Memoirs of a RAFian

[Cloak]

New chapter.

CHAPTER FIVE:
Bait

Out in a deserted avenue stood a boy between The ages of twelve and thirteen. He wore a brillant blue cast on his right arm and hand (indicating a broken hand), pressed khaki slacks, white shirt with a pocket protector, and thick-framed glasses. His sapphire blue eyes were hidden behind the glint of his glasses, but projected a certain strength of mind and will, and his stringy, limp hair looked as if it was a barber's blooper. He was incredibly tall for his age, rail thin and not muscular in the least.

And there he stood, looking scared and nervous, clutching a book -- "A Brief History of Timel -- like armor, holding it tightly to his chest. Didn't help that it was rather chilly out and he wasn't exactly dressed for the occasion. He looked rather out of place on this abandoned, bricked street corner.

That's when the car pulled up, blacker than night with silver hubcaps. The window was drawn down just a inch or less. The driver a man, or a woman with a husky masculine voice, spoke, "Need a ride, son?"

The boy looked apprehensive at the offer. He clearly was a long way from home, and didn't fancy getting there on foot. Granted, that didn't answer he got here in the first place. But he hesitated.

"Now, now, boy," he or she said, "I don't mind. I don't mind at all."

Still he hesitated, as breezy as it was at this cool time of year. He knew better. He knew not to accept rides from strangers. He knew that. But his resolve was dissolving with each wind gust.

"C'mon, now, son" he or she said, "it's far too cold to be walking out there. Especially without a jacket. Lemme take ya on home."

This wasn't right. He didn't know this person. He didn't even know of he or she was a he or she. He could not see her face, as the windows appeared to be tinted to an illegal degree. It was so very tempting. . . . But no. No, he must refuse. He didn't know this person. He --

"Son, are you sure you don't want a ride? It's getting dark out. Might even rain." the driver said, still refusing to show his or her face. The driver only waited for a moment more of hesitation from the boy. "Well, then, if you're sure . . ."

"No, wait!" the boy said. He had a sort of like a cross between Mandark from "Dexter's Lab" and a nasally teenager. "I'm coming, I'm coming."

With that, he got into the card and they sped off, but not into the direction the boy's supposed home, but a very obvious detour. But this was not unnoticed, as two figures were watching from a rooftop. They had watched the kidnapping and done nothing to stop it.

The taller one said, "He's in."

[Cloak]

New chapter.

CHAPTER SIX:
Taking and Tracing

"This isn't the right way," the boy said. "I said my turn off was on the left."

The driver said nothing, and the boy, who was seated in the backseat on the passenger side, thought he felt his seat belt, both the lap belt and the shoulder belt, tighten unusually.

"Ma'am?" the boy asked. The belts were uncomfortably tight now, as if they were trying to bind him to the seat. This wasn't going at all the way he would have liked, or at least that's what the driver believed. Things were not what they appeared. When the boy spoke again, his glasses tumbled to the edge of his nose as his voice sounded rather constricted, "Ma'am?"

No reply. The boy could not see out of the window very well, but knew this was not the path to his home. Or that's what the driver had been led to believe, as the boy was complaining about it.

Suddenly, a semi-opaque partition separated the front seat from the back and all windows were up. The backseat was permeated with a knock out gas the color of toxic waste. The boy was knocked out, his book and glasses dropping to the car floor with a clatter and a heavy THUNK.

Once the gas cleared, siphoned out of the area, having served its purpose, the driver stopped the car and then lowered the partition all the way. Unsurprisingly, it was Ekzacto's hunchbacked assistant, Shillar. She had graying blonde, flyaway hair and wore a rather large muumuu in a pink floral print design and what appeared to be mismatched oven mitts, and lacy socks with orthopedic shoes. Her natural voice was a deep, masculine voice, so it was easy for her to be mistaken as one.

She wasn't quite as mindless as she appeared, but she had unwavering loyalty to Dr. Ekzacto, which is why he made her in such a way. But she wasn't smart enough to discover the ruse. . . .

***

"Got the coordinates?" Cerulean asked Cloak as they stood on the building.

"The tracker that Underseen took is broadcasting at these coordinates," Cloak said, giving Cerulean the coordinates. "It's stopped, but there is no reason yet to believe that it is the HQ."

"You think they have some sort of citadel island?"

"As cliché as it is," Cloak replied, "yes. Yes, I do."

