PLDN Chapter 37

"Chapter 37: The Fall/The Bad Ending Arc"

Sub-Entry 361: The War Ends but the Fall Begins
The beginning of a New Year. It holds the promise of a lot of things.

Unfortunately, Chaopolis was one to make their own promise.

I hated to segue into dark times so quickly especially following a grand night of ringing in the new year...but Madam Fate wasn't about to give us a choice.

Fortunately we got a moment's reprieve with New Year's Eve and New Year's Day.

But make no mistake...once the 1st of January ended? All bets were off and she would lay into us.

She'd drop plenty of hints throughout New Year's Day to let us know the whatsit was going to hit the fan.

Before that began, however, I might as well clean the palette of last year with a buffer before then.

So. Let's get the good out of the way; bridge between December 31st and January 1st. That time of year that was double special. Especially to a certain mouse from Neon City.

I'd been preoccupied after Asriel's graduation and for good reason. I'd been divided between two things on my mind. The first, obviously being New Year's Eve and the Shimmer Ball that Dr. Lynx, Violet, and I worked so tirelessly on to make special for each year. I know I say we outdid ourselves every year, but why change my tune when it's true?

I built the hardware. Violet programmed the display and the show itself and choreographed the lights and countdown. Nikita handled sending the ball from her lab to the square as her own security failsafe. No middle man. No chance of it being tampered with between here and there.

Unfortunately someone would always find a way to made a few...enhancements to the show, either inadvertently like Hailsarinth did last year or Rainbow Wing did the year before...or on purpose like Ripper had done in previous years. I should know better than to take my eye off Robert "Ripper" Traveson...sooner or later he'd be tempted to try again. And yup...yup, he did.

So how did his surprise come about this time? Let me take you back to the final hour of the countdown...

Chameleon's wife, Valkyrie was first on scene.

"Hello, Sophia. Don't mind the boxes. Safety orders."

"I am hoping that the ball does not set a distance record again this year. "  VARS Cyborg, Sophia responded.

"... Soon as it's all pass, I get ta yank out my blasts, cool?" Ripper wasn't even trying to deny it. Not a good sign.

Drew was quick to jump to the first degree. "Just make sure that shit doesn't get near the firework barge this year."

"Hey! If it was, ya wouldn't be concerned o'er, would ya?"

I plugged in the last of the cables and finished the last of the hardware checks.

"...all hardware circuits on our end are connected.  Receiver array is up and ready for Matter-Wave download, decompress and execution."

"Alright, boss. My end's set." Drew's confirmation came over my com link.

Rainbow Wing entered. The Blue Wyrmling of the bunch came bouncing in singing in Draconic "Vrantvrak tenpiswo vur vrantvrak mobi, itrewic vi basket ihk wer-"

That was moments before the Black Wyrmling and leader,  bopped him over the head as the other three simply flew in a bit more peacefully.

"Songs for eggs are not for THIS holiday, soft-boiled brains!" The black Wyrmling scolded.

Nikita gave her own confirmation, following up Drew's. "Affirmative, Commander.  The hardware for the ball and the EMF transmission system is online and ready to send.  Despite protests on my part, I finally okayed her latest software build.  It's...within acceptable tolerances and parameters."

I nodded.

"Excellent.  All light-sensitive citizens in city have been issued protective gear and eyewear.  And we've doubled down on all other safety precautions and security...with the threat of hiring Al Dente next year if ANYTHING goes awry..". *glare*

Oh HELL no! Nobody wanted that.

" Is it true that security dimwit made his own mother sign a logbook for his house?" The Black Wyrmling asked.

Before I could respond, Violet chimed in with, " Yes.  It's true.  That man has no--"

"Aunt Violet!" Asriel scolded.

"Does not matter what she says. No matter what, that man doesn't have it. Integrity, strength, posture, intelligence..." The Black Wyrmling scoffed.

"Si guulac batobot drekim ui vi sthyr ekess tlush mrith!" The Red Wyrmling responded in Draconic. Unfortunately I do not have a translation for it.

"True, true!" The black one agreed.

"Also, everything is ready on the other end.  Mitzi's birthday lime green birthday cake and ice cream are ready to roll after the ball drops.  A special thank-you to Hestia for arranging it AND making BOTH home-made."

"If you are willing to behave yourselves, I am authorized to share some snacks with you, little ones." Sophia offered.

Speaking of Asriel, he was all gussied up, once again looking so dapper that Napstablook would approve.

"Guess it's time again already." Isabelle slithered to the square, already wearing protective shades.

"As leader, you know I should get a larger share to compensate making sure all goes well, right?"

Wrong thing to say, Wyrmling Black.

At that time, Bunnie wisped into existence in her lavish New Year's outfit and kimono. She could almost be a Jangese empress in this getup...hint, hint. (Sorry, Daimyou.)

"Greetings, all."

"Bunnie, Asriel... My you're all decorated for the event." Valkyrie admired.

Miss Zah, of Augustgrad, wandered in and for once it looked like she was wearing more than usual. Seemed that the winter weather finally got her wearing something looking more like a schoolgirl outfit and a jacket along with a nice scarf. The Huntress wandered around as she was sniffed around as she wasn't sure exactly what the big thing was here although that contraption in the distance was something to draw the woman's eye as she approached the main group.

"Little colder than usual, Zah?" Isabelle gave a wave to her fellow Augustgradian. Augustgradite? Whatever. A wave, nonetheless.

Zah shrugged a little bit, "A bit more than usual although.  And people were glaring at me more than usual for wearing the usual. So got this outfit and it worked out so far." She stretched out, "Oh hey it's another of us hunters howinsup." The half beast gave a wave towards the fellow girl.

"It's not like us dragons can start wearing sweaters..." The Black Wyrmling complained.

"Y'know they make sweaters for dogs and stuff, right?  What's to stop someone from knitting one for a dragon?" Drew offered.

... You just want to see me wearing some sort of crocheted polka-dot elderly ensemble, don't you?

"Be funny, but no.  Just meant it'd help you be warm.  Shit ain't just out to get you ya know."

"Coi tiliw qe yinvets." The Blue Wyrmling said before being bopped by the black, who protested out loud "IT WOULD NOT BE CUTE!"

"Alright, Violet.  You passed the Nikita test so...I'm going to allow whatever programming you compiled. "  I gave Vi a pass after years of her making her "matrix code" more and more obnoxiously offensive to epileptics and light-sensitive beings.

"Have faith, Spark Wolf.  It'll be kickin'."

"See, us of canine-descent know that fur definit' got advants o'er scale! Ain't that right, UCI?" Ripper agreed with Vi.

"You know it.  We got Drew on pyrotechnics and Sally D.J.-ing."

Brooke was said to be watching from the VIP skybox.

" Vaaaaal!" Marcel glomped his bigger little adopted sister, Valerie from behind. Valerie greeted Marcel before greeting Ripper.

"Heya, Ripper."

"Hey Val!" Ripper grabbed and hugged the girl tight, glad to spend more time with her!

"Alright.  Program has completed its last file check and debug.  It's loaded into resident memory and ready to upload."

Rainbow Wing 's Green flew up to and tapped Drew on the shoulder.

"Aussir... Aussir xurwka vi dakic."

"... So what, Green? Everyone purchases something this time of year." The Black sneered in response.

"Uhh...  Black wyrmling?  Translation?"

"She said 'White made a purchase.'"

"The real question is what did the white one buy?"

"Alright.  Program has completed its last file check and debug.  It's loaded into resident memory and ready to upload."

"Begin sending the Matter-Wave, Dr. Lynx.  We'll reassemble it from digital data into physical form once complete."

"Uploading to the coordinates."

The wire-frame ball outline at the top of the virtual tower and electromagnetic tether began to fill with what can only be described as  "liquid matrix code".

It filled up completely and the outline of the tower fleshed out as the "graphics" unscrambled into an actual physical object, and boy, she was a  beaut'! That there… was a hell of a lot of lights and display.

"100%.  Do your thing, Violet."

Violet uploaded to the shimmer ball. Once it reached 100% the ball lit up and activated. WOO. It looked like Violet just slipped under the absolute maximum that Nikita and pretty much the whole city would allow.

Green muzzle-pawed... Then pointed at Ripper.

" ... Ya ain't winning this time. Don't worry, Val! We're gonna get one awesome show!"

Drew glanced over at Ripper. "...You selling crap to Rainbow Wing, Ripper?"

Joining the festivities was Eury, the Viera having dressed nicely for this although she had decided to ditch the hat as she came in with a nice dress on. Who says this viera could go couldn't go classy looking? Hopefully this time it'd not have her ears ringing for the better half of new year’s day. Really it seemed that Mirandians REALLY liked to do some overkill here.

Heh. Guilty as charged.

"Good evening, miss Eury. Would you like some refreshments as well?" Sophia greeted.

Eury nodded, "Might as well get something here.  Probably something alcoholic to be honest." If she was going to be having her ears half blown off her head in a few minutes she'd rather be slightly buzzed about this. She shifted side to side even though her dress did give a nice view if one was tall enough. But with how tall Viera tended to be she was mostly hiding that fact from most  people. But well a girl can look pretty sometimes in her opinion.

Sophie mixed the drink and offered.

Eury took the drink in hand as the Viera looked towards the ball as she took a deep breath.

"...What exactly's in there?" Marcel questioned.

Ripper grinned wider...uh-oh. Something tells me I should be concerned more with Ripper's conversation than with who all was joining in the growing celebration...

"We'll see her coming from any direction. Nice dream, Ripper. But not this time." Valkyrie warned.

"Blasts that'll react great ta very... very col' temperatures."

"You'd better not be planning any bull schtick that's gonna cause issues."

Ripper grinned even wider.

The Black deadpanned. "... I had nothing to do with this."

Asriel felt inclined to add to the warning. "Hestia said she'd volunteer to discipline you if anything went wrong." Yeah, she was STILL salty about the time Ripper blew up her bakery with a motorcycle stunt gone wrong. And Chameleon had an even bigger grudge over the stunt that leveled his shack years ago.

"I paid that Draco ta provide extra boost to the works, n' they're really gonna fly!"

"...Ripper, do you not trust me to put on a good show?" Drew arched an eyebrow, feeling his pride as a pyrotechnician on the line.

There was no time left to continue the argument because at that moment...

THE COUNDOWN BEGAN!

"Glasses on!" Sophia instructed everyone to put on the protective shades.

* 10 * 9 * 8 * 7 * 6 * 5 * 4 * 3 * 2 * 1 *

-=[HAPPY NEW YEAR MIRANDA CITY =2020=]=-

Every light on the UCI building went absolutely crazy as every holo-projector displayed every possible animated image a computer could generate from a ball-drop.

And that was when...

Rumbling started occurring under the ground... In several seconds, a box was shoved under the fireworks... A large breath of ice blasted upon on them, sending them bursting!

Drew launched the fireworks as the ball drops. Warily;  only to have the ones by him go off all at once! He dove for cover and a deafening explosion occurred.

Ripper grinned as he used his Earth Magic to help protect the others.

"OHHH WOOOOOW!" Asriel was dazzled.

"N' may they all be as burstin' as this one!" Ripper fist-pumped with all the enthusiasm of Springfield's own Duff Man! Oh yeeeeah!

"...Ripper!  That show was supposed to last ten MINUTES!  Not ten seconds!" Drew roared,. "Someone hold him for me." He growled, threateningly cracking his knuckles.

"Yeeeeeeah it did!" Violet cackled in her best Regular Show's Mordecai impression.

"... I think we need to move." Valkyrie wisely put some distance between her and Ripper.

"Ripper.  We at UCIAT are under no obligation to protect you or Rainbow Wing from whatever's coming...   You're on your own." I said flatly and matter-of-factly.

"Hey! Don't include me with that dunderdog!" Black protested.

Bunnie made a formal bow and greeted the new year with "Akemashiteomedetougozaimasu!"

Eury had her glasses on before she began moving away from the massive explosion; which had the Viera wincing from just how incredibly loud. She ended up spilling her drink on her dress as the mage's at least got a small ice wall in front of her this time. "What’s the idea going on now?!"

Zah meanwhile was laughing like an idiot.

"Now that's perfect.  I swear you city dwellers got a thing to do everything bigger. It's funny as hell. All that boom going off at once?!" the half beast is laughing even harder considering apparently since this WASN'T PLANNED!

Valerie Gilneas was knocked down from the blast shaking the ground, also laughing like an idiot.

"Black, I assume you can discipline your underling? Or do I get a speed bag to go with my new heavy bag?" Drew approached, cracking his knuckles again.

"I know where a large selection of perfectly-heated lava pits for that frozen skull..." Black smoldered.

In all the excitement we didn't notice Mitzi arrive before the ball drop. But now that the drama was dying down...we sure as heck noticed. HOLY SMOKES, she was dolled up! She sure could go from girl-next-door to drop-dead-gorgeous bombshell. That amazing hairdo! That sparkling, shimmering, emerald green gown! Those matching sparkling, emerald green, strappy icepick heel stiletto sandals! The ruby red lipstick and foundation and those eyelashes! It was enough to make you forget she was old enough to be your mom or aunt!

"Happy new year, and happy birthday, Miss Mitzi!" Asriel congratulated.

"Thank you, Azzy!"

Gadget was on hand with the lime green birthday cake and ice cream.

"A new year indeed... I never thought I'd agree with you guys so completely." Black complimented, actually civil.

"Just this once I'm not gonna give you a hard time." Marcel offered the black of rainbow wing a few candies. "Spread these out among you and your crew."

Black took the candies...then rushed after the White! She squeaked in fear as the Black yelled out some draconic words. Quickly the Red and the Blue went running after her into the night... The Black remained, though.

Drew chased after Ripper and gave a few slugs to the gut.

Ripper his earth magic to try and protect himself... He's still laughing, though a few tears are definitely let loose as well.

Drew juked around the earth that was raised while managing to give a few punches; From an amateur boxer no less.

"Seems you went all out again." Mitzi admired the celebration.

"Yo, D.J. Aelita!  Kick this party into OVERDRIVE!" Violet called out.

"You got it!" Sally cranked the sounds.

"And now to go find some burn ointment to spread over my back.  Hurts like a bitch.  And you get to pay my fucking hospital bill." Drew grumbled.

"Hey, it looked magnif, ya gotta admit!" Ripper protested.

Zah looked to Val, "Hey this the usual Or did I go and show up for one where something extra fun happened?"

Although it looked like the brawl's breaking out, there was definitely a beast man party going on nearby. Considering how much chaos was breaking out. "Still easy to get booze, food and tons of action.  Definitely seems like it's going to a fun time."

Isabelle rolled her eyes and sipped at some champagne.

"Nah, this isn't normal.  But every year, something goes awry.  Last year someone managed to sink the firework barge.  This year... well, you saw.  Another year someone launched an explosive at the ball.  Another year Ripper decided it'd be a good idea to jettison the new year's ball into the stratosphere." Isabelle explained.

"Only in Miranda, eh, guys?  Also, the birthday mouse looks HAWWWWWWT!"

"Goddammit, Vi..." I complained, too burnt out to remind that she was flirting with the closest mother figure I had besides Nermal.

"It's...okay, Commander...I'm...mostly flattered. Violet will be Violet."

"Again.  Would've looked better if they could make head or tails of the display, and it worked with the music."

"... I just want one bit of information. Because she likely is not going to confess, what did you give her for tunneling? She does not know earth magic, I can guarantee that."

"My guess is he directly tunneled for her." Marcel replied.

"Not quite, but close. I gave 'er a couple o' special enchanted claws fer diggin'. That way, she could get under, th' only spot I knew wasn't covered." Ripper laughed.

Drew hobbled off in search of ALL THE ALOE. He wasn't fortunate enough to get cover from the explosion and was very clearly irate.

"Soooo...think Ripper's luck will hold again?  One year he did get our budget expanded for his impromptu.....enhancements to our pyrotechnics."

"Luck how?" Marcel asked.

"The question is will her majesty mistake this one for intentional again." Valerie followed up.

"Depends if Queen Brooke thinks it was planned. "  I snorted.

"That he's still alive is my bet..." Valkyrie muttered.

"That's the closest to luck he's gonna get from the sound of it."

A surprise hug from our favorite viera sniper, Lulu for Eury left her surprised and delighted.

"Good evening, Luvenia." Eury sighed softly as she felt those familiar arms around her as she leaned back into Lulu's arms. "Happy New Year Lulu." She seemed calm with that hug even though her ears were still ringing a bit.

"If she doesn't welll...who can saaaaay?" Violet interjected into the conversation. "And anything Brookie-cookie can do to punish him his WAAAAY worse than anything Drew will have in store once those burns heal."

"Vi, you have a DEATH-WISH for calling her that nickname behind her back." I snapped.

"I'm standin' here, ya know." Ripper reminded us he hadn't left.

"We know." Marcel said almost rehearsed with his timing.

"Just... Prepping you, Ripper." Chameleon's wife warned.

"Which punishments did Chameleon last use on you?  Just idle curiosity."

"That's... Actually somethin' that scared me. He gave me a 35, n' a 12... Then 'e paused. He.. Umm... Well... That was th' scary part." Ripper tugged at his collar.

"A 35 and a 12?" Marcel questioned.

He said he wanted ta give a third punishment fer what I did last time... But... Umm... He's still thinkin'. He said he needed time ta come up wit' a new one ta use fer th' amount of wrong in 'is eyes...

"He's... Still working on a retribution?" Black looked him dead in the eyes.

"...basically, yeah." Ripper admitted.

Zah was still laughing. "You guys are crazy. Must make things always exciting here. Wonder how long until demons decide to show up or something when you have the thing explode into something else."

"Crazy is as crazy does, Zah." Violet shrugged with a Hyperdeath headshake and grin.

"Eh, if demons show up they're probably just here to celebrate.  Otherwise, a lot of us are armed I'm sure." Marcel shrugged it off.

