Gar grabbed a metal spider by its leg and yanked it toward him. He threw a fist that smashed into the eyepiece guiding the machine. Then he flung it over his head and slammed it into the ground, scattering its remains everywhere.
Another spider raced toward him, blasting lasers across his body. It didn’t do him any harm, so he waited for it to get to him. Suddenly, a shuriken cut its laser in half and then another buried into the eyepiece. It stumbled around, unable to direct itself now that it was damaged. Chase slid past Gar and threw her blades again, this time burying them in the large body under the legs. It exploded, sending those legs in all directions.
“Is that all of them?” Gar asked.
Chase looked around at the carnage, robotic parts were scattered across the floor. “I don’t see any movement.”
Hoturi knelt next to the already wounded soldier. The General now had a nasty burn wound on his left shoulder. He held his communicator up and then said, “we are far from over. Those spider things are popping up in the front courtyard, and these are even bigger. We can’t get the security lockdown to shut off. Everyone is trapped inside with those things. It’s going to be a massacre.”
“Not if I can help it.” Gar dashed through the halls.
“Wait for me!” Chase called out as she pulled up her BADGE comm unit. “Nova, we have a problem here! Robots are attacking the palace, some kind of booby trap left by Shoju’s former scientists.”
Nova answered, “I’m sending an emergency call for heroes. Keep those people safe.”
“We’ll try.”
They rounded a corner and found the grand entrance doors in ruins as soldiers leaned out to fire their guns at the attacking machines.
“How many are there?” Chase asked of the commander.
He shot a few more times and then said, “we see at least ten, maybe more. It’s too dangerous to take them on out there. We have to hold them back from getting inside.”
Chase almost spoke, but was pulled aside by Gar as a laser blast zipped by her. She quickly threw her blades and nailed the robot in the laser emitter, but it was only one of the five this model had. “These are much bigger!” She threw again, hitting another of the five weapons.
Gar jumped over the soldiers, “I’ll keep them out of here!”
“It’s too dangerous!” The commander yelled.
Chase threw again as she said, “don’t worry, he can handle them. But, I don’t know if he’s enough.”
Gar rushed at the nearly two story tall robot and punched one of its eight legs. It responded by kicking him with another leg and rolling him across the ground. Two robots blasted him with dozens of shots, but he simply rolled over and then grabbed two legs and yanked them down, planting the robot into the soil. He stomped on its main body and buried his foot inside. It jerked and sparked, then stopped. He had destroyed it, but now his foot was stuck. He yanked and pulled, but it was no use. Suddenly one of these giant spiders kicked him and sent him over. Instead of blasting him with lasers, it pounded him with its feet. He wasn’t injured, but was completely pinned down.
These ten spider monstrosities were joined by five more that appeared out of the ground or burst through walls. These things were everywhere, and they could do little to stop them.
Gar saw the spiders line up and take aim. Their lasers were charging to give a massive blast. They would take down the entire building with this. He struggled, hoping to do something before they murdered hundreds of innocent people. But it was too late. All the lasers went off. However, they didn’t hit the building; they met a new brick wall that appeared out of nowhere.
Suddenly Prime Minister Shizue came through that wall and held her hands up. Domes of bricks formed over several of the spiders. She slammed her arms down and those domes flattened, crushing the spiders. She twisted around and two walls of bricks appeared and she threw her hands out and the walls flung to the sides, shoving more of the spiders away, crushing them against the buildings and one expensive car.
Just then a series of blue energy blasts hit the spiders attacking Gar and one exploded, the other stumbled away. A blade sliced through the metal casing Gar’s foot was still stuck in. Shinobi yanked him to his feet.
“Having fun, stony?” Shinobi laughed and then quickly spun around and used his blade to deflect laser blasts. Running with incredible speed, he dodged the lasers and got under one robot, then another and another. All at once, the three robot’s legs split in half and they toppled to the ground.
Gar saw a spider rushing toward Shizue, who had her back to it. He ran, jumped up high using his wings and then came down hard on it with both fists. He crushed the central body, eliminating it instantly.
A series of laser blasts hit one of the remaining spiders and it exploded. Furious Squirrel fell from the sky and tumbled into a perfect kneel. He used his two pistols to shoot at more spiders. Hotwings landed next to him and grabbed a spider by the leg, flew up, carrying it, and then dropped it from enough distance to break it.
Gar, still ready for a fight, paused long enough to realize they had destroyed all the spiders.
Shizue asked, “are we safe?”
Hotwings landed again and nodded, “I don’t see any more of those things.”
“Good.” Shizue waved her hands and all the various bricks she had conjured evaporated into a fine mist that faded away.
Chase rushed out of the capital building, “is everyone okay out here?”
Gar said, “I think so. I took the most beating, but they can’t do much to me.”
“I had a teacher.” she bowed her head to Shinobi.
Shinobi bowed to her, “you did well, my student. I’m sorry that I was away when this started.”
Chase looked at Hotwings and Furious Squirrel. “You guys got here quickly.”
“We were already on our way when Nova called the emergency.” Hotwings said.
Gar asked, “you were on your way?”
Furious answered, “yeah. Nova told me you guys found some tech that was evidence in this case. I am sorta an expert in tech stuff.”
Chase said, “good. We have something you might help us with.”
Chase, Gar, Shizue, and Furious Squirrel stood in the laboratory again, people still cleaning up the first spider attack mess. A soldier had the criminal scientist by his arm. Furious used a special eyepiece to examine the device they retrieved from Dr. Osteen’s cell.
“If I’m not mistaken, this is a controller. Some kind of remote for something.”
Chase asked, “is it active?”
“No. It’s incomplete. It doesn’t have a power source.”
Chase turned to the scientist and materialized a blade in her hand to point at his face. “What was this for?”
“I’m not telling you anything.”
She stepped closer, pushing the tip of her blade against his neck. “I can make it where you bleed to death over five days of the worst torture you can imagine. And, after you tried to massacre all these people, I would be in my rights. Now, answer or suffer... your choice.”
Sweat glistened on his forehead as the realization of her honesty flashed in his eyes. “Fine. It’s a controller for these robots. Dr. Osteen was going to use them to break out of prison. But, someone else broke him out. That’s all I know."
Shizue asked, “where would he go once he broke out?”
“I don’t know. Honest.” The scientist was now dripping in sweat.
Chase gave him one last glare and then put her blade away. “This is a dead end.”
Furious said, “I don’t think so.” he had the device as close to his eyes as he could get it.
Gar asked, “what do you mean?”
“This has a unique signature to the design. The metal on this is the same as the metal on those robots outside. I have seen nothing like this before. To most sensors it would appear as steel. But, it has a strange additive that makes it strong against morphonic energy.”
Shizue asked, “what does that mean?”
Furious answered, “it means that this and those things out there were designed to resist super heroes who use morphon based powers. It isn’t all that strong, but I suspect this was just early stages of development for a new, anti-hero armor.”
Chase asked, “how does that help us?”
“If I’m right, I can rig a sensor to trace this metal. I would suspect that Dr. Osteen would use the same metal wherever he is now. No doubt to protect him.”
Chase said, “get on it.”
Shizue added, “use whatever you need here, my people are at your disposal for this project.”
Furious was already heading for a workstation as Chase said, “okay, Gar, let’s help them pick up the mess.”
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