"These villains really have no originality, do they?" Cerulean inquired.

"Eh," Cloak said, with a shrug, keeping a diligent eye on the transmitter, "there's no accounting for villainous tradition, I guess."

"Should I get going?" Cerulean asked.

"Yes," Cloak said. "But don't be seen. That is imperative."

And the speedster sped off to do his duty. . . .

[Cloak]

New chapter.

CHAPTER SEVEN:
To the Island

Shillar picked up the boy that Underseen was disguised as, began to lug him to the pier, showing her uncommonly prodigious strength. Underseen wasn't as knocked out as he would appear, as he was still quite conscious. He was just pretending so as to sell it toward this single-minded hunchback, as he did not know their base of operations were. The fact that he still held his shape was a key to his continued consciousness.

Shillar wasn't aware of Underseen's true identity, she was just aware of the one that he just conjurered up with this form. Shillar did whatever her boss told her to do, despite of the morality of it or not, and all she knew was that he wanted brains, good, strong, powerful brains. So why she was kidnapping children, whose brains weren't done maturing, was anyone's guess. Might be because of her rather rudimentary intelligence, although that would just be conjecture.

In any case, she lugged him from the pier and into a small rowboat. Underseen was sorely tempted to groan just to see her panic at the very thought of him coming round, but that very well might have screwed up the mission, so he abstained. But pretending to be knocked out? It was rather dull, tedious work. He might have even drifted in and out of sleep, which silently alarmed him because he worried that he may have reverted to a white, gelatinous form.

But, to his silent relief, he didn't. He had maintained his form consistency and density. Fortunately, he must have exercised some subconscious control over his shapeshifting. This was truly a relief.

Finally, the boat bumped onto some bank or shoreline -- Underseen dared not open his eyes or alter his form in the slightest to see which exactly. All he knew is that he had the transmitter, the transponder, safely tucked away inside his from, like he did with the whole fiasco with the ape army. Shillar seemed blissfully unaware of this, and Underseen was glad.

"Gas not worn off yet," she muttered, though Underseen could hear perfectly. He wondered if most of her captives had been coming out of being knocked out by now, he thought to prolong the facade, just to be on the safe side. He drew confidence that the tracking device and the transmitter was working fine.

***

Cerulean had arrived at the car, and, like predicted, Underseen and his kidnapper were gone. This was good. Everything was proceeding like planned. He examined the parked car, seemingly abandoned, and found the things that he had expected. Illegally tinted windows, a poor parking job, those kind of things.

Cerulean's job wasn't to follow Underseen and his kidnapper to whatever citadel they were going to. That's why Underseen was carrying the tracker chip. His job was take their vehicle out of the equation. He looked at the license plate, and it read "EKZACTO!" which Cerulean could not begin to guess the story behind. He wasn't particularly sure that he wanted to.

He opened the door, surprised that they were unlocked, and saw the gas nozzles, cleverly hidden in the upholstery. They clearly could be retracted into the seats in front, but haven't been yet. Cerulean looked to see that the keys were still in the ignition, and he was dumbfounded by this. He would had assumed that they would take some protective precautions!

It had to have been a trap! They must have been betrayed! This was way too easy!

He sped away from the car, to what he felt was a safe distance away. But nothing had happened. He hesitated and waited a few minutes, waited to see if anything happened. Waited . . .

Still nothing happened. Cerulean was cautious, due to his experience as a RAFian. But it was now perfectly clear that nothing was going to happen. It was just the driver's grievous oversight. It would cost them dearly.

Their misstep was his advantage. He would have to exploit it while he could. It was time to call in local law enforcement, but it would have to be an anonymous tip, given how demonized and maligned RAFians were right now. As crazy and inane as it sounds, it would be considered a stigma to take such a tip from a RAFian.

[Cloak]

New chapter.

CHAPTER EIGHT:
Impounded and Bound

As it turned out, the car was stolen -- though not reported so until recently -- and illegally modified. The license plate was actually legit, though, and they managed to find who it was registered to.

A dead man. No, a literally dead man.

It was registered to one Morceau "Morry" Bullei. A former General in the army, and actually a contemporary of Louis Cannon. The two did not get along, and he had recently died of complications due to a brain aneurysm. Then he had his name stolen to register a license plate with.

Anyway, the police repossessed the car and impounded it, notifying the true owners, though having trouble reaching them momentarily.