"Don't we have a paling or something to keep that from happening?" I responded to the comment about demons.

"Oh!  Before I'm too distracted by the festivities..." Bunnie dug into her kimono and fished out a Jangese envelope which she handed to Asriel with both hands with her head bowed, all formal like.

"Your otoshidama for the year."

"I'm not too old for that am I?" Asriel joked with a chuckle before accepting. "Arigato, sensei."

"Don't spend it all in one place, goat son." Violet grinned with a wink.

"Otowhat?" Lulu asked.

Suddenly Nikita.

"Otoshidama is a monetary allowance given at the beginning of the year, in Jangese culture." She explained. It still freaked people out when she appeared out of nowhere without warning. More so than Bunnie. But now we knew how she did it.

"No, even I know that serpent. Tell me. How often have any of you ever seen Chameleon hold back his opinions?" The Black denounced Ripper's explanation.

"Maybe he's still trying to figure out something appropriately severe enough." Isabelle shrugged.

"How hard do you think he'd want to make of an impact if he just backed up and said "Eh, I don't feel like it right now"?" Black questioned.

Well, maybe he hoped it would give you time to think about that.

"Or maybe the third punishment is to make you worry about it for an entire year."

"...that's actually pretty ingenious." I reasoned.

I'm going to cut off the conversation before Violet would turn it to NSFW. Suffice to say it involved Al Dente.

In all the excitement Isabelle was the first to remember it was Mitzi's birthday.

Isabelle noogied Mitzi a bit. "Happy birthday, mouse."

Mitzi didn't even mind that it was messing her perfect hair. "Thanks, Izzy."

Well with this last high note, I think I'm going to leave things off here and say that it was a great last hurrah of the year and a great way to start the year off.

But the next day that was when the reports came in that alerted me...that we were losing ground in the Crossover Wars. It came as a shock but not nearly as hard hitting as what was to come.

After all those worlds we'd helped, it looked like Chaopolis had managed to succeed at making their plans come to pass right under our noses. And many worlds were falling while many others had already fell.

"...what!?  How could this have happened?"

"S.T.C. Outposts were destroyed at each targeted location.  Completely blown out of the water."

As the bad news started to trickle in, it was too late for me to say I had a bad feeling. The feeling was justified and my fears were unfolding before me.

I looked dismally at the list of worlds in VideoLand that were now under Chaopolis control...and some which were outright destroyed.

"Power Blade?  Panic Restaurant?  Dynatron City!?  Whomp Em'?" I looked in other sectors. "That's the world of Blue Gender...no...s-CRY-ed, too?  Wait...Sword Art Online: Alicization just...!...and that one's--!"

A lot of anime worlds were under siege. By the time we'd get there it would be too late.

It was when I got to one of Dr. Faraday's territories that it really sunk in. Then Dr. Persephone barely escaped one of her own assignments. And even Dr. Nicodimus reported heavy causalities under his watch. When Dr. Archimedes came to me begging for help regarding a nano-mechanical plague that Dr. Eggman had wrought upon most of the populace of STH-IDW-001...that was when I started like I was losing pieces of myself inside. While not explicitly called "Mobius", this was a Sonic AU. What I believed was a successor dimension to what I had left behind when ACM-002 had ceased to exist...and now my biggest fan and most respected STC coworker was about to lose his own blue hedgehog world.

I'd soon learn that Chaopolis was successfully recruiting a lot of the enemies we had beaten down even before the Crossover Wars. A lot of names on that list I thought we left behind. From minor ones who were barely any threat like Dick Dastardly and Muttly...to Megabyte of Mainframe and Mallanox who'd we'd thwarted with the Eagle Riders and the Silverhawks.

I should have seen the signs when I got a message from the Bat Computer warning about Dr. Jonathan Crane going missing from Gotham. And sightings of not one but TWO Shredders fighting for control of New York. But the real shocker was when Donatello emailed Violet saying that their lair had been destroyed and they had retreated to a new location.

It was like that AU, TMNT-1990 all over again. Only there was no garbage truck waiting for the leader of the Foot Clan at the bottom of a fall off a building.

I got a call from Ray Stantz next informing us that Sam Hain was still on the loose. Not to mention other headaches from their past...namely the People Busters of Boo York.

And more kept piling up.

"It's like VideoLand all over again." Asriel commented.

"No.  It's worse." I had a bad feeling.

I was getting emergency calls from the Phoenix Foundation explaining that their entire server farm was lost. I received word from Coral Harbor that despite putting the kibosh on Evox...something was very wrong in town and it wasn't the loss of an entire tower worth of Morph-X. Robotron attacks were starting up all over again, despite the portal to the Cyber Dimension being closed off and despite both of Evox's avatars being destroyed.

About the only places that weren't getting hit were the Institute of Future Technology and Hill Valley itself...and Kadic Academy. Violet doubled down on things at Kadic just in case, while I made sure to put Hill Valley on lockdown.

I'd also recently gotten a garbled message from the future. While I could make out very little, I did learn of the most un-excellent passing of Rufus. What little I could make of the rest of the message contained the code phrase "Face the Music".

"We'll fix this.  We did it before and we can do it again."

I nodded to Asriel....but I really should have told him that I had a feeling...a feeling that things weren't going to go our way...

Sub-Entry 362: "Making it Personal."
The losses piling up in our allied territories in time and space was a bitter pill. And it was about to get chased down with castor oil.

The first instance came when Violet's finances--the finances which drove our operation and many others off world--hit a...snag.

Violet assured she'd straighten it out. She never lost a legal or financial battle before and she wasn't about to start now.

This unfortunately was the prelude to something that I thought I had buried deep in the past. All of the enemies we had made on our home turf.

Starting with...

Gadget gasped as her eyes went wide; she dropped the box of gears and parts.

"You...!"

"Yes.  Me.  How lovely for you to remember."

It was like looking into a mirror...a mirror that wasn't smiling back...rather it was scowling with a look of hate.

This story...this story I had told Asriel a long time ago. A bad experience my little sister had with her own doppelganger in the world.

A doppelganger that tried to replace her and steal her life to escape her own life...her own responsibilities...her own boredom.

I'd had the UCIAT founders take every legal measure they could to distance Gadget from her and lock that bad memory away.

But lo and behold...she found her way back. Yeah. That girl. That tropical tribal princess with a heart of ice and a Hybrid Ability to match.

Luwhiney.

By the time I reached Gadget following her unfinished text message on the emergency channel, I found her frozen in ice!

"Azzy!"

"On it!"

"She's still alive." Lupe assured me.

"Oh my god...who...!"

The Taiyoudamas were enough to set her free and warm her up.

"Who did this to you?"

"She...she's back..." Gadget looked up at me with sad, terrified eyes.

"Oh no..." I didn't have to ask who. I KNEW that expression. That scared, hurt expression.

"Your evil twin is back..." I gripped my fist, remembering how she hid her ice hybrid ability well.

For the rest of the day, Gadget wouldn't leave my side or let go of my arm.

My blood was boiling...and it was only going to raise a few degrees higher when the next encounter took us to Rock-Afire Pizza...the very next day.

"You!" Mitzi snapped as she recognized Pasqually and Jasper T. Jowls.

The band members who had booted Dook Larue and Beach Bear out as drummer and guitarist when the Make-Believe Band kicked the Rock-Afire Explosion to the Curb.

"Let's'n not make this harder than it has to be." Jasper's southern drawl warned.

"You've-a got something the Big C wants." Pasqually brandished the rolling pin.

Mitzi already had the Green Pistols aimed.

"You can march yourself back to my ex and tell him no deal."

"I was hoping you'd say that..." came a voice from behind before Mitzi found herself slammed in the back of the head so hard that she flew over the counter and into the tables and chairs with a crash.

When she pushed herself up to look up at her attacker.

"...guess what?  You're boyfriend...ex-boyfriend's back and now YOU'RE gonna be in trouble.  Hey-lah.  Hey-lah.  My boyfriend's back."

"Helen..." Mitzi managed to get out before the high-top sneaker dug itself into the back of her neck.

"As tempting as it is to put you out...you're going to want to watch this..."

By the time Asriel and I got there with Gadget reluctantly behind me...

"Oh my gods...!" I looked at the ruination.

Rock-Afire Pizza was in shambles and torn to pieces.

"Ouch!" Asriel jerked his hand back from the dark but glowing neon purple construct still lodged in the door.

"It's like--"

"Dark matter." Mitzi groaned as she dragged herself out the door, barely hanging onto its hinges.

"That's...her hybrid ability...the opposite of my own control over light."

"Who?"

Mitzi slapped down a torn poster of a hybrid hen in a purple cheerleader outfit with a grossly oversized autograph on it.

"Helen Annagrey Henny." Asriel snarled, angrily. "Your old rival.  The one who--"

"Stole my ex-boyfriend, stole our band, stole our fame, stole our fortune, and stole our dignity among other rotten things." Mitzi's eyes were bloodshot and she looked beaten up pretty bad.

"He's coming for Rock-Afire Pizzeria...and he's suing."

"He can't do that!" Gadget protested.

"It's like the King Cousins used to sing in that one cover song.  "Money Talks and Cash is King."...unfortunately it's truer than I wanted to believe."

We helped Mitzi up.

"There's no court in the world for people like them..." Mitzi frowned.

"We'll help you through this.  I promise." Asriel held her hands.

It wasn't long before...

"Coming soon...Scapelli Enterprises Corporate Plumbing Emporium!?" I read the notices and posters plastered all over the Walrus Brothers' building...in EXCESSIVE degree.

"What the Hell, man!?" Skeeter yelled.

"This...this isn't right.  How'd he find us way over--"

We turned at that moment to hear someone making tick-tock noises from the window of a stretched limo. And sure enough a man in a fancy Valendian suit was pointed to his watch before making an "I've got a huge wad of cash between my fingers" gesture.

The window rolled up and away it drove after I caught the whiff of a cigar and the fading sound of smug cackling.

Asriel's cell phone went off.

"Aunt Sally." He gasped.

We raced to the recently built electronics emporium, boasting a pretty sizeable jumbo-tron TV in the window. One large enough to draw our attention as Team Copy Cat had a triple announcement, bragging that the era of Team Acorn was over and that a whole new wave of flawless victories was headed their way...on top of that now they were releasing a fashion line that was going to stomp the competition--mainly Honey Cat--into the gutter, and they were further going on tour in an unprecedented joining with the hottest act in Technopolis...one which heavily put Willamina's pop stardom on blast.

Team Acorn was present...and all three shaking with rage...especially since it seemed like people were actually buying into the hyper.

"I'm going to strangle Kool Kitty with his own skinny neck tie!" Wille's knuckles were cracking.

"That bloated hairball!" Honey's fur was standing on end.

But the real kicker was Sally's head photoshopped onto a chilidog with the words "hot dog water" coming down in an endless rain.

"War has been declared, girls." Sally's eyes were burning like coals.

And then there was the vandalism at Gaia's Navel which level Lupe huddled up in a ball, surrounded by her animals...that almost all seemed to be...crying.

And when I saw the barrels of improperly disposed toxic waste tossed around...that was when I could FEEL her heart breaking.

It was then I noticed the reams and reams of computer paper all over the ground. I picked on up and found questionably legal documentation by a lot of names Asriel and I recognized.

"Hoggish Greedley!" I hissed.

"Dr. Barbara "Babs" Blight." Asriel followed up.

"Sly Sludge." Bunnie narrowed her eyes.

"Dr. Duke Nukem?!" Sally about ripped the paper from my hands.

"Verminous Scumm." Violet finished.

The Big Five. As in Big Five Eco-Terrorists/Criminals from Captain Planet's home world. How'd they find their way to ours!?"

"This will not stand.

This was just the beginning, we'd find out.

Sub-Entry 363:  "Our Rivals Show No Mercy"
By now they were coming out of the woodwork. They had smelled the blood...they had smelled the weakness. They were all too eager to strike while we were wounded.

Gadget's experience with Luwhiney had let her in a state of fear and anxiety.

Mitzi was fuming over Helen Henny finding her way to her new home AGAIN and daring to threaten legal action over the return of mis-appropriated Showbiz Pizza place assets and properties she intended to prove rightfully belonged to C.E.C. Entertainment and by extension her and Mitzi's ex-boyfriend. This came after the announcement of discontinuing all animatronics in all shows; a move which signaled the end of an era.

Rotor had no idea what to do now that Scapelli Industries was primed to buy their family business out  or leave their home in South Plumbington to the banks to repossess before selling off the property to some lucky bidder...which they assured would be Scapelli Industries.

With Team Copy Cat breathing down her neck, Sally had to be the level-headed one as Willie was facing down concert appearances canceled due to their manager's questionably legal actions and Honey now dealing with a boycott of her entire fashion line.

It was a nightmare for everyone even remotely close to me, on and off world.

I don't know how Chaopolis pulled this off, but I know they had everything to do with this.

Bunnie crumpled the letter addressed to her from Jang.

"Bad news?"

"Yakuza." She replied.

Ugh. For generations none had dared to intrude upon the Rabbotou Clan's Shiba Temple.

"Violet?"

"Dealing with massive global cyber-attacks on top of trying to untangle the mess that the Tokugawa assets are in. Worse news is...Jerry Attrick resurfaced."

"The one who pledged his loyalty to former Prime Minister Seymore Cheese? The one who originally headed the village that spawned the Gorgonzola gang of Ninja Crows?"

"One and the same. And he's out for blood over the death of the Big Cheese and vowing to plunge Little Tokyo into a black Hell the likes has never been seen.  He put a hit out on Good Bird...or...whatever he's calling himself now.  The leader of the splinter faction of Ninja Crows we met that drove off Attrick's faction."

"They're clipping our wings, Bunnie."

"He knows no shame."

"So it IS Adonis."

"He's not exactly covering his tracks."

"There's that narcissism that I despise." I crossed my arms. "The real stinger is that there's not much we can do to fight back."

"There's a way to.  We just have not found it yet."

I looked up at the sky.

"The problem is...they're heaping the bad news onto us faster than we can deal with the bad news we already have...faster than we can recover and start to do damage control.  This morning, Scott was approached by Vorostovian intelligence...moments before he was ambushed outside of town by what appears to be another quantum being.  For years Scott was assured he was the only one and that his kabuki appearance was merely a fluke made possible by his ancestry......but thanks to Rotor's help, we've determined there actually may BE a conspiracy that goes much deeper."

"We try to move on from our past...but our past sometimes doesn't give us a choice."

"And in that lack of a choice, our decisions just don't seem to matter.  I'm starting to think that there's even a connection to DeltaRune."

"Do not start getting paranoid, now, Commander."

"Starting to?  I've been paranoid for a long time, now, Major.  We're on top of a metaphorical super-volcano that erupts every so many thousand years.  And guess how long it's been since the last eruption?"

"Do not start confusing science articles on the internet as genuine without hard evidence.  Gadget has already made that mistake before."

"Dually noted.  Speaking of little sister...is she doing any better?"

"If there's one constant around town, it is that Asriel has been everyone's crutch to lean on during these hard times."

I nodded.

"Commander...you have that look.  You believe that we've all started relying on him too much and we're setting him up to collapse if--"

"Not if.  When.  When Adonis strikes at him.  And me."

Bunnie frowned.

"I dislike house of cards analogies."

It wasn't long before Chameleon stormed up to me.

"Sparks...you're responsible." He thrust the number of canceled contracts into my face. I immediately recognized Chaopolis' emblem.

"They hit me in the wallet.  That's my bread and butter they're 'effing with.  And you know that pisses me off.  And when I get pissed off somebody has to answer for this.  They're you're problems.  Start fixing them or this WILL affect our friendship.  It's already affected our professional relationship.  Do we have an understanding?"

"Loud and clear."

And before long other allies of ours were coming to us but a little less abrasively.

"...and they're threatening to turn me over to immigration!" Foxy protested. "I became a citizen of this bloomin' town LEGALLY!  Queen Brooke has personally handled my work visa up until I could get permanent citizenship!  Tis' a daft move by no-good snakes-in-the-grass!"

Drew voiced his complaints after enough bogus complaints orchestrated by Chaopolis forced Harbor Patrol to suspend all of his naval licenses PLUS he was being investigated by an agency regarding his demolition license supposedly in the name of "national security". A likely story.

And still more of our allies were being hit and looking to us for answers.

It was starting to get to Violet who felt like our loyalties were now in question. To her it almost seemed insulting that the blame was falling on us and not our enemies. Rotor suggested that maybe the smear campaign went higher up that we thought. I even considered maybe they were under the influence of spells or even that psychoreactive mood slime from my mentor's outing against Vigo the Carpathian.

Whatever the case was, Chaopolis wasn't just attacking us, they were making it personal and hitting us where it hurt. And they were spreading plenty of fake news and straining a lot of friendships and alliances.

We were under siege.

No matter how much I resisted the urge to assume that it couldn't get much worse, Adonis had already read my mind and served up another "stack of suck".

Here we were and the year was tanking.

I keep in mind the wisdom of Captain Blue, and by extension Viewtiful Joe that there always has to be a plot twist; that means something has to go wrong before you get to the happy ending.

And boy oh boy...we were getting "wrong" in spades.

"They're just toying with us at this point." I muttered to myself.

They could pull the trigger any time. So what was stopping them?

Simple answer? We weren't suffering enough. I knew Adonis was crazy enough to pull a REAL jerk move out of his hat at any time. I just had no idea what that could be. I knew it would come the moment he saw an open spot.

Fact was we were all off balance and who could say when we should be guarding, counterattacking, or retreating?

"Are we even pushing back in any way?  I'd even been satisfied if we were slowing them down just as comfort."

"There is still hope.   Archimedes passed along a message from...some outsider from another universe that knows you."

"Outsider?  From another universe?"

Thinking back to years and years past...that was pretty vague. But...there...was something. Something in the old days...something during the time of...no...it couldn’t' date back to when Universal City was still around...could it?

