Sunday, October 31, 2010

The Green Devil Strikes Again - Chapter 21


"Angry Clouds & One Angry Statue"

            After initiating his flight sequence, Rob and I took off toward the Mauve Mountains.  We made sure to fly high enough to avoid being seen by Lived Neerg.  Rob even emitted a sensor jamming frequency to avoid being scanned by the other robots.
            When we arrived at the mountains, we were greeted by mauve faces with pleasant smiles. Their eyes and mouths were made of caves on their rocky fronts and they all appeared to be sleeping peacefully.
            Heading up toward the top of the mountains, we found they were covered by pretty, pink snow caps.  Light orange clouds drifted over them, gently dropping little bits of snow.
            Upon closer inspection, we found that these little orange clouds had little puffy faces.  They also had puffy portions on their sides that were functioning like hands.  And the little bits of snow that were gently dropping on the mountain tops were actually snowballs being thrown from one cloud to another. Since they were having a snowball fight, they must have been younger, cloud children,
            “Hey, Rosie,” shouted one of the clouds, “look at the weirdoes over there.”
            “A meat-person!” she shouted back, “aren’t they the ones poisoning our cousins in the third dimension?”
            “I think your right.  Get him,” he shouted again.
            The clouds ceased tossing their pink snowballs at each other and began tossing them at us.
            “Rob, can you emit short heat blasts?”
            “Affirmative.”
            “Good,” I replied, lowering his protective field, “quick blasts of just the right amount of heat to melt those snowballs.”
            “Affirmative,” he replied.
            Rob extended his arms and shot three quick bursts from his pincers.  The snowballs all melted instantly.
            “That metal thing’s melting our snowballs,” cried one of the other clouds.  His cry was more of a whine.
            “Then we’ll just have to rust him,” stated one of the larger clouds, slowly turning a deeper shade of orange.
            “And let’s soak that scrawny kid, too,” added the cloud known as Rosie.
            Hearing that, I quickly reinstated Rob’s protective field.
            “Our job’s done here, Rob,” I smiled triumphantly, u-turning to fly back toward the others, “Just keep a sensor out for those clouds.  Let me know if they stop following us.”
            “Affirmative.”
            Flying quickly down the sides of the Mauve Mountains, we were pursued by the clouds.  Not only were they trying to rain on us, but the began hurling bolts of lightning at us.  Fortunately for us, the electrical bolts just bounced off of the Multi-Purpose Protection Fields.  This, of course, made the little orange clouds even madder; and the madder they got, the redder they got.
            Once or twice it looked as if the clouds might have been abandoning their chase, but they weren’t going to get off so easily.  I lowered Rob’s field and let him send a few bursts out to electrify them.  That made them turn around even angrier and redder than before and they would soon be on our heels once again.
            Arriving back at the clearing, I was surprised to see that in our brief absence, it had turned into a battlefield.  It looked as if a cyclone had hit it.  I swooped down over the Green Devil and his robotic army.  The now-completely red clouds followed; raining and tossing lightning bolts all the way.
            The armies continued their attack as the downpour began.  General Spruce had instructed his fruit and nut bearing trees to throw them all at the robots.  General Boulder’s men were rolling themselves under the treadles of the robots and had managed to topple a few of them.  Unfortunately, this only slowed them down as they all had self-righting mechanisms that put them back on their feet again.
            General Iguana had readied his men to provide back-up as needed, but upon my arrival with the clouds, the lizards retreated into the dryer portions of the park.  All of the other attacks came to a gradual halt as the assemblage quickly became drenched by the clouds children.
            After a few minutes of bone soaking rain, the clouds got bored by the lack of retaliation on our part.  They soon turned and headed back up to the Mauve Mountains.  The three suns shone brightly down upon the wet warriors.  I took this opportunity to land right in front of the evil Green Devil, Lived Neerg.  Rob landed right behind me.
            “You!” shrieked Lived Neerg, in that grating squeaky voice of his.  “You puny excuse for a meat-person!”
            “Now, don’t get personal, Neerg” I grinned.
            “Robots, attack this miserable mortal!” he shrieked.
            There were a few flickering lights left on the panels of a couple of the units, accompanied by a few creaky groans and sputters.  To Lived Neerg’s surprise, the only movement those robots made was to slump forward in defeat.  The robots had been rusted solid.
            The others in the clearing began shaking off the water from the rains, now that the clouds had all returned to their kingdom.  The three suns dried everything very quickly.  Everyone approached the front line that had been set up by Lived Neerg.
            “My robots!  My lacertinium robots!  You stopped them!” cried the Green Devil.
            “If you hadn’t been in such a hurry to conquer this place, you would have taken your time to ensure that the impregnable metal you stole from Lizard Land was applied properly—welded together with watertight seals,” explained Melissa.
            “Watertight seals!  He didn’t use watertight seals!  Any fool would have used watertight seals,” squealed Jeremy with delight, rolling around on the ground.
            “Defeated by a meat-person and some stupid clouds,” moaned the Green Devil, “a meat-person!  Of all the idiotic lifeforms.”
            “Sorry, Neerg,” stated Lisa proudly, “but your plundering days are through.”
            “That’s what you think!” he yelled, grabbing the little pointy hat off his little green head.  He reached around and grabbed his tail as well.
            Just before he had a chance to stick the tip of his tail into his hat (which would have caused him to immediately disappear into a puff of green smoke), I hit a couple of buttons on Rob’s chest plate and aimed his pincer.  An intensified, concentrated heat blast—at a much higher level than we used on the clouds—shot out.  It seared right through Lived Neerg’s tail, snipping off the tip.
            “My tail!!!  You’ve taken my tail!!!!!” he bellowed in pain.
            “Be glad he didn’t take your life!—you lousy heap of slime,” stated a familiar voice.  We turned around instantly, only to find our old friend, Bringle Brand of Jingleland.
            “Sorry I’m late,” he smiled, “but I was delayed by the Kowdoon.”
            “You’re here, too!” shouted Lived Neerg.
            “Yes, I’m here too,” replied Bringle calmly, “your days are indeed through here.  Shrinking me was bad enough.  Turning me into a mouse was even worse.  But when you begin to dimension hop and to kidnap lower lifeforms—no offense intended.”
            “None taken,” I said, in a slightly offended tone.
            “You know damn well that meat-people know nothing of this world. Your actions have opened up this dimension to untold dangers.  For that alone, you should be punished,” finished Bringle.
            “I’m not through with any of you yet,” threatened Lived Neerg, “I’ve still got tricks up my sleeve.”
            With that he began waving his arms and mumbled few words that I didn’t catch.  Just as I swore I saw a hint of green smoke appearing around his feet, Bringle made a full sweeping motion with his left arm, directed right at the Green Devil.
            A large puff of purple smoke enveloped Lived Neerg.  He emitted a loud, piercing scream that sounded as if it trailed off into the distance.  The purple smoke dissipated and what we saw brought joy to everyone’s heart.  Lived Neerg, the Green Devil, had been turned once and for all, into a statue; hat in one hand, tail in the other, his face in the hideous image of a scream.

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