His job done, having prevented the kidnapper from possessing transportation so they could continue abducting more kids, Cerulean returned to the forum. But, on the brief trip there, questions nagged at him.

What if they possessed more than one vehicle? Possible, but doubtful. But it was really possible . . . but he had discovered Underseen's book and glasses props, so this was the right car, but what if they had more than one to evade capture?

What if he had found the wrong one and their was another kidnapper on the loose? Farfetched, but it had the slimmest of plausibilities, nonetheless.

What if the kidnappers paid off some dirty cop? It was possible. They do exist in the local police force. And most, if not all, sported an anti-RAF attitude.

What if they found out the tip came from a RAFian? What would happen then? This he didn't have a satisfactory answer to, that gave him pause, but he decided that all he could do right now was to hope for the best . . .

***

Shillar hauled Underseen, still maintaining his tweenager boy disguise and still pretending to be knocked out, up the many deteriorating floors to Ekzacto's tower base. Many of the lower floors had massive holes and gaps in it, making it look like a platformer game more than a stable dwelling place.

It didn't surprise him that Shillar didn't bring her boss kids in bulk, but it still didn't make sense why she would do it one-at-a-time. She would just have to go right back down and fetch another one from the mainland when whoever her boss was done with him.

It seemed inefficient, though Underseen had no intention on enlightening her to this. His objective wasn't to make them more efficient kidnappers, but locate their HQ. This would allow the others to come here as the cavalry. He was also to find out just what they were doing with these kids.

Suddenly, Underseen felt like he was being dumped into a chair, strapped down tightly. Underseen thought it was safe to pretend to come around.

"Huh? . . . Wha . . ." he said, deliberately slurring his words a little. He did this to effect coming out of a drugged state. He blinked believably blurrily. "Where are my glasses?"

"Shillar, is this a suitable brain?" said a strange man.

"Yessir," she said, placatingly, her voice inexplicably high-pitched now. "It's a really strong one."

There was no way she could know this for a fact. She was clearly just trying to please her master, even if she had to outright lie to him. He clearly did not force her to abjectly honest with him, because evidently he also used her to mill flagrant flattery and praising platitudes.

"Well, we shall see about that!" Ekzacto declared. "Now, little boy, we need you inhalevery dee-- where'd he go?"

Underseen was gone.

[Cloak]

New chapter.

CHAPTER NINE:
Brains, Brains, the Musical Fruit

"Where'd he go, Shillar? Where did he go?!"

Yeah, this guy wasn't very mentally stable. Underseen reflected as he hid, quite expertly, in the guise of a small turtle in the most hidden and shadowy corner of the room. Which was odd as the room was round.

"I -- I dunno, Master!" she cried plaintively.

"We needed that, Shillar!" Ekzacto cried. "We needed his brain!!"

"I know, Master, I know!" she said, her terror making her palliative words ineffective. "I'll . . . I'll go find you a replacement brain!!"

Ekzacto's mood swung from being in the throes of anxious anger to calmly contemplative. Yeah, this guy was not the most stable person around.

"Make sure it's a strong one this time," he said. "Selling those suits on the black market can only bring in so much, you know."

"Yes, Master. I know, Master!" she said, servile and slavish.

"You know without powerful brains, full of psychic potential, the Think Tanks and the Train of Thought are mere pipe dreams!" he monologued. Underseen wondered why every villain seems to enjoy that nonsense. "Imagine the world where such monstrous armaments are wondrously functional? Imagine such a beautifully dystopian world. Nicely post-apocalyptic and everything!"

That settles it, Underseen observed from his little corner of the world, this guy is TOTALLY insane!

"It's a sweet dream, Master," Shillar said sycophantically.

"What? You still here?" Ekzacto said, dismissively. "You were supposed to be getting me a new brain, Shillar!! I would use yours, but I need strong and powerful ones. So, get going!!"

She was hasty to comply with this direct order, leaving Underseen to wonder if she was enchanted to be obedient like a house-elf, because she didn't seem to be under the Imperius Curse, but Underseen wasn't an expert.

"Brains! Brains! The musical fruit!" Ekzacto "sang". "The more you have, the more you woot!"

Underseen rolled his turtle eyes, in annoyance. The tracking device was still intact and transmitting their coordinates. And Ekzafto was still none the wiser for it.

[Cloak]

New chapter.

CHAPTER TEN:
Dude, Where's My Car?