"That could be anyone." I shrugged it off. In retrospect, I wish I hadn't. For in looking much further ahead in this adventure...this would definitely become relevant before our war with Chaopolis came to an end.

"So.  Anything to the message?"

"A lot of it was pretty scrambled and Archimedes is still trying to fix it.  He was able to make out two words...sounds like something fan-made, though.  Must be an anime fan"

"Fan-made?" I started to head toward the lab.

"Yeah.  Gundam Silverbolt--"

"...!!!!!!!!!"  My eyes widened and my jaw dropped and I stopped in midstep. Impossible.

"Where...did that transmission come from?"

"Point of origin unknown but...Archimedes traced the last echo of it from a relay unit on planet Gunsmoke--"

Immediately I got another echo in my memories. An echo of a man with a 60 billion double-dollar bounty on his head...but that reference was most certainly a code-word.

"There was one more thing...there was a watermark on a partially recovered image.  It looked like an Autobot with a name imprinted under him.  Must be a fan of the 1986 movie, but...it was misspelled."

"Misspelled?"

"Yeah.  Rhodimus Prime--"

That clinched it. My distant past had caught up to me. And honestly...it was the grandest of all hopes and a long shot longer than anything. If it was true...then the old triumvirate wasn't as dead as I thought. Our universes...then went separate ways after...the event.

But if this was a message from...him? Then the other of the two surviving alliance of the big three universes had become aware what was happening in the UltraVerse.

Truth be told...I don't know why this memory didn't trigger back when Adonis banished us to...but I wonder...?

Yeah...things were so bad that old memories were starting to stir and maybe...just maybe--

"Volt...what's...going on?"

"..."

"Oh.  I see...something...that personal in your past, isn't it?"

I looked over my shoulder and gave a closed-eyes nod.

"I'm...not ready to know the whole truth about that, yet, am I?"

"Let's not heap another big secret onto the promise, okay?"

Why was it so hard to keep more baggage from being heaped on.. This is not how you maintain friendships and trust.

"Volt....how shaky a ground are we on, right now?"

"I see serious things on the horizon, Goat Son.  And each one is going to get far worse than the last.  Maybe..."

Dead silence.

"There's a lot more bad news inbound according to Dr.  Persephone.  We're trying to re-establish contact with Project: A.L.I.C.I.Z.A.T.I.O.N. but--"

"Yeah.  I get it.  I'll put Violet on it when she has a moment.  Provided her buffer funding holds out."

"Alpha 5 had more bad news to report...apparently...Tommy's forfeited his morpher..."

I sensed a really big kick to the stomach coming.

"...to the leader of the Foot Clan." Asriel looked...really down by that info. He didn't know Tommy that well...but this wasn't helping his faith in the Green Ranger. But that led me to the conclusion I really didn't want to arrive at.

"Oh god...a Shredder Ranger?" I was horrified by how Oroku Saki could corrupt the Green Ranger power. And then I remembered...the Green Power coin had a history of being used for evil. The memory of Rita Repulsa's spell over Tommy Oliver still echoed in my memories to this day.

"Okay...time out, Goat Son.  Please tell me there's a silver lining to all this crap raining down on us."

That earned a momentary look of reassurance with a nod.

"Scrooge McDuck is already on auxiliary funding."

"A spark of good news."

"Kitty's working overtime straightening the legal matters out."

"Anything else?"

"Nothing else to report...but it isn't good on the home front or our allies.  And yeah...worse news on the horizon.  They're not letting up on us...professionally or personally.  Violet didn't want to tell you but..."

"Chaopolis is DOX-ing us again.  And not just dimensional coordinates.  Am I right?"

"Nikita reports they've...acquired a large amount of classified information from various Cryptosmasher hubs...and older UCIAT archives."

"Decades of anti-terrorist and counter-intelligence reports on the Dark Web.  It's a freakin' road map to any would-be criminal wanting to reverse-engineering our operation."

This conversation kept see-sawing back and forth between what we had going for us...and what we had going against us. And boy oh boy the latter was overwhelmingly greater when you summed it all up.

No mercy. That is what we were seeing.

And as it turned out...the next stunt Adonis pulled was even less merciful, begging the question:  How do you show even less mercy when you're being shown none to begin with?

He found a way. And it was a doozy. Boy oh boy was it a doozy...

The promise was more endangered than ever.

Sub-Entry 364: "A Goat Mom Lost on Our World":
Doing damage control was a full time job for us. Kitty was fighting tooth and nail on all of the legal cases that she had taken on from our town alone. And it was still getting uglier.

Granted, Adonis had crossed some serious lines daring to mess with us like this. But he was about to do something that just absolutely made my blood boil.

I'd worked so hard to prepare Frisk for one last game. I'd arranged the Boss Monsters' scenarios to make them as fair as the game would allow without Madam Fate screwing things up again. I'd taken as many redundant steps as I could to keep every inch of the Underground under my watchful eye such that Chaopolis couldn't pick their noses without me knowing it first-hand.

And yet...they slipped one by me. And not a small thing, oh no... This one...was pretty major.

When Alphys made the call, I knew it wasn't a pleasure call. No. I could sense it. I could feel it. I just know it was coming...but I didn't know what "it" was.

Adonis was about to sabotage all our hard work in Undertale. But what could he do that was so--

"D-D-Doctor!  Th-th-thank g-g-goodness I got in c-c-contact with you."

"You're stuttering worse than usual, Alphys." I'd gotten to a covert area away from Asriel and anyone else I didn't want this leaking to.

"I-It took a l-l-long time b-but I finally g-g-got cameras inside the R-RUINS.  D-don't ask me h-h-how I d-d-d-d-did it it."

"Spare me the details.  What's this regarding?"

"For a while I k-kept tabs on th-the Queen, j-j-just to watch out for y-your enemy.  I d-d-didn't really th-think he'd dare to m-make contact with Flowey an t-time soon but...b-better safe than s-s-sorry."

"Alphys...I don't like where this is going."

"It's j-j-just that....I c-c-can't f-find her."

"What?" I blanched.

"I...I've been r-replaying the security tapes and I c-c-can't figure out wh-when and h-how she disappeared.

Oh no.

No.

No no no no no no!

If Adonis did what I think he just did...then this was one of the WORST things he could do to UTPR-3235!

I charged off toward UCIAT HQ, maintaining contact with Alphys.

"Has anything shown up on the incursion logs?"

"I'm s-s-sorry, b-b-but there's nothing recorded by any of the instruments."

"How much h of the security tapes have you been through?"

"I'm still combing through them and--"

Alphys broke off suddenly.

"Oh gods...!"

"Alphys?"

"I th-th-think I can c-c-c-confirm the point in which she was abducted."

"A cyber-portal?"

"Yeah.  It's s-s-so r-red and ch-chaotic."

Alphys switched over to her monitor, patching my T.A.O. link into it. Sure enough...a red cyber portal behind Toriel's chair as she was minding her own business, reading.

I'd recognize those twisted clawed wolf hands anywhere.

"Adonis!" I snarled, moments before he dragged Toriel in, chair and all; clamping her muzzle shut in the process. Not that anyone in the RUINS would hear her.

"That clinches it."

"Th-this is terrible!"

Okay. I had two scenarios the gauged how much time I had to fix this. The first scenario was that Frisk had already come and gone and left Toriel to her lonesome. This gave me the most amount of time to work with. But it still meant I had to get her back or she'd never show up with the others after reaching the Barrier room. It was her who'd knock Asgore off his feet and stop the fight before it even began. So yeah...this was a big deal.

Scenario two was that Frisk HADN'T actually reached Toriel's house yet which gave me a much more limited amount of time to work with time passing on both sides. Of course I could circumvent this, being a time traveler...but it would also leave me with a lot more mess to clean up, regardless. And frankly...I didn't like the idea of Frisk arriving to Toriel's house to find it abandoned. Not sure she'd know what to do if something this major was out of place.

And then there were a whole bunch of other complications I could think of, too numerous to list. Yet, each was a problem that risked screwing up this last chance to get a happy ending for everyone out of it.

"Okay....think, Volt.  Where would he have taken her?"

"I-I-Is there anything I c-c-c-can d-do, Doctor?"

"From where you are now, Alphys?  Unlikely.  Best you can do is keep in touch.  Contact me only if absolutely necessary.  I'll call you when I've got more info.  Arcade out."

"G-g-good luck!"

Connection terminated.

"Okay, Allouicious...what would be the absolute worse place you could take her to 'eff with me?"

And that's when I passed by a TV shop where plasma screens were being demo'ed in the window. That's when I saw Prisma's news report; delivered live by her camera rabite, Wrench. Yes, that Wrench.

"...breaking news from the center of the commercial district where traffic is in chaos at an intersection.  I'm on the scene as an unknown hybrid or abhuman is at the center of it all."

No. Oh Hell no...

"Adonis...you really did it this time...!"

He could. He would. He did. After so many times of letting Evil-Chara loose in our dimension...to our world...our planet...now he had the keys to our door and dropped Toriel right in the middle of it.

This. Was. Bad.

Just. Bad.

I'm pretty sure I don't need to explain why, but just for the sake of argument it was like this:  Toriel was on OUR world. Toriel was technically on the surface. Toriel was lost and alone with tons of things to question. Toriel WAS AMONG HUMANS. LOTS OF HUMANS. And of course those humans were intermixed with all kinds of non-humans and such who I was ten-billion percent convinced she'd mistake to be monsters.

All this was waaaay to much to take in.

With things already volatile...the worst thing I could do was swoop in and get her out of there. Why? Simple answer is two-fold. One: because I'd have to answer to a lot of people in town, including our queen, just what the heck I'm doing. And two, and far more dangerous to everything I'd work for: I'd be in a position where I'd have a LOT to explain to Toriel. She'd pressure me to answer questions that were difficult to answer, that were uncomfortable to answer, and which I couldn't answer.

I was going to treat this as my mentor's advice about the future: no one can know too much about their own future. And technically...this was a future that even I didn't consider. At no point did I ever consider a moment where I'd bring the Boss monsters to our world. Even after the happy ending. Even after...after what I was trying NOT to admit to myself at this point came to pass.

"Okay.  Toriel has met the majority of my action team.  I can't send anyone human after her, especially Scott and Callista, either.  So...who do I have left that's my best bet?"

The fastest on the scene would be the other parts of Team Acorn--Willamina and Honey. If they arrived in tengu suit and made sure not to have their OGPX emblems showing, the risk would be minimized but still there. There was a chance she could connect them to Sally.

Another possibility was Felicia. And probably a good choice if I explained really carefully to our cat woman what to do and what not to do. And especially what NOT to say.

Plus there were other allies I could turn to who weren't human that might be able to assist.

Asking for Chameleon's help could possibly cost me, but it'd be worth it. By extension, Valkyrie and Dragonius were reliable allies of his to turn to. Annnnd...if I REALLY wanted to take my chances, I'd bite the bullet and trust Ripper to get the job done. Oh, I had no doubt he could succeed...what I doubted was that he could succeed without crashing something or causing a huge spectacle that would upgrade this from going from local news to national news...possibly world news. I did not need Toriel's face all over the media--

Oh crap!

"Violet!  I need a favor, and quick!  I'll explain later but it might cost Prisma a bit of her professional journalist reputation and might get her mad at me later on...but if I learned anything from Section 9 Public Security and the practices of Daisuke Aramaki?  It's that the most effective tool in your toolkit when taking an active approach to information control and anti-terrorism is the news media blackout.  I couldn't risk Asriel seeing his biological mother's image on TV or the internet in any way."

"You don't have to remind me, boss man.  Just tell me your order and I'll have it out  faster than an Amazon Prime quadcopter drone."

"Don't name-drop for commercial-plugging, Vi.  I'm going to start limiting your knowledge of Earth worlds if you keep this up."

I explained fast. She clammed up and turned serious at that point. And took it as a special initiative to get back at Adonis.

I contacted Bunnie next. Probably should have contacted her first but getting control of the immediate problem took priority. I explained and had her relay my orders and instructions to everyone. But most of all...

"I will personally keep Asriel isolated from Toriel-sama's position.  Once you have someone intercept her, we'll have her tagged with a GPS signal."

"Affirmative.  And let me make this very clear, Bunnie..."

The biggest thing for any of my crew to not let on was the most obvious thing in the world. Do not, under ANY circumstance drop so much as a vague clue about Asriel much less his existence on our world. This was a game-breaker--the bad kind--and the equivalent of a massive cheat on our part. Everything had to stay convoluted. Everything had to stay as we planned it. I

I'd worry about fixing Toriel's memories once she was out of trouble.

Once I finished making my instructions and my conditions very clear and very much immutable...

"As you command." Bunnie agreed with me ten-billion percent.

And so I had 2/3's of Team Acorn head to the scene, while instructing anyone else who had been to Undertale...to Mount Ebott...to the whole of the Underground keep their distance from Toriel until we could get this contained.

Now for the other issue...how do we keep Asriel in the dark? This...was another secret to keep from him but it tied into the Promise. That's after all what Adonis was attacking. Our sacred promise.

"Do what you have to do, Major.  But don't let him figure out what's going on.  And don't be seen by Toriel."

"And most obvious of all...don't let him be seen by Toriel." Anyone with common sense didn't need me to explaining this. This was an instance where I couldn't exactly show not tell so...

Really, was this an appropriate time to start nit-picking this log? At a time like this.

Both 'Windshear' and 'Flametrail' deployed at sonic speed. And it was a good thing they did.

Border patrol was on site and they were getting close to calling in the Mage Academy to deal with her fire magic...possibly the royal guard.

Though in all fairness...Toriel hadn't actually attacked anyone...but it was only a matter of time before her warning flames caused property damage.

"...this...this cannot be...!  What is this place!  Have I...made it to the surface!?  I do not understand!"

Toriel clutched the fireballs in her hands, shifting her aim from target to target, but still holding her fire.

"Ma'am I need you to calm down!" Hyperion of the border patrol was on scene. I really hated something like this getting dumped in his lap. Mitzi, Violet, and I were just as guilty as anyone for giving him a hard time and commenting behind his back about his...personality quirks while he was once one of Bunnie's students. And...a bit of an overly-dedicated and overly-loyal one at that. Bunnie had forbidden us from making light of his moments of him being a bit of a sycophant during those times, but his heart was always in the right place. Plus...he'd got better. Mostly.

"Humans...!  There are humans here...!" Toriel was overwhelmed and on high alert. "And...Monsters walk among them, too?  Has the barrier been broken?!"

These were the questions I'd have to deal with. Than any of us who'd met her would have to deal with. And even those who hadn't probably would.

Right now things were optimal for us to snatch her up, neurolize her, and get her back home...and hopefully her recliner, too. That would cause a bit of a "plot hole" if I left that detail out.

"...media blackout...now." Violet clicked the enter key.

"What the...!" Prisma's earpiece went to static as her contact with her news staff and bosses suddenly cut off.

"And censoring Toriel's images in real time."

Thankfully, Wrench's rabite-cam hadn't gotten a clear image of Toriel or the DeltaRune on her robes. In fact any images that did get through were too blurry to make out while the rabite's camera was attempting to auto-focus.

"Make the rescue!" I commanded as the high-speed, shrill whine of Honey and Willie's suit turbines provided an audible smokescreen, while their respective red and yellow light-beam contrails drew split second attention away for them to zoom in and jet Toriel out of there.

"What is this!  Unhand me this instant!"

"Relax, ma'am!  We're only here to rescue you."

"Rescue...me?  From what, my child?"

"Your fifteen minutes of fame and certain people's 15 years of regret." Honey wisecracked.

"But mostly to diffuse the situation.  You seemed to have caused a panic so...we're just getting you to somewhere safe."

"I have so many questions...but I do not know your names."

"Uh...we'll...answer what we can that's not on a need-to-know basis." Honey cringed.

"We at least owe you our names.  "I'm Willamina. Willie to my friends. And this is Honey."

"Your magic is...strange."

"Er...yeah...kinda." Willie tried to lead on. "Speed magic is...tricky."

"Where are we going?"

I trusted the two of them to think of a safehouse or safe location for them to lay low. I mean we were only hiding them from the town......annnnd this was already a slippery slope I'd been down once already when I first brought Asriel to town. I'd explain to Brooke later.

Wouldn't you know it? Chaopolis would up the ante and have some of their elites drop in on Team Acorn unannounced.

"Stay back, Toriel.  These guys are enemies."

"My child, must you fight?  There must be a better way to resolve this."

"Sorry goat gal.  These guys do not listen to reason and they don't solve things peacefully.  They've already committed countless atrocities in the name of their evil empire, Chaopolis."

"Oh my!"

At first it looked like Honey and Willie were going to win this...at least until Honey felt herself face down and pinned to the ground with a torrential-force geyser of water.

As it turned out, Chaopolis found someone in the Marvel Universe who was willing to work for the right price.

Hydro Man.

Which left Willie taken out when her Tengu Suit was disabled with an EMP disk. And then she found herself sucked into quicksand..

Yup. Super-villains came in twos.

Hello, Sand Man.

"Unngh!  Can't...move!"

"Trying...not...to drown!"

"We have to protect...Ms. Toriel...!!!"

"But we can't...protect her...and get out of...this mess at the same time--"

That was when one of Sally's Zeus Thunderbolts went off, followed up by one of her Ice Grenades, immobilizing Hydro Man before freezing him completely.

"What the--!"

And then came a blast of Storm Tornado, which scattered Sandman everywhere.

"Sa....er...Lightrunner?" Willie asked.

"Girls!  It's me, Felicia!  I can handle this!" Felicia removed the confiscated weapon of Storm Eagle salvaged from the Maverick Hunter storage vault to be studied at our labs. She was also carrying some of Sally's various bombs and grenades.

"Felicia, it's up to you now!  Take care of Toriel."

"Medical teams are on their way as is Dr. Lynx.  She'll get you patched up."

