!"

If one looked closely, you could almost see he zippers on the giant suit.

Edited 2011-06-25 05:41 (UTC)

"Oh, you have got to be #@*&^%$ kidding me."

This would be a great time for the magic weapons to be... well, magic weapons again. Still, no hesitation. "Deal with the death ray and give the villainess her spanking. I got this." he calls, charging right at Gamera, or at his foot, anyway.

"Oh for God's sake, just call it Anguirus." Howard's more than glad that Dr. Lady Whatsername is sending Zou and Anwei after him and Jamie. Rubber suit or not, he doesn't want to tangle with Godzilla. "Guys, I'll try to get near the Death Ray. Hopefully I've picked up some plot-convenient sidekick hacker skills since landing here."

Or maybe he'll just start hitting buttons, but at least he doubts that the evil scientist is going to try and shoot her own super-awesome weapon. It'll provide cover by default.

Chase can handle a rubber-suited monster, right? Zouichi hopes so, because he makes a dash straight for Lash. Something in her attire has to be the key to the mind control, at least if he and Anwei were any indication. What was it, her (stylish) cape? Her (tasteful) goggles? Her (maybe a little over-the-top) skull earrings?

Percival looks at each of the threats in turn -- the Death Ray, Neutro™, Gamera, the Death Ray, Neutro™, the redshirts, Gamera, the Death Ray, that angry government employee waving his clipboard around and complaining about workplace safety standards, Neutro™, Gamera.

Wait, this was no time to be indecisive! Not with Daisy's life at stake! He ran towards the Death Ray, firing a few shots at Neutro™ just to keep her distracted. "Daisy!" he cried, with the perfect amount of mournful wistfulness in his tone. "WHAT HAVE THEY DONE TO YOU? WHAT. HAVE. THEY. DOOOOOONE?"

He was apparently completely ignoring the Death Ray's control panel, despite currently being the one closest to it.

Sakura thought it was pretty obvious. "THEY'VE RUINED MY NEW DRESS!" Her tears were like diamonds as she swayed in the wind, precariously decent.

... Very precariously.

Anwei was not entirely confident that Percival could be trusted to pay attention to the redshirts instead of wailing at Daisy, er, Sakura. Chase and Zouichi had their targets, but Howard was undefended. And there were still too many of the redshirts on their feet: a bumbling, burly brigade of buffoo-

She bit her tongue, barely. Then opened her jaws wide, hissed like a snake that could devour worlds, and charged.

The impetus of her attack hurtled the redshirts entirely out of frame, and into that empty space spurted blood: jets of blood that would put a fire engine to shame. Screams and shouts and the crackle of what might be breaking bones or just the sounds of stalks of celery being twisted by the Foley guys filled the air, along with enough blood to fill several swimming pools.

When Anwei reappeared, her costume and face were spotless except for a single drop of blood at one corner of her mouth. Of course. She moved to watch Howard's back, and offer advice if she could.

"Holy #$@%..."

Unfortunately, in real life, there are no discretion cuts. Howard sees exactly what Anwei does to those red shirts - whose shirts are now the blacky-red-purple of fresh pools of blood. He stands frozen for exactly one second before getting back to what he was doing (sneaking and not retching at the carnage, right!).

Hey, wait a minute.

"What am I doing trying to disable this thing when I've got a tech geek ripping open jugulars right behind me? Anwei, stick with me."

What where her minions doing?

"WHAT ARE YOU TWO DOING?" No! No no no no! Something was going wrong! Lady Deathtruction NEUTRO™ was very displeased with her minions suddenly become freelance officers.

"If that's what you get for allowing you to serve under me you will also suffer the conseque--" she didn't continue as the large skull from her cape was ripped away by Zouichi's hands, and the cape slowly blew away in the wind.

"WHAT THE #$%!#%^!%?!" Dude, that was terrible sportsmanship. "!$!#$%@%^!" NEUTRO™ didn't like it at all, if her mouth and a series of beeps was any indication. "And one more thing you $#%!$%. I have the power of a thousand suns and lighting storms in my hands. With it, I will destroy the very essence of your life! EAT MY FIST!" She punched him.

...rather weakly.

"!#$%#% It appears the cape always powered my death fingers. How unconventional."

"We'll get you a new dress, Daisy!" Percival cried, working feverishly at the ropes that served to bind her to the Death Ray. Unfortunately, he only had an E in Untying, so rather than loosening the ropes, he ended up tightening them. In fact, by now the relatively straightforward knots that bound Daisy had exploded into a nightmare Moebius loop hell of rope frizz and splinters.