Shillar quickly climbed down the crumbling building infrastructure. She had not given any mind to the abusive words of her master, grateful to being in his employ. She would have never betrayed him, the though of which actually never crossed her limited mind. She didn't have a thought, didn't have an opinion, didn't have a stance, on anything that wasn't given to her.

She had clinked open the wrought iron gate, and left the old abandoned sanitorium. She decended the staircase to the shoreline, to the two-person rowboat. The real reason she went and got them one-at-a-time. She would probably be able to bring more if she could just take their brains out directly and then bring them to Ekzacto. But the insane dentist demanded to be the one to do it, as he wanted that . . . pleasure.

Shillar, as mentioned, didn't have a thought about this, as Ekzacto didn't give her one on this topic. So she didn't mind the trek, the platforming that she was required to do to get down to this boat. But there was a major problem with needing to be given specific instruction, because some things are incredibly obvious that Ekzacto neglected to give Shillar the specific instructions to that -- like taking car keys with her and locking the car doors.

As she docked the rowboat, and left the oars inside the rowboat. She turned on her voice distorter, which made it difficult to tell whether her voice was a man or a heavily-masculine woman. Then she looked around, and was confused.

The car wasn't here.

This didn't make sense to her. She parked it here. It should be here. Yet it was not. She needed it to be here. Yet it was not. She needed to it to procure more brains for the doctor. But it was not here.

"Lose something?" came a disdainful voice.

She did not answer. She had a mission, a duty, an objective, to accomplish. Answering anonymous voices was not part of it. She had to get a new brain for the doctor. She neded the car to do that. She wasn't as accustomed to being stymied like this as you may expect.

"Lose something?" the goice repeated, and Shillar ignored it. "Like . . . a car?"

Now, the voice had her attention, as it could be seen as an addendum to her objective. She couldn't see who the voice belonged to, but that wasn't important. This person knew where her car was.

"Where is it?" she said, in that husky-but-strangely-androgynous voice. The voice did not answer question. She demanded, "I said, 'where is it'?!"

No answer, but she saw at roughly ten o'clock to where she was facing flashing blue and red lights. She wasn't given a thought as to what those things were or what they represented.

But, fortunately for her, she didn't resist arrest, which would work in her favor. At least a bit, especially when it was clear that she wasn't competent enough to stand trial.

[Cloak]

New chapter.

CHAPTER ELEVEN:
Cavalry Readies

Cloak watched as Shillar was taken away in handcuffs, not competent enough to understand her wrongdoing, while Cloak hidden in shadow. He looked at the tower, their next goal. That's were they had to go next.

Cloak looked at his team, for all of the RAFians heard Ekzacto's rambling about Think Tanks and the Train of Thought. The Realm Walker's glance passed from one to the the other.

Hunter. He was armed with his usual two guns, and looked confident in his abilities.

Aquilai. He looked prim and proper, armed only with his sonic screwdriver.

Helen. Her Star Sapphire ring was fully charged and she was ready to kick butt.

Dino. She was in her compact form, as the tower would not support her full weight and length.

Dylan. His small cape was blowing in the breeze and he had a rather childish bravado about him.

Damien. He had a very special pen out which he wouldn't elaborate on its purpose, just referring to it as a very special pen.

Finally, GH. He looked distracted as Helen gave him that same annoying look that he was coming to despise. What did she know that he didn't?

Cloak said, "Time to go and end this."

***

"What's this, here?" Ekzacto said, suddenly. Underseen had been discovered. "A turtle managed to penetrate my defenses?"

Underseen fell back on keeping up the pretense. It worked once, who's to say it wouldn't work once more?

"Oh, little turtle," he said, almost affectionately.

Underseen marveled on how well this was working. He wasn't really putting forth an effort to keep up the pretense. All he had to do was pretend like he didn't understand a word that Ekzacto said. That all he had to --

Sudden movement!

Underseen hadn't anticipated it. He hadn't seen it coming. He cursed his foolish complacency, as he curled up into his shell, hoping that Ekzacto would just assume that he was just any old turtle.

"Tonight, I dine on turtle soup."

Oh, wonderful.

[Cloak]

New chapter.

CHAPTER TWELVE:
Storming the Asylum

Undersen couldn't allow himself to become soup naturally, so he shapeshifted into a Helmacron, which easily allowed himself to slip from Ekzacto's grip. And somehow he kept a hand on the tracking device. Then Underseen managed to transform into a turtledive and fly out of the tower, circle it a bit before landing on the ground around Cloak's team.

