Chapter
4: Not yet, don’t get your
Spandex in a bind…
Rikki groaned and grunted as he
tried to open the trapdoor. Vinnie watched silently, perched on the roof of
Little Air. After ten minutes of huffing and puffing, Rikki sat down flat on the
sand, panting. Vinnie crawled over and settled on his lap. Rikki looked at him
for a moment.
"Well, Vinnie, I
tried." he said, and sighed. "I just can't open it. It's too heavy, or
maybe it's locked. I don't know. But I do know we have to do something,
or else we're abandoning them. But what do we do?"
Vinnie was moved by Rikki's
speech. Or at least, he moved. He waddled over to where Rikki had been digging
before. After sniffing around a bit, he followed the tire tracks away. And away,
and away...
Rikki sighed again, and heaved
himself up to chase the lizard. Somehow, saving Team Xtreme wouldn't be quiet
the same if he'd lost their pet.
Mr. Lettuce-breath was now only a
few feet ahead. Rikki took a last step, bent to pick up the reptile, and the
ground sank two inches.
Rikki froze. This was probably a
stupid thing to do, for as a general rule, ground sinking when one steps on it
is not a good thing. However, he quickly recollected his wits, grabbed Vinnie
(who was still waddling away slowly), and darted back a few feet. From his new
outside viewpoint, he saw that the space he had been standing in had sunk
neatly. A square, in fact, about six feet wide had sunk an even two inches.
Rikki gulped, and took a cautious step on to the sinking ground. It stayed put.
He gave a half-hearted little jump. It dropped a very small bit, and something
behind them creaked terribly. Rikki turned and saw the trap door slightly
raised. He grinned.
"Vinnie! Look!" he
hopped around excitedly. The door rose up little by little. "Come on,
Vinnie!" he dropped the lizard on to the platform as well, and this last
bit of weight clicked the mechanism. The door opened up, creaking rustily. Rikki
laughed a maniac laugh, and grabbed Vinnie by his back half.
"Let's go, Vin!" he
practically skipped to Little Air, flipping Vinnie around almost by the tail
(much to the iguana's dismay). He flung the reptile in before climbing in
himself, revving the engine, and taking off down the tunnel.
Alex looked at
Grinder. He gave him a "Well, nothing for it." look, and turned to the
door. It was about then he realized it was going to be hard to open without
hands. He turned around backwards, thinking the entire time what a stupid thing
it was to do, and managed to work the handle. Immediately turning, he saw...
Nothing.
"Well, what d'you
know," he said, grinning slightly. "She was trying to fool us!"
Grinder snorted. "Trying?
Ha! She sure had me fooled..."
The door closed suddenly behind
them, and two large men stepped out from behind an optical-illusionally hidden
door. Grinder sighed.
"Aw, and for a minute there
I was getting disappointed."
He'd no sooner said this then the
original cloaked figure entered from a similar door. His hands were folded
together unseen in the long sleeves of the cloak, and he seemed to glide over
the floor. It was quite eerie.
"Gentlemen," he said,
and looked almost welcomingly at Alex and Grinder. "I am so pleased
to see you. I've waited...quite a long time. Such a very long time..." His
way of speaking was odd as well, so silkily polite it would make anyone anywhere
feel uncomfortable. The figure turned his head from Alex to Grinder, and
continued.
"You see, I have developed a
device I am sure you'll be interested in." he reached out his right
hand, and suddenly a small object was placed in it. He held it up before Alex's
eyes. "Before I go into detail, we shall dispose of your friend..."
Alex looked sharply at Grinder, who was ogling only slightly. One of the men
reached forward to grab him, but Alex swung his cuffed hands around a full 180
degrees, hitting the man in the face rather ineffectively for such a windup.
However, it was enough for Grinder to bolt away, back the way they had come.
Alex hoped desperately that he would be able to hide or...or something!
The man grabbed Alex now, and the figure waved one long hand dismissively.
"Let him go. He is not
important." He walked forward, Alex restrained now by both men, and slipped
the object around Alex's neck. He pushed something, and the device beeped a
response. Alex's heart raced a little faster. What was it? A bomb? That would
certainly be effective in killing him, although it would kill everyone else as
well. What was it? It couldn't be good...
"It's a special
collar." explained the figure, as if reading his thoughts. "I designed
it to control your AMP factor. Unfortunately, I was unable to find a suitable
test subject. So, I've been forced to wait so long to capture the real
you..." He smiled under the deep hood, although how one could tell when one
couldn't see his face is beyond me.