He paused for a moment to rub his magnificent chin in thought -- or what, for Percival Phoenix, approximated thought.

"It seems that perhaps I should take a different tack here and--"

He whirled, Atomizer Ray in hand, firing at Gamera. Of course! It wasn't that he was woefully inept at untying ropes, it was all these distractions lumbering about! Once those were taken care of, he could go back to addressing what was important -- JUSTICE!

...wait, no, it was... erm...

"DAISY!" He shouted, half as a mental note to revisit this topic later.

Zouichi blinked for a moment as Lash struck him, fully expecting the logic of the setting to dictate that he be blown violently backward by her blow.

Nothing happened.

Unfortunately, by this time an extremely dedicated redshirt (who probably should have been issued a raise by now) had worked up the courage to attack. With a piercing screech that could only have been inspired by heartfelt loyalty, or perhaps mortal terror of being on the wrong end of NEUTRO™'s official employee termination package, he tackled Zouichi, catching him off guard and sending them both tumbling down a flight of nearby stairs.

"How's that Death Ray coming, Howard?" he shouted in the brief pause as he reached the landing, even as the redshirt came at him swinging. Boy, this guy was persistent. He was like a super redshirt.

She hadn't meant to DO that! She'd only meant to knock the redshirts down, but they were like marshmallow dummies or something. Marshmallow that squirted blood in all directions when you touched it. The blood smell was around her now, in her brain, urging her to drop down on her prey, to rend and tear and feed...

She didn't do that. Teeth clenched, she guarded Howard's back while casting decidedly unimpressed looks at Percival's antics with the ropes. She didn't have any weapon except for her teeth, but in a burst of inspiration she grabbed the clipboard from the government flunkie and started swinging, paperwork fluttering around her with each blow. The redshirts' skulls were apparently as soft as the rest of them, and they toppled with aplomb (if perhaps a bit too much flailing).

There's a button.

For a split-second, Howard's completely flabbergasted that there is an actual. Button.

Just one.

A big, shiny red button with 'DO NOT PUSH' written in white and capital letters that would scream to anyone under the age of ten to press that button like it'd launch a rocket. Which it probably will given this scenario.

Howard's stupid logical brain says don't touch that. The part of Howard that is still an annoying teenager just screams PRESS THAT MOTHER$%#@ER.

Without even consulting Anwei, he slams his hand down on the button and prays he doesn't blow them all to $%#@.

"Try not to die while I maybe kill us, Zou!"

And high above, for some bizarre reason, Sakura has slipped out of her bonds... precisely because they were tightened. Wearing even less than before (somehow) she is managing to use her former bindings to rappel down the DEATHRAY.

The backside.

Yes.

Somehow, this is entirely happening.

With her sliding away from the hero she adores.

LIFE IS FULL OF HARD DECISIONS. And decency ratings.

It was highly likely no one had noticed her escaping yet at this point, even as she shouts out something devoured by the wind ~~and several large fans~~.

Chase, finding his hammer lacks its usual magical punch, settles for distracting Gamera, dodging giant paw swipes, even diving between the monster's legs at one point, doing a pretty good job keeping it occupied, slamming Truck Stop at its feet or its knees any time he needs to keep its attention while the others figure out the death ray.

Gamera was now jumping on one foot due to the attacks from Chase.

NEUTRO™, on the other hand, watched as Zouichi was tackled by Super Redshirt aptly and ironically named Red Green (who was getting a raise after this was done), before turning around and realizing her captive was gone. Again.

"$#%@%^$#@!$%!$%!!!!" Really, the censoring man's finger was bleeding at the end when she was done.

The entire sky and lair began to glow red.

"!$%!$% WHO IS THE IDIOT THAT ACTIVATED THE SELF DESTRUCT SEQUENCE?!"

"Sticks and stones may break my bones, NEUTRO™!" Percival crowed, apparently failing to realize that his archnemesis was referring to Howard and not himself.

Oh, wait. Destruction was good. Self-destruction was bad.

Time for some serious firepower! He twisted the Atomizer Ray's adjustment knob, past 'Zap', 'Pow', 'Destructify' and 'Defibrillate'... all the way to its maximum setting, which appeared to be labeled 'VAPORIZE: DANGER DO NOT USE REMEMBER LAST TIME'.

"Your nefarious plans will never succeed as long as I, PERCIVAL PHOENIX, am here to foil them! HA!" A brilliant green ray beam shot from the Atomizer, aimed directly for the Death Ray.

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