Ekzacto was coming down the flight of stairs, and then upon a rickety elevator. It was a rather anticlimatic entrance, but not everything in life can be seriously dramatic and daring. It did seem to take forever though.

"Shillar!" he cried out in anger and frustration. "How'd these interlopers get in here?! Shillar!!"

Silence, as no one answered him, which did not please him any great deal.

"Shillar!! Where the devil are you?! SHILLAR!!!"

"Arrested," Cloak said, in a quiet voice that nonetheless carried across the desolate yard of the crumbling, antiquated, abandoned building.

"What?" Ekzacto snapped.

"You heard me," Cloak said, stepping forward as his fellows readied themselves for battle. They were not foolish enough to be taken off guard by his eccentric dress or his maniac movements and gestures. They were experienced in these kinds of things, in the procedure. "She was arrested, and your kidnapping car was impounded. You cannot kidnape anymore children, you rank pedophile."

To this, Ekzacto laughed. It was an insane laugh of which Jafar would have sued for copyright.

"He's . . . not all there, is he?" GH asked, as this reaction was not what he was anticipating. He, like the others, were expecting the usual bad guy bluster and ideological monologues. This was not any of that.

"Yes, GH," Underseen said, "he's quite insane."

"'Pedophile'? You think me a pedophile?" he said, scornfully. "You poor, unfortunate dolts!"

"Watch yourself, human," Cloak warned.

"I have no interest in those kids," he declared, with a maniacal laugh. "It was their brains that I was after! There bodies were processed to sell at the black market. The money was necessary to finance the ultimate goal."

"Black market?" Helen said, aghast.

"Processed?" Aquilai asked. "How? And to what ends?"

"What ultimate goal?" Hunter said.

"I don't think I wanna eat him anymore," Dino commented.

"I needed their brains for my arsenal," Ekzacto crowed belligerently. "They shall both power and pilot my tanks! Prepare the way for the Train of Thought!"

"Why children?" Helen asked, her revulsion permeating her voice and tone. "Why are you using children?"

"I needed them strong-minded, strong-willed, and powerful," Ekzacto said, enjoying revealing his plan, unaware that his shower cap had toppled off his head, revealing a bald head. "I needed them full of imagination, before life began to beat them down. Imagination translates into psychic power far easier than you may think."

"He can't be serious, right?" Dino asked.

"I think he is," Damien said, seriously. "Or he thinks he is."

"I just had to wipe any of those disgusting filth from them, those pesky memories. Like black mold, they were." he said, enjoying this far more than he should. "Without those memories, they were open to be molded into being killers, loyal only to me. Well, me and my matron."

Matron.

The RAFians all had a shrewd idea who that was.

"She's baaaaaaaack," GH commented.

[Cloak]

New chapter.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN:
He Really Likes to Talk

"These tanks are really awesome, too," he said, almost as if the RAFians were a captive audience. "Really incredible and cool, too!"

"Um, why are we just standing around?" Dino asked.

"They have really cool psychic blast cannons, which can really cause damage without causing any undue collateral damage," he continued, unaware of the fact the RAFians weren't really paying attention.

"He's not really a threat," Aquilai answered.

"They can levitate, too! Really! Actual levitation of up to six feet!" Ekzacto exclaimed, dementedly.

"Dino's right," Helen said, "we should at least incapacitate him."

"They all have flamethrowers, too!" Ekzacto went on, glowing with pride. "Can you believe it? Actual flamethrowers!!"

"Look at him, Helen," GH pointed out, "he's already incapacitated."

"They can also read their enemy's minds! They can even see them through their eyes!" Ekzacto spoke with manic energy.

"I meant, restrain him somehow," Helen said.

"They can even chuck out these yellow energy bombs," Ekzacto said, with a rather mad glint in his eye. "They induce disorientation and confusion to any within their target radius!"

"He's not a real threat," Aquilai repeated.

"And they project powerful psychic and technological shields," he said, with questionable lucidity. "And they are impenetrable!"

"Yeah, he is," Helen said, contradicting the Time Lord, before clarifying, "to himself. A danger to himself."

"And they can use telekinesis!" Ekzacto declared, his lucidity still in question. "They can lift anything under two hundred pounds and throw it!"