Sally had never name-dropped Nikita specifically, just the fact that she had an...engineer who kept her gear running.

Nevertheless, I set my plan in motion with having additional backup like Felicia standing by.

Passing Tori off to Felicia bought us some time...but not as much as we thought. It turns out Chaopolis weaves a dark web in both cyberspace and the outside world. And they'd find some headaches of Felica and Jon's past that they only wished they could forget.

"Donovan Bane, Anakaris and Lord Raptor!"

"Oh no!  Cover your--"  Willie warned too late as out came Raptor's guitar.

I wasn't at all surprised that Raptor was here making trouble. He was always seeking to usurp power from Makai World, despite always failing miserably. As a zombie that Jon had warned me about, his concerts were infamous for stealing people's souls...and for some reason both AU iterations that had been recorded in Cryptosmasher's database had a footnote of him sounding remarkably like 90's veteran voice-actor, Scott McNeil. Huh. Bit of a weird detail to put in there.

Anakaris, a pharaoh from ancient Egypt was recorded as rejecting the peace-offering of Atlantis and eventually leading his own kingdom to ruin. His resurrection hadn't done anything for his mind, considering that mummification entailed the removal and preservation of all major internal organs, so yeah...his skull was probably as empty as Al Dente's.

The one I couldn't figure out why he'd be in league with these two was Donovan Bane. Human in appearance but every bit as cursed with the Dark One's blood as any of Jon's...old acquaintances. Jon had known him as a hunter of many creatures...even his own kind, the Dark Ones. Half of the accounts had said that he had allied with Hsien-Ko (Lei-Lei) and her sister in exorcising many supernatural phenomenon, despite their fusion making them a Jiang-Xi, complete with talisman charm on the front of the hat. While the other accounts came from Felicia herself, speaking in infamy of the number of times that he had tried to hunt her down, claiming he know her soul as one of the evil ones. In Jon's own words? A load of bullocks.

So how did Chaopolis put these three together and sic them on our cat woman?

Felicia ended up passing the baton to the next ally in line--Dragonius.

"I apologize profusely for the horrible experience you are going through."

"It is...difficult to bear all this misfortune.  Yet, it is tempered by all these...strange and wonderful miracles around me.  I have seen the sun...I have walked among human and monster living in peace and equality.  So much that I have only dreamed off.  But so...right and wrong at the same time."

"M'lady, we are tested by life that our ability to survive may evolve and grow with us."

"I only wish I understood what is going on.  Why this is happening."

"I can tell you this much.  You are in the kingdom of Miranda, the land of second chances.  My allies and I of all people understand that better than anyone."

"I have...heard this phrasing before...!"

Careful, Dragonius. Don't give things--

"AARRRRRGH!!!" Dragonius went flying from one rooftop to the next as something icy had blasted him in mid-jump, also forcing him to drop Toriel.

And the form of a familiar polar bear mutant had managed to find his way to our city and even be contracted by Adonis to do his dirty work. It could only be Dr. Victor Fries...alias Mr. Freeze. Still mutated from Arkham Asylum. By now it was probably too late to undo his genetic recombination after Joker and Harley Quinn had flooded the sprinkler systems with the canister of mutagen that Shredder had given Ra's al Ghul...who in turn gave it to the most dangerous man alive in Gotham.

"If you will excuse the pun, I bear no ill will to you.  But you are the job.  And I intend to fulfill what I was hired to do."

Chaopolis was targeting our weaknesses, to boot. A fire elemental like Dragonius against a freeze ray? This fight was horribly unfair.

The howl coming out of the sky from the modified jet was a good sign that help was on the way.

"Ripper's in the hooooouse!  Robert "Ripper" Traveson was borrrrn to be wiiiiiiild!  Heheheheh!"

Okay. Violet somehow put him up to quoting Hulk Davidson from Viewtiful Joe.

The tow cable snagged around Toriel's waist as she was yanked up with a panicked yelp.

"I do not like this!  I do not like this!"

And so it was all over town, we were playing hot potato with Goat Mom...and I was hating every moment of it;  all I could think about was how we were traumatizing this poor woman as bad if not worse than anything Chaopolis was doing. And their forces were really starting to pile up.

And ours were really starting to whittle down. I knew what Adonis was doing. He was forcing my hand. Eventually I'd have no choice but to personally intervene. At this point, I was starting to feel like I was the only one who I should trust with resolving this. But I also felt...I was inviting him to make his move.

All the while, the chaos was starting to spread around the city as Adonis dropped more of his pawns and followers on the city and started a panic, with intent to stir up total bedlam.

Whether riot or panicked evacuation, he was bending the people in town to his will...and trying to corral Bunnie and Asriel toward Toriel's position...and it was working.

This reeked of Dr. Leviathan and Dr. Benedict.

"Sensei...what's going on?"

"I can only tell you so much but Chaopolis has infiltrated our town."

"What?  We have to go back and help them--"

That was when Asriel's bracer went off and Daimyou contacted him.

"Negative.  Do not engage.  This is a direct order and decree."

"But, Se...Lady Daimyou!  I don't understand!  Why can I not assist Volt--"

"I have my reasons.  I assure you they are for the best."

"But what if I'm the one they're after!  I don't want my own home town to suffer because of--"

"Please do not question my order.  Rest assured, they are for the best."

Asriel looked back and before between Bunnie and Daimyou a few times before Bunnie nodded.

Deciding to trust the present Bunnie, Asriel reciprocated.

"Okay.  I'll do as you ask."

"I am sorry that it has to be this way.  There is an important reason why you must evacuate until the danger has passed."

"But it's S-Level only."

"Yes."

"Will I...ever know the truth about this?"

"I cannot say.  For now...please go.  it is for everyone's own good, including your own."

And the transmission ended as Bunnie grabbed Asriel's hand and coaxed him into a run away from the city. Hopefully she could break through Chaopolis' blockade.

By now I'd run out of non-human allies. They even had a counter for Kid the Cat.

With Cid Padesh the last ally to be subdued, I had no choice now. It was all on me.

As Toriel backed herself into a corner, figuratively though in all fairness it might as well be literally...the Followers of Chaopolis bore down on her. She was still hesitant to defend herself...was the memory of Asriel so strong it was holding her back? Where was the gatekeeper that forced Frisk to prove she was strong enough to survive?

"Stay back!  I do not wish to harm you!"

"That makes one of us..." The leader advanced, taking out what appeared to be a Grimoire that might as well have been stolen from the Magic Knights of the Clover Kingdom.

"Binding magic...Steel--"

He didn't finish his sentence as the lightning bolt PLOWED him into the brick wall and knocked him out cold. Before his comrades could follow up, each one was struck by a lightning bolt from above, in a cascaded sequence; like dominos falling one by one.

"And stay down." I snarled as I landed in that Iron Man landing that Sally had made popular since seeing the first movie and trying it with her own Tengu Suit.

"Whomever you are, I am in your--"  Toriel gasped and placed her hands on her cheeks. "...it...it's you!"

I took a deep breath and sighed half-heartedly as I rose and stood up straight.

"Hello, Toriel.  I...really hoped we wouldn't meet...under these circumstances."

"Why are you here...!?...how are you here...!?"

"I know you wouldn't believe me if I told you it was a dream; pretty sure I was taught better to lie, anyway...so...yeah...we're not in the Underground.  That much is...pretty much obvious."

"I have so many questions--"

"And...I'm afraid I don't have many answers to give.  The ones I can...I...cannot.  I can't explain why I must withhold this information from you...but it is for the best."

"I do not understand."

"You are putting me in a difficult spot, my friend.  We can't stay around here.  The enemy is closing in and--"

"The enemy...is already here."

My eyes widened. In that moment I felt as if the world was watching and it had suddenly rotoscoped around me in a 180 degree arc, putting the focus on the one who said it.

"No...!!!" I blanched.

"Is that any way to greet an old friend...?"

"You're no friend of mine.  You're the enemy.  You're the WORST person who could be here!"

Adonis licked this fangs before twisting his maw into a disgusting grin.

"Now don't make this boring.  We can have a lot of fun with this...or you can be a spoilsport and I can still force this little game of mine to be even more fun."

There was nowhere to run to except...

"Toriel, please accept my apologies.  The first one being that I never wanted you to get mixed up in this and I'm so sorry that you got dragged in."

"My friend, I...!"

"...and the second is for this..."

I grabbed her and rocketed upward with a lightning jump that led us back to the rooftops and back down in a number of electrical ricochets before landing on the power lines and skating away at high speed.

"That-a-boy..." Adonis mused before he gave chase

"Who IS that person?"

"A horrible man who's killed many, many people--human, monster, machines with souls...you name it.  He's a total sociopath and an anarchist.  That's all I can tell you."

"Oh no...!  What a wretched creature!"

"I'm going to get us out of this, Toriel.  I promise!"

"Bless you, Volt Arcade."

"Don't bless me too soon.  I can't promise you answers.  Not now or the immediate future.  It's...just complicated."

Adonis' shots soon rang out with his weapons, dark magic, and everything else he stole from his cohorts and those he'd tricked into allying with him.

"Gaaah!" I'd never dodged like this before. Even by a danmaku bullet-Hell shooter, this was ungodly unfair. Not only was Adonis raining terror down on us, his snipers were targeting us from rooftops and from the ground level.

I pulled a risky move while carrying Toriel in my arms and spread my electromagnetic wings and attempted to glide to safe spots once I attained the altitude.

"The plan is working, Lord Adonis.  Like moths to a flame."

"We report that we were successful in diverting Rabbotou's path.  Target is with her."

"Excellent.  Now comes the big climax!  Will you be able to avert the chance meeting of a lifetime, Volt?  Or will all your hard work go up in smoke and fire...?  I wonder...hahahahahahahah....!"

I managed to land us at ground level in a spot the Followers hadn't gotten to. Unfortunately I'd brought us too closed to where people were evacuating the city.

"Oh no...it's already begun!"

"What has?"

"I can't disclose that now.  Your safety takes priority.  I am sorry but I have to think."

"You are pushing yourself too hard, dear Volt."

"I know.  But I know what I'm doing."

I don't know what the Hell I'm doing. I just needed to reassure her so this didn't get worse.

I radioed on ahead to UCIAT headquarters and ordered all human personnel on site to evacuate the building while all non-humans must stand by to receive me and a guest. It was the best long shot I could think of. UCIAT HQ had at least some kind of fail-safes to keep Adonis out. Plus the means for me to get Toriel back home.

So the big gambit began. Me vs you, Adonis. Who's plan (yours was a bit stolen, though) would pay off? Who'd have the better strategy, the greater guile, and the luck to pull it off?

"The good news is that you're no longer the hottest news story in town.  The bad news is the one that IS so, is also the one trying to capture and/or kill you."

"But I have done nothing to them--"

"Welcome to the story of every one of their victims.  And the ones who have crossed them and wronged them in their mad scheme to spread mayhem, chaos, pain, and misery across the universe only had it far worse."

"You speak from experience...what do you know of them?"

"Too much I wish I didn't and too much I can't tell about." I brushed it off.

We charged toward HQ as the masses charged past us. We were the only ones going toward the center of town.

I finally convinced Toriel to fight back, assuring that it was still called self-defense. Honestly...I felt dirty and rotten for walking her down a road that she'd condemned Asgore for...though his road had more permanent results. Certainly she'd be able to hold back with the same "love taps" she knocked Asgore off his feet with?

It was right about here that Adonis' gambit was either going to either crash and burn...or pay off resulting in everything I worked for disintegrating. For at that very moment as we were passing down the intersection, the next intersection over, Bunnie and Asriel were going in the opposite direction.

In that brief moment, I felt as if a Chrono Trigger had been used and a time freeze had gone into effect. At the very least time had slowed to a crawl in my own perception. That's how it felt, anyway.

And try as I might to determine it...I couldn't tell...

In that brief second...that moment where time stood still, Goat Mom and Goat Son were parallel to each other...and in a spot where if they turned, they'd look each other in the eyes.

But...like I said, I couldn't tell...could they see each other out of their peripheral vision?

"...???"

"...???"

But we kept going as reality snapped us back.

Toriel's expression was...a look of surprise...hinting at being disturbed...but at the same time, somehow...an unsure spark of hope.

"We can't slow down now, Toriel.  He's still after us.  We can't let that maniac catch us."

"I...I trust you...but...just now...I felt something...something inside that I thought had long died...but maybe...it was nothing."

Asriel stopped in his tracks and turned to look back down the street.

"Asriel-kun...what is it?"

"...I guess nothing.  But for a moment...I had a feeling...a familiar feeling.  Something...or someone I felt I knew.

I was sure we were in the clear. We dodged a bullet. Adonis'  big gamble and his followers had failed to bring us all together. As it turned out, the crowds were just too much for them to intercept their targets.

So Lady Destiny WAS looking out for us, after all. I'd regret assuming that sooner than I'd know.

From above a rooftop, Adonis sloooow, sarcastically clapped.

"Bravo, Volt.  It seems luck was on your side this time.  Disappointing.  So I'll have to--

That was when he felt it slice into the back of his knees.

"...speak of the demon and she shall appear."

"Demon?  No.  Death?  Maybe.  Alas, I still have my doubts that even I can kill you." Soul Reaper Chara let the blood drip off her un-summoned Zanpakutou.

"Just what did you intend to do with my mother and my brother?"

"You are a spoil sport, aren't you?"

As it turned out Chara wasn't alone, either.

"You can babble all you want..." Violet cocked the Broiler microwave cannon that she still had from our stint with Providence.

".....but we're not going to let you get away with this." Sally had already activated her FRENZY W.I.S.P. and it was looking to devour Adonis whole.

"Heheheheheheh...HAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!" Adonis opened his eyes to an unhealthy level of wide as his expression turned crazed.

Meanwhile, we got to UCIAT headquarters.

We were honest-to-goodness home free.

I collapsed against the wall of the elevator and slid down covering my face and just letting off a bit of stress with the deepest of moans and sighs.

"Volt...you got us away from that horrible experience.  I feel...I was right to trust you.  So...I will respect your wishes and not ask questions about things I do not understand.  That I...might not be meant to understand."

"I want to explain so much...but doing so would cause more harm than good...it would only ask more questions than it would answer...and....honestly, I'd be betraying a promise I made to someone."

Was I vague enough.

"I understand.  I...had someone make a promise to me...a promise that they did not like making but...gave me their word they'd keep it."

Sans.

"Where are we going now?"

"To find our way back home." I answered, knowing it only prompted more questions."

I led past the staff who were murmuring among themselves.

"Toriel, I appreciate you giving me the benefit of the doubt in all this.  I tried to avoid all this but I can't.  All things considering, I am grateful you didn't make it any harder on me to do what I had to do."

"I owe you that much and more.  You have been a guiding light since we met."

"Yeah...I guess so."

I lead on through the labs until we got to the Gateway Room.

"Here we are....the way back to the RUINs."

"Then this experience is finally behind us.  I thank you, Volt Arcade."

"You didn't make it any harder on me for what I had to do...but that doesn't make it any easier for what I have to do next."

"Doctor?  What do you mean?"

"Toriel.  I need you to accept my apology."

"Apology?  For what?"

"For this." And I brought out the Neuralizer, as I put on my dark sunglasses and clicked on it..

* FLAAAAAAAAASH*

Toriel's eyes went glazed before she collapsed into my arms, unconscious.

"It was said before and I will say it now...this was all just a bad dream..."

Hours later...

"...!!!!"  Toriel awoke in her recliner, her reading glasses on and the book dropped to the floor.

"Oh my!  What a strange nightmare...and yet...I...cannot recall what happened in it.  How unusual.  I have never had a dream that faded this quickly."

And so life went on for her like nothing had ever happened.

I'd taken great pains to cover it up and both Daimyou and KOMMAND had taken greater pains in kicking Chaopolis off our world. In the end Adonis retreated.

"I can't believe it...he actually destroyed my FRENZY W.I.S.P. from the inside..." Sally looked at the latent sparkles of unstable energy, collapsing upon itself until it fizzled completely.

"And he stopped my bankai from landing...with his bare hand even...!" Chara sheathed her blade.

"I've heard of back-door cheats and debug modes...but that scumbag pretty much put himself into god mode.   Whatever game he's playing, he's completely broken it.  And I SO hate it..." Violet narrowed her eyes.

"This was just a warm-up act." I realized. "Something much bigger is coming very soon...and I'm scared out of my wits."

A while later Asriel found me outside of UCIAT HQ.

"Volt!  I got here as soon as I could!  The moment they lifted the evacuation...huh?  Volt?  Are you okay?  You look like you said a permanent good-bye to a life-long friend."

"No...not permanent...but yeah...a pretty good friend.  I'll...talk about it someday when I'm up to it.  It...really opened a lot of old wounds that are...too personal to get into."

"I'll respect your privacy.  After the ordeal you must've had, it's the least I can do."

"How about you?  You have any trouble--"

"No.  It was...well...it was what it was.  I'm sure Daimyou had her reasons."

"Yeah.  She'll...probably tell me some day."

"But...you have S-Class clearance--"

"Even the Empress of Time and Space keeps secrets from me."

"Ohh...I see."

From there the day just seemed...lukewarm and in the grip of a malaise that I really didn't want to understand...but I knew full well what it was. I was looking into the abyss...and the abyss was looking right back at me.

What horrible thing were you going to do next, Adonis?

Sub-Entry 365: "The X-Vault Destroyed.  What Memories Can Be Salvaged?"
"...you've really been on edge, Volt.  I don't know what happened in town or why STC said I wasn't to engage.  I mean this order came from Daimyou herself.  But..."

Yup. The first big thing Chaopolis did to us that we could fix."

I was way salty over Adonis DARING to pull a stunt that could have royally messed up Undertale and furthermore...completely compromised my promise to Asriel.

