July 2, 2014. Wednesday.
A thunder struck outside of the Terrible Motel. It started to rain. Inside a motel room, the four heroes were having a discussion.
Max explained, "Soap, soda, paper and aerosol cans is all we need to make some decent bombs. I will write down the list. We will need to get them the first thing in the morning as the shops open up.
Having a difficult time to conceal the excitement on her face, Sally asked, "Am I going to receive some bombs? I'd like to use some."
"Everyone gets as many as they can carry."
"Nice." She hit George's shoulder with her knuckle. "See, George, everything is going to be amazing. Lighten up."
But George did not lighten up. The sadness was stuck on him the entire evening. There was a bad feeling inside his stomach. For him, something just did not add up. He said, "So we blow up the gate, go through all the guards, Gango's squad, the tank and somehow manage to get to Alfonso's mansion, where we defeat his strongest minions. Then we come face to face with Alfonso, who probably is going to have his finger on the button. What do we do then? Ask him politely to give up the launch device?"
Max glanced at George. He said, "With a little bit of luck on our side we are going to manage it. Have succeeded in even more difficult situations, no way we're going to fail here."
"You sure? Had there ever been a more difficult situation than this?"
Max let his eyes down.
Zoop attempted to cheer George up, "C'mon Giarge, we have that ninja you spoke on the phone, we have the group of strange people on our side. Everything is going to be just fine. You'll see."
"Yeah, I almost forgot the lady from extreme pizza. But if time cops have problems stopping Alfonso what can an old woman do?" George frowned his lips. "I'm sorry for the pessimism. Please continue without me for a while. I need to get some fresh air." He strode out of the room into the rain.
Max asked Sally, "What's wrong with George? Is he always stressing out like this?"
She shook her head.
Heavy water loudly battered onto the cars parked outside of the Terrible Motel. In heavy steps, George walked where his eyes led him. No matter how hard he tried to draw the picture inside his head in which Alfonso is defeated, he failed. He imagined himself reaching for Alfonso's waist and being stopped by a bullet in his chest. He imagined himself talking, but failing to find enough arguments to change Alfonso's mind, on the whole, world destruction thing. In no outcome of the multitude of scenarios inside his head, he came out of the mansion victorious.
"Has someone died?" a voice awoke George. It was the manager, who currently was smoking a cigarette outside of the entrance to his office.
"No, Sir. Sorry, it's just..." He sighed. "Lately I've been feeling that the weight of my troubles has become a bit too heavy for me to carry."
"The weight is never heavy to carry when you have friends to help you." The manager gave him a warm smile. He was not the prettiest of men, and his smile, missing a few teeth was not the most beautiful, but it was enough to cheer George up. The man continued, "You've got our cult on your side, and I heard the Cool scumbags are joining in too. All those guards outside of the mansion are going to fall like flies. You'll see. We've got some sneaky ways to deal with the people we dislike."
"Thank you."
"On the TV they said that the weather is going to be amazing tomorrow." Getting no reply from George for a long while, the manager added, "My name is Tom by the way."
"George."
"Glad to have you here, George."
Leaning against a wall, George stared at the rain, smelling manager's cigarette smoke. They did not speak anymore. Once Tom had left, George stayed outside for a little longer before returning back to the planning room. Back in the room, he sat on a chair in the far corner and for the remainder of the night silently listened to his companions.
——-
A thunder struck outside of Alfonso's mansion as a mysterious figure descended down the hill towards the gates of the mansion. Darkness and pouring rain concealed its advance. Wearing tight black clothes the figure naturally blended into the night. The person was short and bulky but moved with a grace that could be envied by a swan. A tight long braid dangled behind its back.
It approached the mansion crouching by the left outside wall. Noiselessly it climbed up the wall, kicked upwards, and making a somersault, jumped over the barbed wire. Landing on a clueless guard carrying an umbrella, it effortlessly bashed him into the mud.
