Saturday, August 9, 2014

The Battle of the Zoo

Mephistopheles, for all his power, couldn't move especially quickly. He could form his black ooze into wings, or even jet engines, but he could never move faster than five or six thousand kilometers an hour. Vector, on the other hand, could move a hundred times faster than that without straining himself. Cognis pulled up Mephistopheles' general location on satellite: he was over North Africa. Vector flew high above the continent, pinpointing Mephistopheles' trajectory with his enhanced senses, and blasted down to confront the villain.

Mephistopheles didn't notice the hero until Vector was right in front of him. The solution was simple: keep flying. The two collided at an incredible speed. They both crashed into the ground. The both got up, shrugging off the impact. "You thought that could hurt me," Vector called out. He used his power to vibrate the air, enhancing his voice.
"You thought I was trying to hurt you? That was just me trying to slow down so I could fight you." The villain began to expand in size. Vector flew over to Mephistopheles
"Size manipulation? Is that a new power? Or are you just making your armor bigger?"
"Making my armor bigger, obviously," the mastermind said as he swatted Vector aside.
The superhero barely budged. He lifted Mephistopheles' hulking form into the air, and then slammed it into the ground. Before Mephistopheles could get up, Vector began piling on soil.
Mephistopheles didn't just lie down for this, of course. Giant tentacles of blackness erupted from the ground. Vector dodged them, but one grabbed his torso. Two more grabbed his arms. Two others, his legs. Vector couldn't move. Soon, he was encased in a solid block of Mephistopheles' black ooze.
Meanwhile, the giant cleared the rubble off himself. "Well, Vector, it would appear I have you at my mercy."
"You're forgetting something," the hero said.
"What?"
"You're trying to physically restrain someone who can move objects with his mind."
At that point, a few dozen boulders came to life and beaned Mephistopheles in the skull.
The battle raged on for quite a long time. Mephistopheles was able to keep Vector encased, but that didn't stop the hero from smashing Mephistopheles into the ground, stopping the blood in his arteries, tearing off his dark appendages (they dissolved as soon as they were separated from his body), denying him oxygen, and throwing rocks at him.
Vector tried to see how the villain was doing. He sensed blood pumping in Mephistopheles' chest. He could make out the vague details of a face. The villain was a male. Based on the number and density of wrinkles, he was somewhere in his thirties. He seemed to have tendrils of darkness permeating his body. Could that be the reason for his durability?
Vector didn't seem to have as much offensive power as Mephistopheles, he thought, as the villain began to crush him. But he had much more range. If he could just break free, he could conduct this battle at a distance. That just left the issue of extricating himself from a solid, building-sized mass of nigh-indestructible blackness.
Vector reached out with his senses. The nearest airport was a little over four miles away.

Mephistopheles stood at the helm of a two-hundred-meter-tall giant. Vector was encased in a gigantic mass at the end of a long stick. Time and again, Mephistopheles slammed Vector into the ground. He could feel the hero weaken, as he endured multiple impacts at tremendous speed.
Some came over the horizon, moving very fast. It sliced into Vector's prism. Before Mephistopheles could react, another gigantic blade flew by. And another. They were moving so fast, it took several more for the villain to realize that they were airplane wings. By the time he realized what was happening, Vector was free, and making a retreat at incredible speeds.
Mephistopheles briefly entertained the idea of using pressurized air to shoot projectiles great distances and destroy the hero. But his ultimate purpose was to get to the Zoo. Let Vector try to stop him...
That's when Mephistopheles realized he couldn't fly with Vector attacking him. The hero could toss Mephistopheles like a rag doll from hundreds of meters away.
Mephistopheles became a giant again. Then, carefully, he began to create an army of Mephistopheles'. The armors carefully budded off from the main gigantic body, maintaining their form as they did so. With enough concentration, Mephistopheles could give his creations autonomy. And so they flew, scattering to the four winds. Vector could destroy some of them, but Mephistopheles was able to get away.

Most of the Illuminati Occultus (Mephistopheles still considered that a far cooler name that Order of Darkness) was converging upon the Zoo, off the coast of Madagascar. He almost there when Titan called him. "We can't get in," the dinosaur said. His voice was full of rage. Even more rage than you'd expect from a Tyrannosaurus Rex forced to use a cell phone.
"Of course not. Do you expect Dr. Carnage would build a secure facility that could be breached by peasants in scuba suits?"
"My brethren lie locked inside their. You promised that I would rule over them. Give me my Zoo of Monsters."
"You'll have it soon enough. I expect I will be able to open the doors in an hour or two. Has General Electric arrived yet?"
"Yes."
"Good, put him on."
"Not until you tell me how to open the doors."
"If I thought I could explain it to you, I would. But I have spent years learning the finer points of fortress design, espionage, computer systems, and lock picking. You haven't."
There was a roar on the other end. Soon after, Mephistopheles heard General Electric. "What do you need boss?" The General's loyalty and comparative intelligence made him one of Mephistopheles' lieutenants, along with Plague.
"The United Heroes will be there shortly. Expect the Titanium Warrior and the Shining Defender to show up soon. Vector will be there soon after."
The General shuddered. He'd been on the receiving end of Vector's powers before, and had spent three years in prison as a result. All he had was a few dozen militiamen, a few dozen gangster, and a Tyrannosaurus. He was worried.

1 comment:

  1. Some came over the horizon, moving very fast. to Something

    "My brethren lie locked inside their. to "My brethren lie locked inside there

    ReplyDelete