Toriel went back home, waking up in her chair with no memory of what happened. Adonis was kicked back to whatever hole he crawled out of; at least temporarily. I'd noticed he was getting gutsy-er and gutsy-er with every last thing he sent toward us.

I think I needed piece of mind more than Asriel did. He suggested clearing my head at an isolated place, away from Miranda. One we could think and let good memories motivate us.

Where else but the X-Vault on Mobius Null--the planet formerly occupying the now defunct ACM-001.

We'd been in the hanger for a bit, now. Admittedly I was getting my mellow back.

Asriel had managed to master the force bubble program left behind by the trio that had dubbed themselves "Explorers", having used the schematics send to them in their dreams to build the very spaceship out of a Tilt-a-Whirl and other junk that now occupied Violet's personal lab.

I think he had aspirations of a Steven Universe Future cosplay. After all now he had the ability to "bubble" things with this antique computer and the program on it.

I just wondered how he'd make use of the oxygen generator made from additional schematics the Explorers had made use of. An unlimited air supply...pretty sure that could come in handy.

Now that I think about it, I was sitting on a large stockpile of gear, tech, and vehicles I was only making minimal use of. Why hadn't I REALLY made use of this stuff in the years even before I knew Asriel?

"I guess we're really in a tight spot lately, huh?" And yet all we could find ourselves doing was making small-talk rather than coming up with a plan. With counter-measures. With even one idea on how to help our friends and family who were under fire and on the verge of losing their livelihoods. Their nest eggs. Their identities.

"What's the point of understating it?" I was a little more than glum. I could feel my own sins crawling on my back. I'd been holding the tide back that was our promise. I could feel Chaopolis daring to throw their pollution--both metaphorical and literal--into the deluge they were forcing upon us. It would crush us at this rate.

Was nothing sacred?

I couldn't bear the thought of the truth coming out...not like this. I'd fight fang and claw to make sure it happened on my terms. What a promise to make, huh? I just knew...that's what he intended. That promise represented stability. Order. It was a rule in place to maintain a balance. And that was the very thing that Chaopolis stood against. It was the butterfly constantly being threatened to be crushed under the mallet of the nemesis of the Simpson baby in that nursery in the town of Springfield. I couldn't let him taint it let alone destroy the most sacred of the sacred.

"Volt...it's just a bump in the road."

"You understate well, Asriel.  But...you are right.  I have gone against darker times."

None darker than Universal City's destruction.

"I feel like this is some kind of anxiety therapy.  Coming up here like it's some kind of safe space."

"Azzy...don't tell me Violet tricked you into watching that vulgar animated series that takes place in Colorado."

"She sure knows how to drag someone into a bet...and then win it big."

"Reference aside, Asriel...you're right...the bad news keeps overlapping and we can't roll with the punches.  This feels like a retreat."

"I'll settle for momentary withdraw just to stop being knocked off kilter.  We're off balance and we can't get our guard up.  At least this way we can try to catch our breath and...well, I hate to say retaliate, but...there's few options at this point.  Like that old song goes that the Seville Brothers sang on their country album...Urban Chipmunk or something like?  Sometimes you have to fight when you're a man."

"Credit where credit is due.  That's a pretty old album by this point."

It seemed like we were compelled to try to get off topic because...addressing the current issues just felt...like a painful chore. But really...we couldn't ignore what couldn't be ignored...what they refused to let us ignore. It was in our faces and ruining our lives.

"Volt...what do we do at this point?"

"I don't know...maybe there's something among all this that can get us...at least a foot in the door.  There's countless artifacts, relics, and trump cards from several decades; spanning countless S.T.C. assignments here.  Something...just might be a hidden gem that could make a difference in the long run."

"You think so?"

"I hope so.  Because frankly I'm not about to stand on a pile of broken dreams.  If Chaopolis things the can win this, then they are dead wr--"

I didn't finish my statement. Out of nowhere, without warning...that's when it happened.

We were knocked off our feet as the hanger doors were  blown completely off their hinges.

"Honey.  I'm hoooooome...!"

As my vision cleared, I started to gasp.

"NO!" Asriel beat me to the exclamation.

"So this is your secret toy chest.  Lovely place...who would have guessed your last big assignment before the Undertale timelines was your big, bad secret."

"How did you find it?"

"Volt...my old friend and mentor...there isn' t anything in your past...in your present...or even in your future that I can't know about.  I'm that little nervous tick you can't get rid of.   Like Shinra's toothy devil grin that so many have dismissed is a look of sadistic glee and the mark of a devil who felt no regret for burning his house down and his mother and brother with it."

Adonis was already aware of that Fire Force world...which meant he probably already had alliances with the Evangelist...and all of those who'd pledged their loyalty to the cause of spreading Spontaneous Human Combustion. Yeah...I'll be he already recruited Dr. Giovanni.

"Goddammit...so what?  You're going to bring a couple of generation 2 and 3 pyrokinetics in to do your dirty work?"

"Oh no no no no.  This is a special, very personal dedication to my favorite mentor who turned his back on me."

"That bellyaching is half-hearted, Adonis.  That hasn't bothered you ever since your mind ruptured like a water balloon in a spike pit."

"Aww...you got me."

He reciprocated too quick. He was distracting me.

"What do you want?"

"Gonna stop you before you spout the face on a dollar bill line you stole from Jack Nicholson's Joker."

"You really have no appreciation for the classics.  But I guess you know what this is.  This world...it should have gone to the way-side like a good little doomed dimension.  But you, with all your order, your structure, your waste of resources put it on assisted living just to make it a storage depot for your old junk.  Now that's just sad.  In Chaopolis when things outlive their purpose, like...rules, per se...they get discarded.  Sometimes with extreme prejudice."

"This world isn't yours to--"

"But wouldn't that be fun?  Throwing away things that don't belong to me?  Just for the chaos...just for the despair...just to see you lose a piece of yourself.  And the more you lose...the more we match."

"Was that a crack over how much you think you lost everything?  You didn't lose anything...you threw it all away!  Get it through your skull."

"We never have talks like this anymore."

"I have nothing to say to you."

Asriel was being ominously quiet. I could tell he was trying to guess and second-guess what Adonis first move one be.

"I see you there, little goat that doesn't deserve that bracer much less a friend like him."

"Save it.  I'm not walking into your little word-plays or mind traps."

"Ooooooh.  Goat son's got claws.  Feisty!  I wish I could say I wanted to make use of that.  But you're of no used to me.  So I guess I'll just make sure you go with Destiny.  She'll want her favorite little play-pieces back when this game of chess ends.

Something...about that statement felt wrong. What were you up to, Adonis?

"Well now...shall we get down to business?"

"We can get down to business, alright.  Business of kicking your sorry gluteus maximus off this planet and back where you came from!" I balled up my fists and started to approach...until Adonis whipped out something that made me realize I'd brought fists...to a flamethrower fight.

"Stop me if you've heard this one before...but like the Messiah of WWE Raw has said before his heel-turn...

BURN.

IT.

DOWN."

And Adonis' flamethrowers unleashed full blast onto the shelves, racks, and lab tables.

"You maniac!!!" I roared as I tried shooting back with full electric arcs from both hands. But the shocks didn't even slow him down much less affect his weapon.

"Volt, look!"

"Tch!  The electric surge disruptor system?" I recognized the tech from an incident now code-named under the word "Viper". I still had the Viper prototype--holograms and chameleon camo-paneling--in all its glory...and if I didn't act fast, it and several other vehicles would be torched.

Asriel grabbed and lugged the liquid nitrogen vessel from a lab-table.

"If your next line is going to be "chill out, jerk wad", I'm afraid you set up that one-liner for nothing, dear boy."

Adonis triggered an oxygen flare around him, burning off some of his fur but otherwise Asriel's gambit was completely neutralized.

"Every time I think you can't find another sick way to amuse yourself, you lower the bar!" I snarled as I nocked several of the Duke Boys' dynamite arrows into a compound bow and filled Adonis full of explosive ordinance.

While the overlapping blasts did finally take out his flamethrower, in hindsight that was a mistake that made things worse when the tanks blew and spread even more fire and caused even greater damage.

From hammer-space, Adonis plucked some grenades and winged it toward the vehicles. And before I knew it, a number of them went sky high.

"He blew up the Mach 6!" Asriel looked horrified as the remains of the Speed Racer movie vehicle rained down followed by the steely crash of the mangled chassis and scraps of the outer shell.

"You're going to lose everythiiiiiiiing!" Adonis taunted as he unfolded a proto-sabre and plugged it into a backpack harness I didn't see him enter with. Crap...he had an arsenal of gear in hammer space!

In one mighty swing, he laid waste to the Picture-Phone booth set up against the wall.

The smoke was starting to get to both me and Asriel.

"Oh gods...!" I could see outside the hanger, where the palm trees were all on fire and turning to ash. And worse yet...I could see the scrapped remains of the Tornado. Oh gods...if Tails were still in this dimension, I'd never be able to face him! His pride and joy reduced to slag by this...this...psychopath!

In desperation, we tried everything to slow Adonis down.

"Our memories...!  Is there nothing we can do to save them?!"

"Juuuust let the repo man do his job, little fluff-fluff.  It'll allll be over soon..." Adonis hefted the Bat-Cycle with Robin's Side-Car and lugged it into the Bill & Ted Phone Booth before ripping the door off of the Ferrari that had been donated by one Magnum P.I.

"Desperate times....call for desperate measures." I tightened my fists so tight the bones actually cracked.

I cleared away the debris from a wall that hadn't caught flame and tore away the paneling until I covered the glass-covered switch with the warning above it: "DON'T PRESS UNLESS YOU REALLY, REALLY MEAN IT!"

"Is that the...!" Asriel noted I repurposed the self-destruct switch from the destroyed remains of Planet Moron's own Mega-Maid. I don't think Spaceball City would be making use of this or the weapon of mass air-suction it belonged to any time soon.

I drew back and pounded my fist through the glass, ignoring the cuts and the bleeding. It would heal quick enough.

And there was that warning klaxon that sounded out with all the flair of a European police car siren.

"Self-destruct sequence, Volt?  You're such a kill-joy doing my job for me in seconds in what I intended to spread out over several minutes."

"It's not a self-destruct sequence.  It's something else." I growled.

"What else could it--"

And that was when Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang was first to dissolve away to wire-frame outline before breaking apart into a cascade of numbers and binary and erasing from existence.

"Oh you clever, clever killjoy.  That damn KOMMAND is a real pain." Adonis immediately realized that Kommand was now squirreling away everything that was still in one piece in the hanger. One by one, at an accelerating rate, things were dragged away faster than Adonis could wreck them.

"Well then, I guess I gotta be "that guy"..." Adonis sneered, rather disappointed before materializing what looked like some kind of carbon composite rod...moments before it lit up white hot...then blue hot in his grasp.

"Oww.  Hey, owwwwwww." He yipped before opening his grip and letting the rod drop into the floor where it started melting through...moments before it suddenly shot downward like a rail cannon projectile.

"What did you do?!" I demanded.

"Chain-reaction at the core.   Consider it my portable take on Frieza's planet-killer attack."

Oh come ooooooooon! Dammit all, Adonis! You just set a timer on escaping this place.

"Step it up, KOMMAND!" I begged as stuff was disappearing in waves, now. Even at this speed...even with her grabbing everything in sight, we were still losing artifacts, weapons, and vehicles. All these keepsakes....going up in smoke.

"We've got to slow him down somehow!" Asriel tried pressuring into him with his NX Gear in proton pack mode.

Asriel grit his teeth as he removed the parallax limiter which prevented him from using all of his mods at the same time. And so Adonis was now getting a simultaneous barrage from the Blast Stream with Boson Darts, the Shock Blast with the Stasis Stream in effect, the Slime Blower with the Slime Tethers coiling around him, and the Overload Pulse with the Meson Collider homing in on him. All. At. The. Same. Time.

This should have vaporized a normal being. But he was resisting it and only slowing down just barely noticeable.

"C'mon!  C'mon!" Asriel had warning lights go up all over his equipment. If he didn't switch off, he was going to blow his pack sky-high and him with it!

"You just can't help but put yourself into a catch-22, can you, boy?

* FWSSSSHHHHHST! *  Adonis' forehead whiplashed as a ruby read laser beam tore through his head, splitting his skull down the middle.

"TARGET ACQUIRED.   ALLOUICIOUS ADONIS LOCATED.  TERMINATE ON SIGHT.  REPEAT.  TERMINATE ON SIGHT.  TERMINATE WITH EXTREME PREJUDICE."

S.A.I.N.T. Prototype Number Four rolled toward Adonis, who was already regenerating.

"You reactivated Number Four?" Asriel whirled to me where I had had the soldering iron and the power screwdriver in hand.

"Do I reeeeeeeeally have to say what a splitting headache you are?" Adonis grinned with a shrug before taking another laser beam, this time to the lung. And a second to the liver.

"Hey!  Watch it!  I need that to binge drink...or maybe I don't...eh.  Doesn't matter to me."

Asriel searched frantically across the lab tables that weren't on fire for weapons or anything.

"Tornado in a Can?"

"Brief stint with the Mystery Men!  It's complicated!" I explained, trying to reach the emergency panel.

"I thought that Flaming Carrot thing was a joke Violet put you up to after losing a bet!"

"Let's not rule out that possibility..." I grabbed a stack of Metal Blades that I borrowed from Dr. Light for the purpose of metallurgy experiments and started winging them. Sure enough, Metal Man's weapon cut through anything and everything. Even Adonis' mutated hide. Unfortunately he was regenerating faster than both Number Four and I could do damage...and he was still advancing and unloading his weapons on everything.

"Eat this!" Asriel winged the tornado in a can where it exploded into a powerful, localized vortex.

The flames consumed Adonis rather quickly...but just as quickly as they started to give him third degree burn, Adonis burst free of his fiery prison.

"Naaaaaaaaaaay..." Adonis ground his fang teeth together as I recognized his word, his tone, and his delivery as being completely identical to the superhuman living weapon and assassin, "Mad Pierrot" Tongpu. The Penguin-ish psychopath that hunted Spike Spiegel relentlessly and blew up half of an amusement park on Mars to do so.

"Oh sh--"  My eyes widened.

As if reading my mind, I saw the Penguin-inspired umbrella come out...and the hail of full-auto machine gun fire ring out.

"Look out!" I tackled Asriel to the ground as all kinds of equipment was shredded.

Out came grenades next...and the explosions sent us both hurtling in opposite directions. Splitting us up? Yeah. He was doing this on instinct, not  by any sort of plan.

The Rocket Launcher sent a ballistic missile careening into the windshield of the Mirth Mobile....I'd never explain to Wayne and Garth this one.

"Run little piggies!  Ruuuuun!" Adonis cocked a pair of weapons he'd lifted from Halo...and lit up the ground, sweeping his ammo toward us.

Asriel grabbed the power saw off of a nearby workbench and immediately cut into the chain-link cage in the room marked "Confiscated Super Villain Items".

"I won't even ask how you got this..." Asriel snatched the first thing he could get, which happened to be Harlene "Harley Quin"  Quinzel's giant mallet before running with it full tilt at Adonis and smashing him upside the jaw.

"Now that was rude..." Adonis mumbled loudly, his mouth full of broken teeth and his cheeks swollen from where his jaw had been momentarily dislocated.

Asriel pounded away at him several times before being absolutely stunned when Adonis' regenerated jaws snapped down on the hammer and bit it to pieces...before spitting it out.

"Here comes the hammer?  There goes the hammer.   And he took Vanilla Ice with him."

A shot at both M.C. Hammer and Vanilla Ice, using Harley Quinn as a springboard? This was nuts.

I grabbed the computer tower that once housed a certain digital genie made by two losers and some Weird Science and swung it hard with both hands, bashing Adonis in the back of the skull.

"Get away from him you bas--"

"Temper, temper!" Adonis whirled, not even rubbing the badly bleeding spot I had completely decimated the machine over.

Every chance we got we hit him with something from the past.

I held up that "Extreme" Ghost Trap before Adonis' face and squeezed the activator trigger. Ray warned to never look directly into the trap and had also warned that contact with the energy release of a ghost trap could easily vaporize a human limb as I recalled the "Venk-Man" incident which Peter had notoriously gained super powers for a short time.

It did in fact boil off everything and threatened to crack his skull...but that still wasn't enough to slow him down...and before I knew it his face was regenerating yet again.

And once it had he started humming a disturbing choice of song. "Memories" from the stage play, Cats. He was taunting us with the memories of ours that he was destroying.

Jeeze! How much regeneration capacity did he have!? It shouldn't even BE this much! Or maybe we weren't unloading enough ordinance into him!?

And worse yet...we were losing ground.

Correction. We completely lost ground.

"Oh crap...!" Asriel and I backed away, now about out of anything worth using.

We were backed into a corner. What else was there to do?

Adonis chuckled as he continued to hum "Memories" from both the Broadway Production and the horrendous movie, Cats. It was beyond insulting at this point. I watched as the last vehicle was beamed away to new space, time, and dimensional coordinates thanks to KOMMAND.

But the things that Adonis had destroyed...the things he'd disintegrated...the ones we couldn't save...

"You've set a new low, Adonis."

"How salty are you that I've broken so many of your toys?  Tell me in grand detail."

"Does nothing matter to you?" Asriel demanded, defensively. "To you it's junk, but we've made a lifetime of memories in this place."

"Which makes its destruction all the more impactful.  Tell me, Volt.  What will you do now that the last semblance of tangible memory of your previous case file is about to breathe its final death rasp?"

"Nothing but low blows.  Expecting anything more to you would be insanity."

"Didn't Violet tell you?  Sanity is overrated."

"That's not what she meant and you know it!" Asriel defended.

We were up against a familiar lab table...and one thing had survived on it that quite frankly...was an ungodly desperate thing to turn to.

"Hey, Adonis..."

"What?"

I smirked before responding with. "You know what...it really is just a car..."

That was when I unleashed every terawatt of electric power I could into...the "Gizmo" time-space warp engine.

