Electric Fire

By Fidget

To Lady Icecubes, who asked for this fic months ago. Sorry for the delay, darling.

Chapter 1

Fidget paced angrily back and forth in Big Air, the hatch open beside her. She was leaning against the side with her arms crossed, a look of unmistakable ill temperament on her face. Stupid Alex, with his super hero duties. Stupid Dr. X, with his making Alex have super hero duties. Stupid me, for not just sneaking a ride anyway…

Her thoughts had changed very little over the course of the past five minutes. Alex had leapt out the hatch in pursuit of his twisted rival, making sure everyone else stayed on Big Air. Fidget had asked, demanded, yelled, stomped, and generally thrown a fit over not being allowed to come, and finally just thumped around the room for a moment before returning to the side of the hatch to stew over how annoying they could all be sometimes.

She did not know where Alex was at the moment, he had jumped out and she hadn’t bothered to look in her flustered state. Truth be told, she didn’t know for sure where the other members were, although they were definitely still on the plane. She kicked the wall behind herself, hearing with bitter enjoyment the metallic clang of the panel she had hit.

As if in response to her hit, the ship bucked. She straightened; her arms were tensely at her sides and her hands balling slowly into fists. A plastic cup rolled off the table and clattered on the ground. Big Air jostled again, harder this time, and Fidget tipped to one side. She caught her balance and ran quickly to the other side of the room, her eyes darting from one place to the next in search of anything helpful in any way. Something to hold on to, or some explanation of the plane’s wild movements. As suddenly as before, Big Air pulled sideways, tipping the floor at an insane slant. But unlike before, if continued around one full circle. The plastic cup flew across the floor, hit the ceiling in a brain-teasing diagonal movement, and flipped neatly out of site through the open hatch.

The hatch!

Fidget realized the how bad the situation really was and grappled wildly for a grip on something. Her hands tipped over anything still on the counters and found nothing solid. Desperately she snatched the edge of the counter top and held on hard enough to hurt her palms. The plane flipped the opposite direction, then back again without rest. She felt her slippery hands sliding off the slick Formica, and then she was flying.

She could see the hatch wide open like a mouth before her, knew she would careen straight through it. She shut her eyes tight, to scared to watch, scared because she knew how long it took to reach the ground even without a parachute at these heights. She knew there would be several seconds at least of sickening dread as the ground came up at her…

She hit something hard. Well, she thought it would be several seconds at least. And she thought it would kill her. She opened her eyes, one at a time, and saw that she had hit directly next to the hatch. She had hit the wall! She giggled convulsively in her relief, and drew her knees up to her chest. The hatch was a good foot behind her, she had missed!

"Fidget? Fidget?!" Rikki’s panicky voice was wonderful to her as he rushed in with his hands on the doorframe. His eyes dashed about the room and found her giggling like a maniac beside the door. He sighed. "Come on, get up here out of the-"

Big Air turned sharply upwards, tilting the deck backwards. Rikki grabbed hold of the doorframe with both hands and managed to stay put as his feet were swept out from under him. Fidget, however, gasped as she toppled backward straight out the open hatch.

She stared blankly at the belly of Big Air, her eyes were wide and her mouth hung open slightly. Such sudden switches of emotion were muddling her overloaded brain and kept it locked shut for a few seconds before acknowledging the fact that she was falling to her death. As soon as that thought had been processed sufficiently, she screamed. Her hair whipped around her face and stung her eyes as she fell backward, and her stomach seemed to leap up into the air and leave her feeling woozy and sick.

She felt a sudden jolt, and her scream was cut short as her jaw closed suddenly and her teeth cut into her tongue. She squinched her eyes shut and waited for the pain to dull, for the moment preoccupied. The second it did so, her mind began flashing warnings in bright red. Sitting?! Where?! Dead?! ARGH!

She looked down, seated with her legs out in front of her and her hands next to them.

Nothing.