"Alright, enough of this," Cloak said, having entertained this far enough. "Let's get this --"

"And they can become completely invisible," Ekzacto said, suddenly sounding and looking quite lucid. And there were several loud thumps around them. Cloak knew instantly, but they deactivated their invisibility. And there were the tanks, the Think Tanks, surrounding them all.

Ekzacto stepped back into the rickety elevator and went back up to the top, as he said, "Have fun."

[Cloak]

Saffa's gonna have a lot of chapters to catch up on.

New chapter.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN:
The Think Tanks

There were sixteen of them.

Each was the size of Dino in her compact form (which she swiftly abandoned). They all were shaped rather like the head of the Brain, from "Pinky and the Brain", with glowing, red, robotic eyes and a tank barrel coming right out of the "forehead" of the Brain. Atop this mockup head, almost like a fez, was a transparent, capsule dome which each contained a brain. They looked more grayer than Cloak had expected.

"Gateburst silent levitation," Cloak cursed.

"We're boned, aren't we?" GH said, hand held high, pick in hand. He was aware the limited things he could do.

"Not if I say anything about it!" Dino said, uncharacteristicall y savage. She immediately went for the nearest tank, and opened her massive jaws to bite down, to buckle the hull plating. But she was blocked by the forcefield shield, she couldn't even scratch the shield. So she swung her ankylosaurid tail at the shield, to bludgeon it. "Okay, this'll be a bit harder than I anticipated."

GH was playing his heart out, but there was absolutely no effect. The brain pilots had all their memories leeched out, being literally brain-washed. They had no memory of  emotion, and did not know to feel. And, in any case, they couldn't hear, as the tanks didn't really have any audio receptors.

"GH!" Damien said, having tossed what appeared to be a disco ball. He drew it in midair with thar special pen of his. "Hit it!"

GH grasps the neck of guitar, changing it into its axe form with a surge of magical light, and then struck the ball. With a clank, it hit one of the tanks, and hovered in midair, casing a strange energy down on them. Whatever it was intended to, it wasn't working.

"A Groovitron, Damien?" Cloak muttered. "Really?"

Helen blasted them with her ring, but those godforesaken shields blocked each blast.

Aquilai was waterbending water from a water skin he cared around with him ever sense he had been deaged (which reset his regeneration count, so he's the First Aquilai again)  He never had learned how to bloodbend, which he would refuse to learn anyway, and these tanks had no blood, just brains, really. But he had trouble getting through the shielding, as well.

Dylan flew over to his selected tank, punching the tank. Or trying to, anyway. He wasn't able to get through the shields. He wasn't too happy about it, and he was getting frustrated.

Hunter took potshots at the Tanks, but they cannot get through the shielding. His guns couldn't get through the shielding. He was wasting ammo, and he didn't have an unlimited store of it. He found himself wishing that he did, though.

The tanks looked to be impenetrable, just as Ekzacto claimed.

[Cloak]

New chapter. Sorry about the brevity.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN:
Shields Down

Cloak hadn't made an attack, just dodged the flamethrower bursts and psionic blasts as the others did. The tanks were made of metal . . . no, wait. They were Antarctic vibranium -- antimetal. How did he manage to procure so much of the material? Cloak was under the impression that such a material was not common in this realm, if it existed at all.

He reasoned that the Antarctic vibranium was just hull plating, as there was obvious electronics and if that antimetal went all the way through, that wouldn't really be possible, Cloak reasoned.

"Cloak!" GH roared. "DO SOMETHING!"

Cloak looked around and saw GH somehow got atop one and was riding it rather like a bucking bronco. Cloak didn't want to know just how he managed that.

"Clooooooooooooooooo oooaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa aaak!!" GH said, as the tank decided to rotate as if it was using a Gyro Ball attack. "Stoooooooooooop thiiiiiiiiiiiis thiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiin g!!"

Cloak leaped toward the bucking tank, and he projected the shield again, which enclosed over GH. This surprised him, actually, as he assumed he was sitting atop it. Cloak wreathed his claws in golden-scarlet energy, and he dug them into the shielding, like a tiger digging them into its prey. And the thing about feline claws is that they are designed to pull themselves further into what they have impaled. So, Cloak's claws had made their way through the shielding (with Cloak marveling on how thin the shield actually was), and pulled his hands apart. This was enough to shatter the shielding for this one tank.

"Aquilai!" Cloak called. "Over here! Now!"

Aquilai acquiesced, didging fire and psychic blasts.