"Relatively speaking...today just became tomorrow.  And your plan just went down...the Tubes."

"Ohhhh you and your movie references..." Adonis narrowed his eyes but grinned even wider when he realized what I had done.

"Azzy, now!" I grabbed his arm before overturning the lab table, the Gizmo getting buried under the mass of equipment as it was reaching critical mass.

"Wha--!"

I dragged him to the Time Train switcher turntable before magnetically ripping it out of the floor and flinging it through the burning ceiling and far away from the building.

"Jump!"

No time to question my words.

We landed on something metallic deep below.

"Ungh!  Ow, that wasn't smart!"

"Better injured than dead.  Hurry!"

I helped him off the huge metal object and lit up my fur so we could see.

"Is this a...!"

"Remnants of the resolution of...Mission X." I wisely withheld the fate of Zordon. While the Astro Megaship would be decommissioned as a museum honoring the Power Rangers, the NASADA shuttle that linked with it to form the Astro Megazord...!

"A space shuttle."

"Get aboard fast.  No time for a F.R.F."

"Yeah, engine testing at this point would pretty much doom us." Asriel recognized the jargon from Space Camp.

We got the heck in and slammed the door shut, suited up in the space suits and strapped in. I fired up the vertical lift thrusters full blast and shot the machine up and out of the building.

"Well played, Volt...." Adonis looked up at where we'd blazed past him moments before a blinding light seared out of the rubble pile, as the time-warp drive overloaded and tore open a hole in space and time...moments before its power surge suddenly gave out and the massive power spike caused its event horizon to collapse...forming a quantum singularity in its wake.

"Oh you son of a--"  Adonis found himself and everything else pulled toward it.

All of a sudden, Adonis spread his arms and legs out and just...gave up the fight against the hybrid of gravitational and chronomorphic pull; laughing more and more manically as he embraced his supposed doom.

To anyone else, it seemed like we finally ended him.

But even that was no match for Madam Fate's contract...his Genie's Lamp and Pandora's Box made sure he'd not only survive...but terrorize us another day.

We tore upward and upward into the atmosphere. The sensors on the shuttle gave us a pretty clear picture of what was happening to the planet. And it was not good.

The time-warp had become unstable and was somehow caught in a paradox of being unable to form into a supernova...or a black hole. The struggle between cosmic forces was tearing the planet apart. I could see the tectonic cracks break up the planet on the high definition monitors even as we hadn't quite left the atmosphere, let alone geo synchronous orbit.

"Volt...!" Asriel started to get a little misty-eyed as he watched in horror as the live video feed of Mobius Null as the ball of blue, green, and white got smaller and smaller behind us.

Adonis' "Rods From Gods" had put the core of the planet into an unstable chain reaction. I could see the continents crack and split with jagged bright orange-red glows...magma. I could see lighting tangled around the planet like rings...the temporal bomb I'd set off was now tearing its already flimsy fabric of space and time apart. Its reality was distorting in and out of existence.

It couldn't make up its mind what it wanted to do...neutronize with a total protonic reversal...get sucked into a black hole..or explode.

And then...it kinda...managed to do all of the above.

it was over. It was all over.

The NASADA shuttle continued on its course to the Jump Gate ring. We'd make it home, the unconventional way. But not without reminders of what we lost...not without scars that couldn't be seen with both the naked and the aided eye.

He cut us deep. He cut deep into our good memories. It wasn't as though he destroyed our childhood. That expression was overused on the internet, y'know? He just...took away the tangible evidence that it ever really existed. Which...sucked.

And frankly life itself did that. it was an inevitability. A lot of places from my past no longer exist. I remember a place that specialized in pizza and Italian food with live entertainment in the form of a Wurlitzer pipe organ...connected to countless instruments, horns, displays, a grand piano, a wooden pipe organ...all kinds of things that gave new meaning to one-man-band. They once called this place the Music Palace. And it shared a favorite spot of my childhood with Showbiz Pizza Place. I wasn't ashamed to admit it to Mitzi. She was fond of the place to.

And then...it burned down in an electrical fire...and never came back. No rebuild. No mention of it...it was like the flames erased its entire legacy...the very business itself. Who'd speak of this place again? Even in passing memory?

Things like this...were normal. But what Adonis had done? This was anything but normal and anything but okay with me.

Asriel looked back at the space debris that had resulted from the planet formerly known as Mobius exploding...and the explosion was being sucked into the gravity well of the massive space-time warp I had torn open with the transwarp drive engine. I'd see what kind of damage it could do on Michael Harland's high school...the amount of energy I gave it before it reached critical mass was borderline cosmic, which meant the warp was on a planetary scale.

Adonis was most certainly pulled in...but knowing him, he'd find his way back. He'd have a way out. One of his followers had a contigiency. Even a space-time warp's event horizon wouldn't nullify his Black Knight contract.

"It's all gone..."

"Yeah...yeah, it is."

"How much...of it did we save?"

"KOMMAND is already taking inventory...but...it's looking like at least 30 to 40 percent of it may be lost forever.  I could...try and reacquire the missing things from other points in their existence in the past but...it's going to be a lot harder to find viable points that won't...affect history around them."

"Oh...I'm...so sorry."

"Not as sorry as I am.  I let this happen."

With some relief I had managed to preserve Conky, Globy, and Magic Screen. Though to where I sent them was...something I'd trust KOMMAND to hopefully be able to locate in the future.

A number of vehicles were gone, too. I'd saved as many A-class and S-class one as I could.

"All those memories.....no, it was more than that.  By destroying the X-Vault and Mobius NULL, it was like Adonis destroyed a part of us.  Like...something deep in my heart just...died."

"The memories are still with us.  That's one thing he CAN'T take from us.  Even with a Neuralization, somewhere in our hearts, an echo of the good times would remain.  At a subconscious level...we'd somehow keep a spark of it alive."

"I get what you mean.  An inch.  Something so small.  So fragile.  Every last bit but an inch we refuse to let him have.  It's all we have.  it's all we need."

He was speaking in metaphor.

This was a dark day. But hour darkest hour was yet to come. Far sooner than we'd ever be prepared for.

Sub-Entry 366: "Bad Ending Part 1 - The Peace is Shattered":
It was on this day the unthinkable happened. It had always been an immutable fact that our world was off limits whenever Madam Fate played her sick games.

Never let it be said Adonis had even a micro-fraction of respect for rules.

It began with my core team at the fountain.

"Commander..."

"Bunnie...we lost a large chunk of ourselves.  It may have just been stuff and cars but...in those moments...it was like Adonis perverted everything we fought before annihilating our safe place.  It was like our man cave.

"And shame on you from hiding that away from us, boss--"

* WHAP*

"Not the time Violet." Mitzi scolded.

"Sorrrryyyyy." Vi sneered, a little incensed.

"Do you have any idea where Dr. Adonis will strike next or what his next move is?"

"Without knowing what his elite followers are volunteering to him?  No.  He doesn't plan.  He doesn't strategize.  He just...does things.  He takes inspiration from one of the traitors that joined him and rolls with it while putting his own twists on things on a whim if he thinks they'll be more amusing in the long run.  He's been following Heath Ledger's "Joker Diary" to the letter when he's not delivering sadistic one-liners from Jarod Leto and more recently I've been seeing him start ripping off Josquin Phoenix."

"He's a bad man.  Why won't he leave us alone?" Gadget sniffled, wiping her tears.

"He can't.  It's a sickness.  It's the mark of a pathological hypocrite, liar, egomaniacal lunatic.  He wants it, he needs it, he thrives of it, he's just completely consumed by it." Violet explained.

"And the worst part of it is...we made him this way.  S.T.C. loaded the gun and put me in a situation that I had no choice but to pull the trigger.  And now we're all suffering."

My guilt was weighing heavier than the core of a neutron star reaching critical mass.

"The cherry on top is that everyone is paying the price for my mistake."

"Stop burying yourself in guilt and shame." Asriel tried to comforted.

"Azzy, I know you mean well but you can't possibly understand what it's like to be him...I sure don't."

"Then help me understand!  What makes him tick!  We have to diffuse him before he does something really desperate!"

"How can I do that when I don't understand...?" I was losing hope.

Suddenly I got a call from KOMMAND

"VOLT!  VOLT!  THIS IS NO JOKE!  HE'S COMING!  GET OUT OF THERE!"

"KOMMAND?  What's--"

"Hey, sister.  Why so serious?" Violet peered over my shoulder. "Drop the mask so I can see who's been keeping my Commander's toy chest so well stocked."

"...I never thought I'd say this to you of all people..but could you not?!  This is serious!  Chaopolis is about to knock on your doorstep!  Serious crap is about to go down!  Hurry!  Get off the planet, one way or another!  There's no time--"

That was when my ears perked up.

"Oh no...it's too late."

"Volt Arcade!  The hour is upon you." Daimyou suddenly appeared within frame with members of the Inner Circle digitally blurred out.

"What the..." Violet could have sworn she recognized the silhouettes but...

"Lady Daimyou.  What's happening?" Asriel gasped.

"It's too late to stop what's already begun.  I am sorry.   There's no turning back now.  Please...hang on as long as you can...I am afraid...when you call for help.....no one will come."

Ominous words that echoed the Underground. What does she mean by that?

Oh no. They can't intervene? Then that means... No...immutable history is about to pass.

My ears suddenly perked up.

"Is that an...air raid siren?" Asriel questioned.

And then more alarms and sirens and horns started going off.

And then as soon as the emergency alerts and the air raid sirens went up...that was when we got split up...and picked off one by one.

And it all started with the space bridge portals in the sky that circumvented the Paling and rained the missiles down all over the city. All over not just Miranda...not one city...but every city all over the globe.

Even Neo Arcadia City.

"We're under attack!"

The flash of light was what I Iast remembered as the explosions sent every one of us at the square flying...

...when I came to, everything was going to Hell, rapidly.

"Asriel?  Asriel!?  Major?!  Violet?!  Sally?!  Anyone?!"

Lost in a city, rapidly being destroyed and twisted.

"Ungh...that...sucked..." I muttered before climbing out of the debris.

The others had been hurled to other locations.

Violet had managed to get airborne and immediately headed straight to UCIAT HQ.

"Gods...the Capital was invaded twice now...do I really have to do another bleach protocol again!?  And backing up our servers to the Tokugawa satellites?  Someone's gonna get my foot up their...!"

And that was when the Cyber-Gates started opening up.

"Oh man...come onnnnn!  Not now!" Sally growled as she and Team Acorn suited up and got ready for battle.

All over the city...people were in a panic.

All over the city, our allies were thrown into battle.

And all over the city...Chaopolis was laying the smackdown to Miranda. And it wasn't just us...this was going....global.

It was bad...like the 199 Super Sentai Great War bad. But we wouldn't find out how bad it was until...

"...!"  Lupe's eyes widened as Adonis was suddenly before her.

"You know...it gets me right here when we kill nature..." He grinned before the dark deed came to pass.

We were about to find out just how dark things were going to get.

It was maybe...an hour into this before Sally and Team Acorn got worried...and they decided to check on the one person they probably should have been protecting this whole time.

"Oh my gods..." Sally dropped her knees before her fallen comrade. Lupe used the last of her strength to pull her upper torso..the remained severed part of her being toward her...pushing her dying body up to look Sally in the eyes.

"...not like this...please...not like this..."

Sally gripped her hand with both hands, streaming tears.

Elsewhere at the same time...Bunnie tightened her fist...understanding the situation quite well.

"Sally...live...life..." Was the last thing Lupe said before...!

She barely rolled over...reaching to the sky...then faltered...and then fell completely limp.

Sally cringed in anguish before hesitantly brushed Lupe's eyelids closed.

"I swear I'm going to get that son of a..." She slugged the ground hard. "I'll make him pay!"

Sub-Entry 367: "Bad Ending Part 2 - Casualties":
Oh lord...this isn't happening...this isn't happening. The body counts weren't just local, they were across the continent...no...across the world. It was completely global and simultaneous.

And now tragedy hit us. We'd lost a friend and the most patient, most caring member of our team.

And they'd continue to pick us off. What I didn't know was...someone very familiar as personally overseeing each assassination.

"Honey!  Willie!  NOOOOO!!!" Sally squeezed her fists even tighter to the point of drawing blood. She was already a mess, now looking at the suffocated form of Willamina and the incinerated form of Honey.

"MURDERERRRRR!!!!" Sally disengaged every limiter on the Tengu Suit and unleashed every speed-boosting enhancement she had including the Laser W.I.S.P. mode, with the full intent of piercing through the head honcho's chest.

But to her horror.

"URRRK!!!" Sally found her neck in the vice-grip of the head scum.

"You know I've been pondering for a while what would be a fitting death for Arcade's speed demoness...and then I realized..."

Adonis grinned a toothy grin as he shoved the jump drive into a port on Sally's Tengu Suit...a few flashes of the L.E.D. and every danger warning started going off.

"Oh no!  What have you done--"

"Guess."

"No!  NO!  NOOOO!!!" The light poured out of every crack as the static swarmed Sally head to toe, the energy building starting to fry her.

"The very Bio-Field...the very  Morphing Grid that was supposed to protect you...turned against you."

The was a massive fountain of raw rainbow light and electric energy that poured from ground zero as a sudden explosion consumed her. When it was over...the suits wearer had been fried from inside to out.

"So...nic..." Sally's last word before her corpse collapsed face down.

"Welcome to the basement, Sally Acorn." He said smugly before simply walking toward his next target, arms behind his back.

Elsewhere, Bunnie gasped loudly as he eyes snapped wide open...and then the tears came. Her first thought was...that she had lost a friend. Her second...was that as  a Rabbotou...she had failed in her duty to protect Ecotropia's last surviving heir.

From there lead him to Rock-Afire Pizza...which he thoroughly bombed to rubble before beating Mitzi to a pulp...and ending her by using Helen Henny's own Dark Matter powers on her; which he had absorbed and stolen from her...with her consent, no less.

The horror was too much for Gadget. So scared was she that she remained deer-in-headlights from the time it took Adonis and his followers to...to...oh gods...not little sister...please, for the love of all that is sacred...not....*sob*...not Gadget...!

Little did I know...Asriel was going through his own Hell.

"Mom!?  Dad!?"

Asriel tried digging through the rubble...and then he found her.

"Asriel...!" Callista sighed, tiredly. Immediately Goat Son spotted the I-beam shoved deliberately through her torso with a message welded into it by Adonis.

"Mommy has a tummy-ache.  Sorry.  No antacid to give.  - A. Adonis

"Oh no...no...oh no, no..."

But that was when he saw the head wounds.

"He...he lobotomized you!?" Asriel's eyes were wide as dinner plates and shaking badly.

"I...don't feel any pain...it's alright...at least...you're safe..." And that was the last thing she spoke.

"No......!" Asriel's eyes welled with tears.

It wasn't long before he found Scott...completely engulphed in flames...both real and cyber-digital.

"Hey...champ..." His KQF form was static-ing in and out. He motioned for Asriel not to touch him.

"Oh no...not you, too."

"It's...pretty bad I know."

"Please...hang on...!"

"Yeah...gonna...try to......y'know...Adonis...he was a real ...wouldn't even let...your mother and I...die together...split us up...just so we'd...each kick the bucket alone...but now you're here so...wasn't...so bad..."

"Dad..."

"Asriel...just...fall back...retreat for now.  Go on living.  Don't try...to fight him.  Don't fall into that "get em' for me" cliché...that payback stuff will only get you killed.  Forget about me."

"No...no, army doesn't leave soldiers behind."

"You have to...this time."

"Dad..."

"Son..." With the last of his strength, Scott saluted...before falling limp...and burning to a cinder.

Asriel shrieked bloody murder.

It wouldn't be long before he found Spot's crushed corpse.

"I'm sorry...I'm so sorry..."

Was running the only thing he could do now? Where would he run to? The planet was breaking apart.

That was when Adonis' image appeared in the sky.

"You know...I don't think this is progressing fast enough.  Getting bored here.  So, let's have a proper extermination.  Let's make this...a True Genocide Run..."

And then the Cyber Gates opened up all around the world in perfect formations...like rings or orbitals of an atom. Each one lined up next to the other in a circular orbit around the planet.

And from each one came...the carbon-tungsten composited I recognized from the X-Vault.

Planet-killers. Rods from the Gods.

Our situation went from bleak to doomed.

There was no shooting them down for they immediately dropped to the surface like they were fired from Rail Cannons. Too fast to see. Too fast to stop. They were already in the planet's core...and the effect was immediate.

"Oh and one more thing...I'm sure you'll all want to see this..."

Adonis moved the camera over to reveal that he was in Miranda Palace amongst a massacre...and right there within holy white flames was Queen Brooke's shrieking corpse as Adonis' followers were constantly flooding her with Holy Water and exorcism spells and prayers.

That was when the flames tore open into the depths of what Marcel would have confirmed was the entrance to Gehenna...and I saw him rise. Brooke's unholy supreme demon father...

"Omnitaru...!" I gasped, turning white.

"Daughter......your rebellious actions cease now.  I decree this.  You are mine now and forever...a tool to implement as I see fit."

"Go...to...Hell...!" Was the last thing she said before his gigantic meaty claws wrapped around her and dragged her down, spreading black flames and actual burning ice everywhere; a paradox of elementals tainted so unholy that they were co-existing.

The effect was immediate. In this move...Adonis had broken the spirits of everyone in town.

Adonis laughed joyfully before stopping suddenly and pointing toward us with both index fingers.

"You're so screwed.  Toodles!" And he waved before the transmission cut out.

More missiles rained down on the city.

My live feed showed that UCIAT HQ was being overrun.

Adonis' feed suddenly sprung up again.

"Oh and one more thing.  Volt my former mentor and ex-best friend...you're probably wondering how much crazier I could get...welll...try this on for size."

Suddenly he was no longer in the Palace...I recognized that he had now show up inside our own Headquarters and was laying waste to the main lab.