"What we need you to
do," the figure said calmly. "I need you to...oh...increase your
adrenaline. And since you generally can't do that yourself, I've arranged a
little bit of persuasion."
As he spoke, he snapped two
fingers on one hand. Doors behind him slid open to reveal...
Fidget was chained to the wall by
her arms, her legs chained together and to the wall below to form a 'Y' shape.
She was gagged, and a trickle of blood ran down her forehead. She looked at him
with frightened eyes, and began to bounce franticly against the wall and screech
muffledly through the gag. The wall itself was covered with holes the size of
tennis balls.
"Let her go." Alex said
in all-but-completely-fake bravery. The figure shook his head.
"No. I think my plan will
work much better with her right where she is. If, somehow, you can
trigger your AMP factor without help, I will consider her release. However,
until then we will take this one step at a time."
Again, the figure snapped. Alex
shouted as spines a foot long shot out of the holes in the wall, all but the
ones under Fidget. She wailed, terrified, under her gag, and tried to draw
herself into a ball. Finding this impossible, she shivered where she hung, her
eyes locked on Alex's.
Alex concentrated on his AMP
factor, berating himself all the while for being so cursing brave and calm. He
didn't feel calm, so why wouldn't the adrenaline flow?!
"Needing any more help, Mr.
Mann?" the figure asked in mock-sympathy. "I could help again..."
"NO!" Alex looked up
sharply, and glanced back at Fidget, now hyperventilating and squinching her
eyes shut. Was the little collar preventing his AMP from working? He decided to
help it along...
Throwing his weight forward, he
ran towards the figure. He hit him full in the stomach, knocking them both down.
The figure struggled to his feet, clutching his hood over his face and
staggering back a few steps.
"ALRIGHT!" He roared,
obviously outraged, and all at once Alex heard
the figure's loud snap
the sharp metallic *SHRING!* of
the spines in the wall
Fidget's blood-curdling scream
cut short.
His eyes darted to the wall, and
instantly he wished they hadn't. It was too horrible.
He glared up at the robed figure
hatefully. This was too. Much. Oh, yes. Killing a teammate? A friend?! Dead?!
Oh, yes, dead, but not just poor Fidget...
A searing pain as his AMP factor
kicked in, sending the little collar into a frenzy of electricity. It stung, but
he took no notice. Straining his arms, he broke the chain on the handcuffs. He
turned and knocked the two hit men’s heads together. Out cold on the floor. He
grappled at the little collar, pulled hard, and...
Choked himself sufficiently.
Dang, that thing was on tight! He tackled the figure, knocking him to the
ground.
"Take. It. Off."
He growled. The figure, so much less cocky now that his guards were lying
facedown on the floor, wriggled and twisted to get away. But Alex held tight,
and glared at him. "I said-"
"I know what you said!"
cried the figure, trying desperately to grab the hood now sliding off his head.
"If you let me go, then I can disengage the collar and you will be free! I
can see that it will do little good. It needs a few adjustments."
The collar still buzzed him with
electricity, and it was beginning to bother him. His eyelids twitched
spastically, and he clenched his teeth against the pain. He grudgingly let the
figure up, but kept an eye on him as he pushed a hidden button and released the
collar.
The buzzing stopped, and Alex
hissed out a breath. But his relief was short-lived, the figure grabbed his neck
and knocked him to the ground heavily, slamming his head into the ground. Caught
off guard, Alex could feel his eyes going dim, his brain already closing down.
he could hear a droning in the distance, probably his ears ringing.
But the sound drew closer,
closer, until Alex saw a steely-white thing blow by overhead, knocking Mr.
Figure back in its wind. It looped around in a hairpin turn, flew over him once
more, and came to a rest behind him. Rikki poked his head out the window, and
Vinnie was perched on his head (looking slightly more alert than usual).
"Come on!" he
shouted, beckoning wildly with one hand. Alex stood, ignoring the pain in his
neck where the figure's thumbs had pressed against his windpipe, and shook his
head.
"Gotta get something!"
he yelled, turning to the room at the end. He ran in and forced himself to look
at the spined wall. He grimaced at it, the anger ebbing away for sadness. He could
not leave her body there, hanging limply on the wall with her head down. He
reached up, grabbed the shackles that held her, and pulled. In his
adrenaline-enhanced strength, he broke them easily, and carefully lifted her
down. She drooped.
He stumbled to Little Air, and
tried to ignore Rikki's confused, then pained, then stricken look as he saw
Fidget's body. Alex squatted behind the pilot seat, and said flatly, "Go.
Now."
Rikki did as he was told.