(no subject)

14.

The thoughts came right into Mickey’s head, he didn’t know from where.

“Pick a single target and deal with it. If you see a way to help another, do so, but, otherwise just deal with a single target. You must not let yourself be confused by the amount of
clamor all around you. If you focus, you will do well.”

At this point Mickey saw the first of the robots. It was at least a story high and bright silver and red. The moment Mickey saw him, the thing took a blast from a bazooka. The smoke puffed a
bit on its back, it leaned forward about a foot, and then recovered. It was immediately hit by a blast on its chest. Again, the recovery was instantaneous.

Mastadon stepped forward and slammed his fist into the machine, and the thing reached out and took his arm. The “head” turned and its single eye opened its iris. A blast of red came
blasting out and would have knocked Don to the ground, had he not been held in place by the machine. It then held the boy’s friend out at arm’s length and dropped him.

Mickey had already given Don invulnerability and flight, so he couldn’t repeat that, but he had to do something. He gritted his teeth and tried to push out a power he hadn’t used before. Nothing happened. He then thought, “Enabler? That’s what they called me.”

Don was slowly rising to his feet and steeled himself to attack again. He stood to his full height, and then Mickey hit him with his mind. Now Don grew even taller. Instead of 12 feet tall, he was now 25 feet tall, with the physical power to match it. He lifted the robot off the ground and threw it into another.

Mickey turned to look at other battles, and had another idea. He couldn’t affect the inorganic robots, but he could give something to his allies.

Suddenly the robots were being hit by invisible allies. They were battered by unseen assailants from all sides. After being unstoppable the mammoth automatons were falling. They were still doing damage, but they had lost the advantage.

When Mickey emerged from the Sphere there were at least a dozen robots laying waste to everything in sight. Within two minutes of their landing, there were only three of the giant machines
standing. And those looked shaky.

A feeling a triumph swept though the mostly young warriors. They had met the forces of the Knight and walloped them.

The army guys were cheering, and, as the last robot fell, the super team felt like doing the same.

That celebratory feeling was shattered as a hanger on the base behind them exploded.

From the building a previously unseen giant robot eminated transporting something metal. No one could tell anything about the Frisbee shaped thing, since it was covered by a
massive tarpaulin.

The thing soared away at lightning speed, and none of the Thunderbase assemblage could maintain that velocity.

The heroes were cleaning up the last of the robots, as Mickey looked back to see his mother coming out of the Sphere.

“You did great, honey,” She assured him, in a low, measured voice.

For the first time he was aware that his mother was filled with a longing. He thought it was the longing to be out there with them. She had been a powerful warrior, how awful it must be to be relegated to the sidelines.

There was no victory in her face, and Mickey was sure he knew what the problem was.

She already knew what he was just beginning to understand about the entirety of the catastrophic destruction that lay before them.

The gigantic monstrosities lay as nothing more that the other rubble in whose midst they stopped even their most final functions. What they were built to do, they had finished.

The robots had been expendable.

The plan was a success.

They got what they wanted.

Phase one was over, and the bad guys had won.

© 2005 by C. Wayne Owens