I watched NintendoNet fall...then SegaDyne...then SonyCom...and finally MicroTech.

I watched their links to my T.A.O. communicator change from online to offline, one after the other.

"This can't be happening..." I watched in horror as he and his forces marched straight to Violet's sub-lab...and blew the door wide open.

They laid waste as Violet stood against the back doorway...with a blank look...but I could tell she was dying inside as she couldn't stop them. There were too many...and she was losing too much data and too many personal items.

Kuma squeaked out of existence as their mainframe was smashed. Glitter outstretched her hand toward Vi, who reached back...moments before she was deleted.

"Where's the Melmac-ian?"

"Gone home and the gateways sealed." Violet fumbled around for the controls to the door.

"And he took the Mogwai with him." She added just before the door slid open.

"Scour the universe for them." Dr. Leviathan commanded.

"As for me...I'm going to pay a call on the Doctor of Digital..." Adonis said as he ripped the doors off their hinges and began to tear apart the hallway, damaging the illusions Vi had left behind.

"No!  No he can't!" I gasped, realizing how vital Violet was to the timeline. If she died then...!"

In the far end future...

"Oh no..." KOMMAND uttered as the walls and floors started shaking and breaking apart. A chasm opened up behind her.

"Violet!!!" Daimyou reached out too late as KOMMAND fell backward into the abyss...her vision clouding...and her voice going...

"I never...even got...to see Nerd vs. Critic part.....part........pa...."

KOMMAND clutched her sides as she felt herself being torn apart...ripped from existence.

My jaw hit the ground...and my eyes welled with tears.

"No...not Violet..." I immediately dashed off to find Bunnie before it was too late. If Daimyou's past self was killed off...then there was no hope."

"What are you doing Adonis!?" I screamed at the sky. "You're going to endanger your own existence, too!"

Adonis just laughed. "I know you're out there, Volt...and I know what you must be thinking.  But if I weren't willing to roll the dice on this, what kind of anarchist would I be?

Anyway...with one headache down...she won't be saying much on her deathbed...really fitting end crushing the throat of someone who doesn't know when to shut up, don't you think...time to exterminate the one who you have to pull teeth to get to talk...I wonder what the universe will become without the High Empress of Time, Space, and Dimension?"

He was joking but what he was doing was serious. He was so far gone he'd even risk all of the factors that led up to him being created in the first place! That's insane!

I hurried toward where Bunnie's locator signal was. At the same time Asriel was headed in that direction.

He stopped, horrified to find Pit's body...both wings torn off as Eggplant Wizard and Adonis himself cackled before escaping into another warp gate to somewhere else in town.

"Oh no..."

There was no response.

And not far from him, he recognized the form of Baby Bonnie Hood...standing over the corpse of Jonathan...his werewolf form reverting to human...the gaping holes from the silver bullets freshly bleeding.

"Who's afraid of the big bad wolf...I guess it's not me..." B.B. Hood put away her weapons.

"Damn...should have killed you AFTER I dragged your bounty into the portal back home.  That tail would have been a perfect thing to grip you by."

She tied him to her motorized scooter which she'd used before in the Cannon Spike incident before dragging him into the gate before Asriel could react.

"No...!"

All over town, people were dropping like flies. Not to say they didn't put up a good fight...many of them fought like tigers. Even the very best should have won their battles. But Chaopolis was fighting as dirty as  possible.

I was zeroing on in Bunnie.

"Major!  Hold on!  I'm coming--"

It was at that moment in time I felt it...a discharge I recognized all too well. An electromagnetic pulse...and an incredibly strong one. One that even an atomic bomb would have difficulty generating.

As the lights in the city all went out...I had a bad feeling...I knew where the point of origin was.

And that's when I found her as the Cyber Gate closed beside her.

And she was in horrible shape.

In the far future...

"My fate is sealed..." Daimyou bowed her head as the pain erupted and she spread her arms out and threw her head back with a mighty bellow as she was torn apart in every direct at the same time.

Erased...from existence.

Back at home.

"Commander...my...duty is...fulfilled...yet I have failed...continue on...without me..."

"Don't talk, Bunnie...don't talk..."

"I can see it...with my own unaided eyes...the sun......I only wish I could...be there with Toriel...when she gets to see it...for real this time..."

"Bunnie..."

"No fate...but what we make..."

I choked up a sob.

"Yeah, Major...but next time...use your own words..." I sniffled.

She looked up with me...hanging on for what little life she had. It wouldn't be long down before she was gone.

"You served me well old friend.  I just wish...you would have taken the reigns of leadership.  I'm not the leader that you thought I was.

But now..."  I turned toward the path that lay ahead where Adonis was waiting.

"...I have no choice but to be."

Sub-Entry 368: "Bad Ending Part 3 - Losing Everything"
I was completely devastated with almost no one else to lose. Our headquarters was in flames and collapsing upon itself. Every tectonic plate had fissured and was now a super volcano, with flames shooting into the atmosphere. The seas were boiling. The skies were falling.

He did it. He really did it. He caused another Universal City. And our planet...it had become the blasting cap for the massive explosives his agents had spread across time and space. The UltraVerse's fall was nigh. Our AU was coming to an end...and I couldn't stop it.

All I had left...was to take him down and I could at least know I'd done that much.

I knelt down to Bunnie's form again. She was in horrible shape and slowly degrading. The black blood coming out of her mouth...her nanites were breaking down before my eyes...and her flesh and fur and even her bone was starting to dissolve, erode and decompose.

"Do...not...grieve, Commander......if there is...justice in the world...I face my fate without fear...I will not be taken across...the Sanzu River...without a fight.......even in death...I would still oppose my fate..."

Even with death imminent, Bunnie was fighting to just to be able to say her peace. She had more to say...and each breath, each word was causing her excruciating pain.

"Don't talk, Major."

"I...have seen Violet's demise........I...have never cried so hard.....I actually remembered what it was like...to have emotions..."

"Please...don't."

"Even in a world of crumbling hope...promise you will carry the last embers into the night, Commander."

"I'll fight him with everything I have."

While I was having my last moments with Bunnie, deep underground...

A trail of tears formed as Nikita descended into the depths of Neo Lemurinopia and opened the final gate generator in her lab.

"...I know I have emotions...I know I have a heart...because it's breaking.  I've lost...everyone and everything for the second time...and all I can do...is run.  Run to the next world...I cannot even preserve Lemurinopia and restart our civilization, for this world is doomed.

Is surviving and starting from scratch the only thing I can do...?"  Nikita looked into the mirror-shine polish of her floor as it tremored and cracked.  "Coward."

She walked into the gate as it closed up behind her...moments before her entire city started to crumble and melt from the magma breaches.

By now the orbital accelerator under the lab was going critical. Who could say how much longer it could last before it detonated.

I'd left Bunnie where she lay. Little did I know that a lot of things would come full circle and it wouldn't be the last I'd see of her corpse.

I knew where to go.

I slowly but deliberately walked amongst the chaos and death toward the center of town to the remains of the fountain...and there he was...standing there, arms crossed, soaked in the blood of everyone he'd murdered.

I wanted to tear into him so bad. I had billions of things I could have said to him...I had millions of ways I could express myself in action.

But all I could do was face him and say...

"I don't have words for you, Adonis."

"Your expression, old friend.  Very unappealing.  You should embrace my return.  I have brought you deliverance--"

I slugged him in the snout.

"Did I ask for deliverance!?  DID I!?!?!" I roared. My anger and rage was vastly understated here. The shaking...the unease...the veritable volcano of everything bottled up inside, ready to erupt...

I could barely see straight. I didn't want to hear what he had to say.

Pain.

So.

Much.

Pain.

And I couldn't stop it from hurting. What more could he take from me!? I had nothing left to lose. I wanted to hurt him. I wanted to end him. This was the most personal attack he could had made. And he was just dancing around it like it was one big comedy.

What really stung was....thinking about the danger of Goat Son seeing me like this. Seeing this beast unleashed.

I'd let out pent up frustration and rage like this before...8 years ago when Al Dente dared to put Asriel through his barrage of security probing...only for Violet to cross the line and make light of that accursed anagram of Asriel's name.

But nothing like this. This was a nuclear fusion reaction reaching critical...no SUPERCRITICAL mass.

"I'm beginning to think you cannot take a joke." Adonis mused.

"This...is all...just a joke to you?"

"Mmmn...not a very funny one, I admit.  I can do better after all.  I did get rather creative with Al Dente and the sewage treatment plant.  Don't tell me you're not going to thank me for that."

"Do you...even know...where the line was?  Do you have any idea what you've done!?"

"Lines represent division and therefore order.  Nothing is off limits, old friend.  Nothing.  I've tried opening your eyes to this.  Don't you see the benefits of Chaos?  Don't you see the beauty I'm creating?  Certainly the words of Serpent must be familiar to you.  Granted it won't be "Model W" Mega Man that saves the people.  But rejoice!  Their suffering is over.  I've freed them all from their weakness and tributed their fear, their anguish, their broken-ness to Madam Fate.  It's just the spice her script was searching for!"

"..."

"An inch, Volt.  Isn't that what you've preached?  That an inch is delicate.  It's insignificant.  It's the last little semblance of yourself and it's all you have when they've taken everything from you.

You must know now...that an inch can still be taken from you. Your idealism doesn't work in the real world. Bad things happen. There's no fixing them."

"You're a horrible creature, Adonis."

"Why don't you just call me monster?"

"Because that would insult everything they are."

"Integrity.  Heh.  Clinging to it as usual.  But you know it's true.  I am a monster.  It's insulting that there's some part of you that hopes to patch things up...and redeem me.  It's even more insulting that every one of you wants me to surrender, pay my debt to society, and apologize for being a monster.

Apologize...for being...a monster. That is so much hypocrisy it's profane. It's perverse. Do they not see the irony of such a thing?

I again remind you...you all want me to apologize for being a monster. Well...when did anyone ever apologize for making me one?"

Ouch. Bullseye in the center of the S.T.C. Council. And because I still stood with the council, despite how much I hated them...I was the biggest betrayer of Adonis' trust.

"You couldn't think of anything to say to that, could you old friend?" Adonis curled his lip into a sneer.

"Order itself is defective.  It must be reset back to the way the Universe was to begin with.  With nothing being compared to another...with no one being compared to another.   No standards to adhere to.  No rules to limit its behavior.  No numeric patterns dictating the flow of the universe...of every universe.  This is the way.  This is the path back from which we went astray."

"You can preach this garbage all you want.  But before this battle is over...I'm going to take a piece out of you for every soul you snuffed out that was near and dear to me."

"That-a-boy.  Give me a good and spontaneous battle...like you always do..."

From that moment...we engaged in catastrophic warfare that would further decimate our city.

I grabbed Adonis by the throat and unleashed the full discharge of electromagnetic energy through my feet, turning them into makeshift rail-cannons, actually propelling my sandals off, the buckles coming undone from the shear force.

I torpedoed him through building after building after building, screaming bloody murder in his face, dealing out all the pain and suffering he had dealt to my dead crew and my dead family!

"I'll BREAK YOU!!!" I spat in his face

"Say it, don't spray it!" Adonis maintained that smug grin.

I grabbed a pair of huge power cables that had snapped off the primary winding of a residential transformer and shoved each one into the sides of Adonis' head electrocuting him to the brain to the point of causing his head to combust...but it grew back just as quickly as I had blown it up with an electrical pop.

I put on the Power Fist and slugged him again and again and again, crushing his internals and his rib-cage...to no avail.

I finally mowed him down into a gas station that exploded violently taking the both of us with a mighty fireball explosion.

...and we still survived.

I kept pummeling and pummeling and pummeling; not letting up and not giving him a chance to recover. I was bound and determined to drain his regeneration until he couldn't heal up anymore.

"You know why you're not beating me, Volt?"

"Shut up!"

"It's because you're not putting your BACK INTO IT!" Adonis' bone crushing uppercut sent through a bill board high atop a 30-story building...good lord...was he really THAT strong!?!

And before I knew it he came crashing down through the building, seizing my throat and driving me through floor after floor after floor until the whole building came down on top of us.

Over the course of several minutes which stretched into a full hour...and beyond...we tore apart the city trying to destroy each other.

"Volt...you still don't understand.  Order is a lie.  Order is a construct.  It forces shape into what doesn't need to be shaped.  Organization is the enemy.  Can't you see that?  I mean...our own S.T.C. is a structured organization and look what a cancer they've spread across time and space."

"Do you believe the garbage you're spewing!?" I shot back.

"Do you believe the lies you're living?" He countered.

"Order is not the enemy.  It's what gives us piece of mind.  It's what lets things run smoothly!  But that isn't all that you're attacking.  You're attacking peace and harmony itself."

"Peace is another terrible lie.  A lifetime of lifetimes of nothing but inactivity.  Staying in line, becoming sedate.  Putting true potential on the shelf so it won't threaten those in power.  Maintaining the status quo.  It's all just to limit what we could all be.  It's all designed to unbalance everyone.  The strong and the weak.  The rich and the poor.  And what was it again...?  The good and the evil?  Feh.  You're so whipped by it all, my old teacher."

"Stop preaching and take this fight seriously!"

"Okay." And then he made it clear just how much he was holding back.

Oh. My. Gods. The pain...!

I pulled myself out of the crater only to be smashed into another...and another.

"It's going to take more than THIS to push me to the edge!"

"You know...you're right.  This battle is getting boring...so.......it's cheating time!"

"What the--"  I gasped as I saw the twin arc-shaped machines sprout up out of the ground...from the red X painted over top where I was standing.

Arranged in the inner circumference of each arc was a series of ruby red emitters that I didn't recognize in terms of technology. But I didn't have time to ponder it because that was when the discharge of red lightning gripped me like a boa constrictor and squeezed the life out of me...and something else...

I noticed my wounds that had previously healed were now tearing open again...my injuries were coming back...my regeneration was reverting! What had he done?!?!"

But the only thing that I could do...was fill the air with the loudest, most painful, unending scream of anguish I'd ever mustered...and I wasn't stopping. It was constant, searing pain...and it wasn't letting up.

By the time the machine was out of power...I couldn't stand up...I couldn't speak...I couldn't do much of anything...all I could feel was overwhelming weakness.

I panted for a good long bit as Adonis took his time approaching me.

"Oh.  I'm approaching you?  I guess Dio Brando really does deliver a good one-liner."

I panted long enough to be able to get my voice back...but it still hurt. Even if I had nothing left I was going to lay into him verbally.

"Do you now understand?  Do you know why Chaos is superior?  Because it is FAIR.  Isn't that the way this world wants to be?  Indiscriminate?  Inclusive?  It doesn't matter what gender, race, ethnicity, religious or political belief, or whatever that you have.  The only time it never mattered...TRULY mattered is when you are born...and when you die."

"You twist everything, Adonis!  What you're saying is true, but you're passing it through a filter just like every supervillain." I hastily decompressed one of the sticks of dynamite preserved from that Monster Squad incident just before Dracula's werewolf went crashing through a warehouse glass window before being blown up by one. It lit it and Adonis got force-fed a spicy snack.

I'll spare the gruesome details. But suffice to say it was no more effective on him than it was on Wolf Man. Regeneration is a pretty broken and lame thing when it's used against you.

I kept the pressure on with every last thing I had, using every weapon I could lay hands on.

And I knew I was losing. Not just the battle but I was falling into his trap; the more he got in my head the more I acted out in revenge instead of justice.

"Don’t look so glum, Volt...we're finally here.  We're finally at the climax.  And I've set such a wonderful stage...wouldn't you agree.......Asriel Tobias Dreemurr-Arcade?" Adonis grinned deviously as Asriel had reached the square...and saw my broken body.

Sub-Entry 369: "Bad Ending Part 4 - A Forced Broken Promise/Hyperdeath is Adonis' Herald!?":
Asriel looked to him...then he looked to my broken body. In one move...one underhanded cheat, Alloucious Adonis had completely flash-exhausted my ability to regenerate mere seconds. It was like he took what I went through with Photoshop Flowey and multiplied it by 1000 and compressing it into a single attack. It would be...months...years before I could theoretically recover. I couldn't speak, I couldn't move, I couldn't help my best friend!

"I don't understand.  I can't understand."

"You will."

"No.  I won't.  I refuse to."

"There's that Determination of yours, boy."

"Everyone and everything I ever loved is gone.  You took them from me.  You exiled my own sister back to the Soul Society with that exorcism.  My parents...my friends...everyone...I can't understand."

"And yet you know the phrase Serial Killer.  All too well."

"No!  That's just a coincidental anagram of my name!  I'm NOT that!  Stop pushing me to bring out my worst!  I'm going to fight you with my best and stop you!"

"Look around, boy.  Do you understand the situation?  You've already lost another home.  It just hasn't gone 'splodies yet!  Hee hee!"

"If there's a way to save it, I'll find it or die trying!"

"Don't make promises you can't keep, little Asriel."

"This battle ends now."

"And there's the hint that maybe I picked the wrong apprentice.  You don't seem to get that your virtues can become vices in an instant.  You're already tempted."

"You can forget ever getting me to spread your evil.  You do your own dirty work!"

"Well of course I can do all these terrible things...but I'm going to make you do all these terrible things I've got lined up.  I've already had a ball getting Volt over there to do countless terrible things trying to stop me.  Now it's your turn.  That's what makes it eeeeeeeviiiiiiiiiil."

"NEVER!"

Asriel forged the Green Pizza-Cutter and charged forth. The time for talk was over. As if talking were ever the answer in this situation.

Adonis' genocide run was all but complete. If he took out Asriel...then it really would have been all for nothing. I didn't...want to be alone... I didn't want anyone else to die alone...

Why...did this happen.

From there Asriel launched an all-out assault against Adonis, who barely fought back...no...it was more like he barely had to fight back. He wasn't even getting scratched.