In almost identical grace as that of Sally's, only at much faster speed, ignoring the rocket, the tents, the murmur in the construction site, it crawled directly towards the mansion. There, it made a pull up to get on a window sill and jumped up to hang on to another one. After two more repetitions, the shadow was already sneaking on the roof.
Using karate chops to the neck, the figure put two guards sleep. Their radios were still making noises as the ninja turned narrow dark eyes to a huge smokeless chimney. It attached a hook with a rope to the chimney edge, checked the reliability of the fixture and jumped into it. It walked down the wall and stopped just above the fireplace.
Three people were talking inside the room. They were at quite a far distance away, but after focusing, the ninja could easily hear their echoes. It listened.
"One of our agents saw Bottlemore exiting a train from Milltown together with his friends yesterday. It's only a matter of time before they strike again," said a dim, squealing male voice.
"Are we prepared?" asked another man, his tone overly serious.
"Of course we are," replied the third. "You got the two of us. It is all the protection you might ever need. Everyone else is just for the show."
The serious one said, "You think highly of yourself."
"My works speak for my words."
"Right. That's why your father sent me here instead of you. Your strength blinds you, Kevin. You have too much of a tunnel vision. You don't care about helping me, all you care is fighting that stupid cop when we have to worry about the guy who invented the time machine."
"Since when did you start speaking like my father?" The voice got dimmer with every second, "Bottlemore is an idiot. Should have learned that after meeting him the first time. You can take care of him yourself. Better hope we can protect your hide from the time cops. They are the largest threat. If I reckon correctly those two are the best ones they ever had." A pause went by. The last words were so dim that the figure could barely hear them. "For Mr. Plan B you are quite picky, Alfonso." A sound of slamming door ended the conversation.
Minutes of total silence passed. The shadow figured that his target must have been left alone in the room and crawled out of the fireplace. Covered by a cloud of dust from the chimney, the shadowy person was darker than the darkest night. To its surprise, the figure found two men inside the room. One of them, a bulky large man with a frowned face sat by a table behind a sofa and used a computer. On the sofa lay a little thin man with a ball shaped haircut.
The uninvited guest recognized its target. It put a hand behind the back. Then, after making a swift swing, it launched two knives at the large man. They pierced the air with a whistling sound. But instead of hitting the mark, the knives vanished. They ended up in the hand of the little man, who now was standing in-between the shadow and Alfonso, staring at the intruder, waving the knives, gesturing to come closer.
The dark visitor did not advance. On the contrary, it kept the distance from the mysteriously powerful little man. From the belts on its thighs, filled with steel projectiles, it grabbed six sharp nail darts that fit well in between the fingers of the massive fists. After two downward swings, the projectiles flew at the small stranger. Now he did not catch them. Instead, he turned and did a side somersault toward ninja. The nails hit the far wall, close by Alfonso, who now had his head sticking out of a massive turned over table.
The ninja removed the mask and wiped off the dark coal from her face. The lady manager from Extreme Pizza stared at the scene with deadly intent in her eyes. She swiftly turned her head to the side and a long weaved hair-tail swung over her shoulder. A knife dangled bounded to its end.
July said, "Miss, lay your weapons down and surrender. You may get hurt if you continue this foolishness."
"I don't know what failure is!" exclaimed the manager. Beneath her feet exploded a smoke bomb.
Many more projectiles came from the smoke, yet July avoided them with acrobatics uncommon to a man of such lean build.
"Who the hell are you?" the female threatening voice asked from the smoke.
"I'd call myself an artist and a helping friend."
"A friend of that coward."
"He is not a coward!"
As July got close to the smoke, the hair tail with the knife lashed out at his throat. With an inhumanly swift extension of his hand, he caught the ninja by the tail. He pulled the woman out of the smoke and with a single punch to the belly, took her down. Then, by driving a finger into her neck, he made her fall asleep.
"Is it over?" asked Alfonso from behind the desk.
"It is," replied July after throwing the bulky lady over his small shoulder. Walking with ease, he passed the large friend and added, "I will put her in the prison."
"Thanks."
"Just doing my job." July closed the door behind him.
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