She was sitting in the middle of the sky, with nothing holding her up at all. Not even a cloud. She felt immediately dizzier than before, and gave an involuntary wavering distress call. Her hand rose up to help balance, but slammed down again as she tipped that direction. Where it hit, purply ripples spread. She stopped balancing, and watched them become fainter and fainter as they spread out for amazingly long. She stood unsteadily, and stomped. The ripples were wider and darker this time, and continued on farther without fading. The purple showed an odd shape to her right, and she stomped comically over towards the bump.

When she was within a few feet of it, she could see that it was actually a ladder. She carefully placed one foot on a rung, then the other, and made her way down the side slowly and deliberately. When she had gone down about fifteen rungs (she couldn’t tell how far up or down it she was proportionally), the purple-blue shimmered into view. The ladder appeared under her hands, and her eyes shot up and down the thing she was climbing.

How could she have forgotten? His blimp had a cloaking device, and she had landed squarely on the top. She looked down; an entrance was just below her and she swung through it, kicking in the panel. Perhaps it was fate, she thought. She had wanted in, and now she was. She crawled through a small access tunnel and came out in an empty hall. Well, here goes nothing, she thought, and proceeded down the hall.

*

Tempest was screaming at the top of his lungs, waving his lightning rods and blasting random bits of machinery to pieces. Dr. X and Alex had fought their way into a side room, but Templeton Storm was off in a rage, growling as well as he could and spontaneously cringing and glowing blue. He was about to launch another volley, when movement on one of the monitors caught his eye. He lowered his lightning rods and slipped over to it.

It was a young woman. She was stalking down one of the back halls, used mostly for storage and repairs. She walked with the deliberately wide stance and long stride of one who wishes they were taller; her clothes, facial expression, and exaggeratedly swinging hips suggested someone who found themselves to ‘hip’ to handle.

He had seen her before; she was one of Team Extreme’s members. What was she doing here? He decided to leave X and Alex to their dueling and catch her unexpected. A bargaining chip, perhaps. He sprinted off down a corridor.

*

Fidget walked more slowly, placing her feet down as quietly as she could. She could hear a scuffle, and was ready to bet it was Alex and X. If she were to suddenly appear, she might be able to help! But for her surprise attack to work, she’d have to sneak up.

Her heart pounded in her ears, getting louder and louder. She swallowed, and took a few more steps. The heartbeat grew louder and louder, and seemed to be surrounding her. She covered her ears and closed her eyes tightly, almost curling into herself, when a sudden pressure was applied to her waist and her feet left the ground.

Her eyes shot open immediately, and she started to scream, but a strong hand covered her mouth and nose. She turned her head back and forth and tried to escape its grip, but it followed her. Then at last, she looked up at her captor.

Tempest?

She yelled something rude behind his hand, and spit on it. He let go of her mouth and made a noise of angry disgust, wiping his hand on her leg. She glared at him and kicked, now past her shock and trying to fight back. That’s what she’d come for, right? The hand that had been holding her mouth grabbed her legs with its entire arm, and Fidget wriggled, helpless and almost immobile. She yelled at him, and growled a little herself.

Tempest realized something had to be done soon if he was to make her an actual prisoner. If Action-breath was going to take him seriously, she needed to be in some sort of immediate danger. Being barely contained in his grasp didn’t seem to have the right effect.

He took off running down the corridor again, carrying the physically and verbally protesting Fidget along with him. He soon saw a door on the left side of the hall, and remembered that it was a storage room. He slammed it open with his elbow and ran inside, then shut it and leaned against it.

Fidget had twisted around in his grasp until she had a clear shot. She gave a crooked but effective kick to between Tempest’s legs, and he dropped her flat on the floor with a yelp. She rolled on to her stomach, then crawled behind a pile of junk.

Tempest recovered (partially) from his injury and his eyes darted from place to place within the room.

"Come out, you little brat!" he cried, pulling out his lightning rods. He blasted a pile of old machinery across the room. Fidget heard the pile burn and fall, and gulped.

Ch 2