"I'm bored." He suddenly said before grabbing the pizza cutter and shattering it with barely any effort. The backlash traveled up Asriel's arm and he clutched his eyes...when he opened them, the green glow began to crack...then fade.

"No...you couldn't have...!" Asriel couldn't feel the Kindness virtue anymore. Something in his soul...just evaporated and went cold. How was this possible.

"Okay...I don't know how I'm going to beat you, but I'll wage war against you for eternity if I have to!"

And out came the watering can. But its draining effect? it might as well be trying to drain every last star in the sky. It couldn't be done. And despite how patient Asriel was being and how well he was anticipating Adonis' moves...

One good slug to the gut made him drop the can...which was promptly stomped out of existence. Another backlash and another virtue broken.

By now Asriel seemed like...he was being less kind and he was starting to rush his moves.

Integrity was next to go. Being slammed into the pavement moments before a blacklight discharge...and then the suit and sandals dissolved.

From that point Asriel felt compelled to resort to underhanded tactics to try to catch Adonis off guard.

Bravery and Justice would crumble. What was this feeling? Was Goat Son's fur starting to darken? What was Adonis doing to him? Were each of the blows tainted with some kind of dark magic that was clouding his heart?

Perseverance managed to last the longest before Adonis did the impossible and lifted the whole mech up by its foot and tossed it into the closest building...the Clocktower we had our cookouts at.

"Okay...no more games...DETERMINATIOOOOOOOOOOOOON!" Asriel swooped in with everything he had...this time he seemed to drive Adonis back and seemed to be causing some semblance of injury.

But then...

CRACK...

Asriel stood horrified as his wings all broke apart and his halo dissolved.

"And that makes seven.  Without those virtues of yours?  You're just an ordinary kid.  Pity you're still so pure that my hexes and curses couldn't turn you evil like they did with Evil-Chara.

But then again...he had a head start, being such a horrible little child in life."

"You shut your mouth about him  You used him and abused him and threw him away like--"

"Like trash.  Funny how that works."

"I won't forgive you!"

I could see that Adonis was baiting him. He was too smart to fall for that...or so I believed. But with all the losses that he had suffered...all the pain and anguish...Adonis had targeted every last weak spot--physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual in him. He was going to collapse on his own foundation. He had had enough.

"Stop it!  Stop it!  Stop it NOWWW!" Asriel swung...and to his horror his fist as caught in mid-air...and crushed.

"AAAAAAAH!!!!!!"

Adonis then belted him one in the mouth before shushing him.

"Shhhhhhhh.  My turn." He taunted, licking his lips and teeth...before unleashing Hell upon the goat.

He tossed him threw buildings, smashed him into cars, drove him into the pavement...he did every brutish thing he could do to Asriel Dreemurr that could possibly be imagined...and he still wasn't down.

Adonis looked over his shoulder with glee at my fallen form.

"Volt...my dear friend...remember when you asked me what interested I had in your precious Asriel?  Remember how I said none whatsoever?  Well...I LIED!!!"

And then a bash upside Asriel's jaw that almost snapped his neck.

"You see...I was after him all along.  And you didn't realize it.  You see...he's key to my...or rather Dr. Leviathan's plan.  A plan that Chara gave to him...and he gave right back to me."

"No....!" I whined.

"Oh the things I'm going to do to him!  I'm not going to kill him, no.  I'm just going to hurt him...really...really...bad...."

I was helpless to stop him from torturing Asriel. Goat Son was bleeding badly and patches of fur were starting to be torn off with his flesh.

Asriel guarded with his left arm before Adonis' next attack mutilated it...leaving what would probably be a horrible scar if given the chance to heal......oh no...it was just like the one in that AU...Caretaker of the Ruins...!

Just to add further injury to insult to injury, Adonis slammed Asriel face first into the pavement. By now Asriel had nothing left and all seven of his virtues had been completely broken and no matter how much he tried, he couldn't reactivate them.

The earthquakes and the steam fissures in the ground were getting worse. The streets and were buckling and buildings were collapsing everywhere. So much fire and smoke.

Asriel looked at me with sorrowful eyes. "I'm...sorry..." He knew he was beaten. While he wouldn't give up, he had nothing left to give.

"Now that you've been whipped into shape and had your body broken...your spirit broken...it's time to break the last thing you hold dear...something irreplaceable...something that you and your so-called best friend have been keeping sacred...something that once it's gone...there's no going back..."

"What are you...!"

Adonis walked over to my ragdoll near-corpse and lifted me up, grabbing me by the hair.

"Leave him...alone...!"

"I just need one thing from him...." Adonis had slipped something onto his other hand...it couldn't be the Infinity Gauntlet...could it?

"Tell me if you've heard this one because Shang Tsung has said it way more times than you'll ever count."

My eyes widened...then it happened.

"GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!!!!!!" I bellowed to the heavens as my head whiplashed backward despite being slammed hard into the chest with the heel of his palm. The backlash of energy was pulling at me from the inside at a force far stronger than the impact.

"VOLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLT!!!!!" Asriel cried out.

That was when my vision began to dim despite my eyelids not closing. I found it harder to move...and then completely impossible...and then...

...then...

...I couldn't...

...feel....

........anything...

"What have you done!?!" Asriel demanded...his voice now sounding...muffled...distorted...in fact I don't think I was...actually hearing him...more like...feeling his anguish.

What...did...Adonis do to me...?"

"I'm sure you know what this is...!"

I felt...like I was hovering...there was...something...horrible underneath me...it was like...a hand, maybe? Adonis' hand? But that would mean--"

"Give him back his soul!" Asriel cried, eyes full of tears.

"No." Adonis simply said rather smugly. "in fact...sharing is caring..." Adonis' eyes widened to ungodly disturbing before he marched over to Asriel and picked him up by the scruff of the neck.

"What are you...no!  No you can't do that!  It...it won't work anyway!  I'm not a--"

"There are ways around everything...even what you are...in fact...I think it's time you had a nice little purge of all that accursed other half of you that you built up over shy of 2 decades."

And then the gauntlet flashed as Asriel screamed out in anguish...trails of multicolored smoke searing off of him and dissolving away like rainbow sparkles.

"You'll have just enough to maintain your physical form...but without that magic of yours...it's going to be really hard to keep yourself together.

Asriel's breathing was labored...heavily labored...in fact he looked almost like he was dying. How...how was I seeing him...it wasn't sight...it was almost like I could feel his spirit...and it was weakening.

"Now...since you're so empty inside...why don't we fill it with something else...?"

"What did you do to me!?"

"You really shouldn't ask questions of the guy who's about to change your life...forever."

Adonis drew back with the hand he had...me...in? Wait...he had me...no...Asriel said it earlier...he had my SOUL!?!"  How did he...!!!  Oh gods no...was he about to do what I think he was about to do!?!?!

"Chara failed to do the one thing he set out to do.  So I think it's only fair that I finish what he started.  After all...you, yourself agreed to it back in your own timeline.  Nobody likes a crybaby that welches on a promise."

"You can't!"

"I can...and I will.  You see...I've pushed you to the tipping point.  And just like gravity...all it takes is one last push."

"I'm begging you...don't do this...!"

"That's cute.  We all have hopes.  We all have dreams.  But hopes can vanish and dreams can die.

So with that said...your forever dreams...are now BROKEN!!! ARISE, ABSOLUTE GOD OF HYPERDEATH!!!"

And then he shoved my soul into Asriel's chest...and then...everything...just stopped...and something...happened.

"...wh.....wh....whyyyy....?" Asriel's tears and look of shock and horror...I could feel them. No...I could start to feel what he was feeling...I could see what he was seeing...we were...merging!"

"You know, I've spent a long time worshipping a goddess and being her Black Knight.  And I never once objected to it.  I still don’t'.  So I have absolutely no reason to consider this line of thinking.  But it was just too good to pass up.  It's a little cliché and it's been done by the likes of Ivo Shandor before...spoilers...but I got to thinking to myself why serve a god...when...?"

He stopped abruptly.

"You probably think I'm about to say "why serve a god when you can become one", right?  Oh no no no, dear boy.  Talk about a boring existence over-saturated with responsibility.  Everyone would be knocking my door down asking for favors or begging me not to destroy their civilizations.

Besides...why do something yourself when you can make someone else do it. To surmise, that's the essence of evil...corrupting someone who'd never do that...and make them do everything that you'd do if you had the power that I've just unlocked in you, Asriel.

So riddle me this...why serve a god...when you can have a god serve you, instead?"

What I felt next...was searing pain throughout his entire body as his screams became endless.

"It...BEGINS!"

Asriel's body...I could feel it from within it...I could feel it burning up...I could feel it contort...and swell...what was happening to him!?

The fire in his eyes...no...it wasn't fire. His sclera began to cloud up...from white to black...those familiar black 8-ball eyes.

I felt his fur burn away on his cheeks...no...it can't be those marks! Those horrible marks!

As his body began to shift, I felt his horns grow out...I felt his clothes begin to tighten and rip and tear away. I felt his sandal straps snap...I could feel wellsprings of an energy I couldn't make sense of built up in him. Was this what magic felt like?

The burning in his chest...and that was when I felt it burn into his flesh and fur...the shape and form of the DeltaRune found on Toriel's robes and Hyperdeath's.

I felt this...presence...like a cloak wrap around...a cloak with huge flaring lapels...just like the one Hyperdeath wore.

But the worst of it was...I could...feel my mind...slipping away...and his...slipping towards it...I was starting to lose track of...who was who...was I me? Was he me? Were we...one...? So. Hard...to think...

Then the final blow came when our two sets of memories intertwined...and he saw the truth. He saw the unbridled truth. Everything I hid from him. My plans and goals. It all dropped on him like a ton of bricks...and I could feel his reactions...and they were not good...they were horrific. Not because I'd kept this from him...but because...Adonis...had...tainted them...he had...tainted the precious...of the...precious...the...sacred...of the sacred...

Our promise...was undone. In the worst possible way, our promise was undone and broken.

Sub-Entry 370: "Bad Ending Part 5 - R.T.T.P."
So...this...was...it........this........how it ends...

Not...sure if...me.....or Hyperdeath... Can't even...shake it off...

I...he....we knew everything...the promise...the promise was destroyed. The one...thing Adonis...took from us...

Why...?

"A  lifetime of servitude, Asriel.  As I said...why serve a god...when a god can serve you?  Oh you're probably wondering.  Why not just BECOME a god?   Talk about an empty, meaningless existence.  As a god, I'd have too much on my plate to just simply discard.  I'd spend eternity just overflowing with responsibilities.   Weak excuse, don' t you think?  Yeah, of course I could become a destroyer god and do all this myself...but it's more fun if I make YOU do all of those horrible atrocities that await every AU.  That's what makes it eeeeeeevilllllll."

Was...having...trouble speaking...was Volt/Asriel...in conflict with my will over this...shared body?

I...we...he...us...were in...state of horror...shock...panic...

"Look around you.  That Determination of yours could save them all..or it could take them away from you.  I mean...what does happen when you RESET a world that isn't your own?"

Taunting us...stop it...stop...you've already......already done...unforgiveable.

He...was lifting us up by...neck...at our size we were...impressively....tall...but...he still......dwarfed us...

* Cryptosmasher ERROR...unable to... *

The world was warping and twisting in and out. It was the...Ripple Effect...stretching out from the future...what had he done?

"You...would endanger...your own existence...!  if...this ceases to be...then S.T.C--"

"What's chaos without a little risk.  I've always wanted to put the..."if you kill your parents in the past then you won't exist in the future therefore can't travel to the past to kill your parents" paradox.  I'm betting that with Madam Fate's contract...I can beat the odds."

"You're...insane!"

"I'm just ahead of the curve." Again...with...Heath Ledger...reference.

"What...makes you think...I can't resist...what makes you think...I won't...rebel...?"

"You'll find out soon enough.  If I have a way to turn you back into a monster than fuse you with the soul of a Lycanthrope...imagine what else I have at my disposal?"

"No...can't....be true..."

"It's true...it's DAMN true...!" Adonis laughed maniacally.

"Come now, Asriel...or should I say Ultimate God of Hyperdeath....you have many more souls to absorb before you become my perfect, invincible, all-powerful puppet...!

Meanwhile...at what was now becoming the End of Time...

At the chasm...

KOMMAND's hand suddenly grabbed the edge of the broken floor...and weakly pulled herself up.

"...Don't...let me down...now........my past self..." KOMMAND struggled to pull herself up...

"This...is our last hope...please...don't fail me...now..."

KOMMAND struggled to stay in one piece; fighting back the paradox of her past self's death at the doors to the Supercalculator room.

"Screw...you...Adonis...no time...to die...!" KOMMAND reached out toward the sky, trying to grab onto anything.

That...was when I/we saw it...manifest. A holo-transmission courtesy...of Violet's hover-drone projectors. No...she couldn't still be...alive?

The drones got in formation and projected an image...I recognized as the Supercalculator room. We/I...could see the long blood trail leading to Violet's torn apart body. Blood coming from her mouth...oh god...Adonis has crushed her throat. How could she still be hanging on...?

Much less...why was she...dragging...herself to...super calculator...something...in memory......

"Ah, you are a stubborn one, aren't you?  Mmn-mmn-mmn-mmn-mmn." Adonis shook his head with a Hyperdeath smug grin.

Violet...pulled herself up by the console, her fingers barely able to click the keys on her workstation. She managed to hoist herself up enough to face the camera, wheezing and rasping for air.

"Oh?  You have something you want to say?  Oh how delightfully befitting that you should go out uttering your last words before you choke to death on your own blood."

Wait a minute...what was...that painful grin Violet was wearing.

"Whaaat?  I can't hear you!" Adonis put his twisted paw to his gnarled ear.

Violet indicated on her other hand with four fingers.

"Four words?  Not much of an epitaph if that's all you have to say.  Defiant to the end.  Even dying you have to get the last words in edgewise.  Always the showboat.  It's futile, you know.  But go on.  It'll be amusing.  I cannot imagine what you could possibly say that could change the outcome of Fate's divine will."

Violet pressed the last key as the monitor displayed something before she managed to wheeze out with the last of her strength one last message.

"Return...

...to...

...the...

...past."

And like that time slowed to a crawl as Adonis' smug grin faded...and distorted...and twisted into a look of rage and panic.

There was no sound. But...we watched...him......mouth the words... "YOU BI--"

* no audio*

Adonis screamed frantically for his forces to warp into the Supercalculator room and put Vi out of her misery and stop what she had just done. But his expression became even more horrified when he saw it on the monitor.

"Program transferred to external modulus.  TRACE THAT PROGRAM--"

Back at the End of Time...

"Pleeeeeease...!" KOMMAND squeezed her eyes shut and cried out before faltering and starting to slip back down into the chasm.

As her hand started to go limp...

Another hand reached out and grabbed it...gripping with all the strength it had left.

There was a hand...and an arm attached to it...and slowly the arm was reintegrating into a body.

"I...WILL...NOT...BE...ERASED...FROM...SPACE-TIME...!  I REFUSE!!!" The voice echoed into existence as her un-helmeted form wisped back into existence.

"DAIMYOU!!!"

"Hold onto me, old friend...this battle is not over yet...as long as there's a will left in us both...our past selves die when we SAY they can..."

"And forever is a long time...isn't it, old friend?"

"The longest wait of all..." Daimyou continued to pull as her strength came back to her by sheer force of will.

"Let's give Volt and Asriel the last spark of hope we have left to give....and make a miracle."

"All of us...together..." KOMMAND nodded, her helmet cracking apart and leaving the face of future Violet in its place.

"Hope..."

"...and dreams..."

"THIS IS OUR WISH!!!" both cried in unison as something...transcended time back to our darkest hour...

Adonis whirled when he saw the movement of Bunnie's hand...the skeletal remains, covered partially by the slowly eroding nanites and cellular tissue.

"The Moji-Cellular!  Adonis took aim and blew it to pieces.  But before the explosion he noticed it.   In the split second before the companion of her Shodouphone was obliterated...a message on screen that only doubled his horror.

"Program uploaded.  Pseudo-code algorithm complete." And he could make out a shape...a diagram of--

"Where did you send it!?  WHERE?!" Adonis grabbed the remains of the Major. Too late. She was already gone.

Where...indeed?

By the time Adonis' head had turned...he saw...me...us...Hyperdeath...with his hand out...hovering over our H.U.D....having flipped it over. The chains over the RESET had been broken. But it no longer set reset on the button. It read: RETURN TO THE PAST in bold letters.

"NOOOO--!" Adonis screamed too late to try to snatch us up by the throat. But...hand was already touching it...the confirmation sound had already rung loud and clear.

As Violet's image started fizzling out as the Chaopolis Elite Guard tried kicking the last bits of life out of her, she started laughing...painfully but audibly...before raising her hand and delivering...well...a rude gesture I'm sure you could guess...

"YOOOOU--"  The rest of Adonis' foul language just...stopped abruptly as all of the sound everywhere just...stopped.



And that was when the Supercalculator lit up bright white...and it was swallowed up by a giant growing ball of light...as it touched Violet's laughing corpse, she dissolved away...and then the elite guard were next...everything was being consumed.

It was...the first time...I could remember...that Adonis was completely...losing it...all the rage...all the horror...all the panic...all the distress...

What...had...Aunt...Violet done...what is...this secret Volt is...no...I see it all clearly now...this is what...you've been hiding in LYOKO all this time.......this is its greatest secret...this is......only.....life...line...

As we...Hyperdeath...crumpled to the ground from Adonis dropping us and trying to run...

I...he...we...grabbed Adonis by the ankle...and held fast...not...going anywhere.

The ball of light had swallowed up UCIAT HQ...and it was consuming the city...before we knew it...it reached us...and...what happened next...

I remember...flinging Adonis into it...first...then...everything...going....going....fading to...white...

So...beautiful...

This is...how it...

The End...???

To Be Continued...

To Part 4

Chapter 38

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