"Whatcha need?"

"Disconnect this brain from the tank," Cloak said, more authoritatively then he intended, "then do it for the rest of the tanks while the others have 'em distracted. I'll shredbmore of their shields, but remember, these are innocent brains they deserve to live until they are reunited with their proper bodies."

"Recranialized," GH suggested, looking a bit worn.

"I got this," Aquilai, pulling out his sonic screwdriver. To what purpose, Cloak didn't know. There were still fifteen tanks for him to deal with. He went off to take care of that.

He ripped their shields to shreds, proving that they were not actually as impenetrable at Ekzacto believed.

[guitarhero01234]

Just a normal day in the life of gh

[Cloak]

Any RAFian, really.

New chapter.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN:
Short Work

Meanwhile, Damien had drawn up something he called a "fourth-dimensional bag", which essentially functioned like a magic satchel, and he and GH were gathering up the "brain jars" into it after Aquilai safely detached them. This effectively made the tanks useless and inert.

"Alright," Cloak said, "next thing to do is to make sure that these things don't fall into the wrong hands."

"How?" Underseen asked.

"I'll take care of it, don't worry," Cloak said. "But the rest of you go ahead and apprehend that cackling psychopath. Don't hesitate."

"Um, Cloak . . ." Dino said. Even in her compacted form, the elevator would not be kind to her or her saurian weight.

"Dino and I will take care of this," Cloak swiftly amended. "Then I'll -- sorry, Dino -- then I'll be along shortly thereafter."

They acquiesced, and either took the elevator or simply flew up to the tower.

"Sometimes being a big dinosaur really sucks," Dino groused.

"Take heart," Cloak said. "We all have our limitations."

"Thank you, Mr. Being-Without-Limits," Dino said, unable to conceal her bitterness.

"Despite appearances," Cloak said, "even I have limits."

"Like what?"

"My business," Cloak said, repressively. "Now, to take care of the tanks."

Cloak extended his arms, and then slow moved his hands closer together. Crushing the tanks into a crumpled ball of metal and whatnot. Cloak continued to crunch and compact them together, until he created a solid ball of metal the size of a laundry hamper. Utterly useless to anyone as a weapon of mass destruction.

"Yeah, you have limits, alright," Dino said, sarcastically, rolling her eyes. Cloak didn't know she could do that in such a saurian form, but he didn't deign to answer.

"Make sure he doesn't come out here," Cloak said, deflecting the previous subject, "I'm goin' up."

Dino said nothing, feeling rather moody, but acknowledged it with a curt nod.

[Cloak]

New chapter.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN:
The Mastermind is . . . You-Know-Who

With the RAFians in the circular tower room with Dr. Ekzacto, it was rather cramped, and everything behind the demented dentist shrouded in darkness.

"It's over," Helen said. "Come quietly."

"Please don't," Dylan said, cracking his knuckles.

"Parker isn't training with you anymore," Helen said, firmly. "Neither is Demos."

"Wait a minute," Hunter said, sensing something was wrong.

"Is he . . . is he okay?" Aquilai said, eyeing the demented dentist with concern. The dentist had not moved an inch since they arrived. He had not spoken once. He did not even seem to be breathing.

"Is he even breathing?!" GH asked, appraisingly.

Then Ekzacto's head tumbled from his shoulders, and rolled to a stop in front of Damien's left shoe.

"Yeah," Damien said, "I think he's dead."

"What was your first clue?" GH asked rhetorically.

Damien gave the head a small, swift kick, sending it rolling towards his body, which was no slumping to the ground, dead. "That," Damien answered, despite knowing it was a rhetorical question.

"Who -- ?"

"Such a pity," came a cruel, cool voice who clearly took delight in the murder. "And he came so highly recommended. Ho hum."

"I know that voice," Aquilai said.

"Oh, you know who it is, Aquilai," GH said, pragmatically, "who else schemes like this against us?"

"Bern Bridges?" Damien asked.

"No, the other one," GH said.

"Chuck Norris?"

GH gave him a look so dirty that Damien was lucky that GH wasn't Medusa.

"Malice," Cloak said, making his presence known to the others.

"Cloaky, dear," Malice said with venomous honeyed tones. "You've trained your little Dweller pets in remedial deductive reasoning!"

"Shut up, Malice," Cloak growled.

[guitarhero01234]

Funny that, since I actually do really hate Chuck Norris jokes