Chapter 9: Clash

Jazz and Spaz appeared behind Devan, standing at attention, deep inside the turtle’s mountain lair. The two had not been hurt by the massive explosion, but they were obviously smart enough not to get caught in the blast. Now, they stood ready, behind Devan, awaiting his commands patiently. Devan was standing near a lizard at a control panel, and the lizard was tapping away madly at the various buttons and keys, displaying Lori’s havoc-wreaking escape from the mountain, and her rendezvous with Acid, Coppertop, and Canadian. He had already seen the gaping hole that Acid’s rocket had left in his mountain, and he knew that they were rapidly approaching to desolate his base beyond repair.
“One got away.” Devan spoke slowly and quietly. “But one is enough. I cannot be safe until all three are under my power, and the threat facing me has been extinguished.”
He turned around, to face the Jackrabbit brothers. “And how, pray tell, did one rabbit escape three Turbulents and a mountainful of armed lizards and turtles?”
Jazz and Spaz remained silent, unsure of whether to answer Devan’s question or not. They stood stock still, watching Devan’s face.
“And now, she’s coming back, with three friends. If you can’t stop one, your own sister, how do you expect to stop four?!”
They knew it was true; if Lori was able to evade both Jazz and Spaz, their new partner Vaper, and a slew of reptiles under their command, they wouldn’t have the slightest hope of defeating their sister, her mercenary friend Coppertop, and whoever the other two rabbits were.
At that moment, Vaper entered. “Milord, the rabbits have breached the surface, and they’re fighting their way in alarmingly fast. What shall we do?”
Devan sighed in dismay. “Release the Attacknids. Vaper, you may use whatever you prefer; same goes for you two. Do not let them escape you again.”
As the three rabbits left, Devan turned again, and stared into space, thinking deeply. If he were to lose Whitespire, he would lose his greatest advantage against the rabbits since he had the advantage of surprise during his first campaign, when he had kidnapped the princess and thrown Carrotus into chaos. He would not lose against his enemies again.

The Attacknids were giant robot spiders, each armed with a chaingun on the front of its head, framed by burning orange eyes, and a single rocket perched on a holder on its back. One alone was an adept fighting force; Lori, Canadian, Coppertop, and Acid were forced to face off against one each, as well as the seemingly endless scores of lizards and turtles that threw themselves at the advancing rabbits, only to be ultimately destroyed. Acid’s rocket launcher was suddenly useless against the masses, as he couldn’t use the weapon in the close quarters of the cavernous corridor in which the battle raged. As a result, Coppertop lent him her navy blaster, then went about the skirmish like a nightmare, slicing into and through foes with the murderous blade of her sword Shale. While not as comfortable with a blaster as he was with his devastating rocket launcher, he quickly caught on to the idea of point and shoot rather than fire and forget.
The Attacknids were a far more difficult foe than any of the sentient cold-blooded minions, as they were surprisingly agile despite their cumbersome weaponry. The lizards and turtles frequently tripped over each other, and didn’t seem to follow any sort of plan, whereas the Attacknids were perfectly coordinated in their strikes against the rabbits, appearing to be controlled by a single intelligence.
However, the blunt stupidity of the lizards and turtles turned out to be in the rabbits’ advantage. Their guns were not exactly fitted for accuracy, and as the rabbits flew in front of them, they could only pull the trigger and hope they hit something. This was often a big mistake, as the Attacknids that they hit would immediately turn on them, and riddle them full of holes. This, in turn, allowed the attackers time to get behind the Attacknids, and deal them some serious damage while not dealing with their business end.
Finally, the balance of the battle tilted in their favour as Acid hit an Attacknid right between the eyes, causing its whole head to explode in a shower of sparks and debris. Acid, taken aback by the sudden defeat of the robotic spider, jumped back, colliding with a group of lizards. They went down in a pile of scales and fur, and Acid lashed out with Coppertop’s blaster, laying a few lizards low with mighty smashes with the blunt butt of the gun.
Weaving among the bedazzled lizards, throwing a punch once and catching a turtle in the face, he made his way over to Coppertop, who was skilfully dancing in front of her Attacknid’s gun, pouncing in close enough to lay a ringing blow off of its armour, then dashing back again. There were several long dents in its armour, and it looked like it had taken quite a beating from Shale; however, it seemed unfazed by the numerous hits it had taken.
Coppertop hardly even saw Acid before he was straddled on the Attacknid’s back, and the single missile on its launcher was flung across the room, exploding into the massed ranks of scaly soldiers. Acid immediately began to hammer down on the Attacknid’s small, round head, and the blows raining down upon the weak appendage eventually took their toll as the head broke off of the main body. Acid leaped away as it collapsed and exploded.
Acid wiped a hand across his brow, mock wiping sweat off of his forehead, as Coppertop approached him. “Not bad, Acid, not bad.”
Acid nodded. “Thanks. What say we go help Lori and Canadian dismantle those other two electronic eyesores?”
“Sounds like a plan.”
The remaining two Attacknids were quickly dispatched as the odds were doubled against them. Coppertop impaled one with her sword as Lori knocked its head off with her fearsome spinkick, and Canadian and Acid both drilled the other one, from opposite sides, with blaster bullets, which quickly drove through its armour and into its inner workings. After that, the remaining reptiles were no hard task to clean up.
Acid handed Coppertop’s gun back to her, handle-first, with an impressive flip in the palm. “Thanks for the weaponry. I think I owe you one.”
“Nah, forget it. It was enough to see you on that thing’s back, bashing away on its head and screaming at the top of your lungs. I’m going to remember that for a long time.” She grinned.
“Yeah, so am I. Good times,” he chuckled.
As they looked around the suddenly empty main cavern, they realized that either Devan had run out of cronies to throw at them, or he was waiting for them to spring a trap. Knowing the infamous turtle mastermind, it was more than likely the latter.
They moved slowly and cautiously through the chamber, their eyes scanning for any signs of an imminent ambush, a hidden trap, or anything of the sort. Nothing obvious sprang out at them from the dark stone walls; then again, Devan was not one for laying obvious traps, so they had to keep their eyes open for anything that looked out of the ordinary. They edged down the cavernous hallway as a group, and their eyes scrutinized every detail of their surroundings.
There was a foreboding presence around them, and Acid didn’t like it. “Is it just me, or do you guys feel something… wrong here?”
They stopped, and Lori looked around anxiously. After a short while, she lowered her head, and shuddered slightly, as if a cold breeze had just struck her. “You’re right. I don’t know what it is, but there’s definitely something here that’s not kosher.”
Canadian caught a glimpse of what looked like a silver flash, in one of the shadowy corners of the cavern, but he couldn’t make out what it was. He kept it in mind for the moment, and where he had seen it, so that he could tell the others. However, for the moment, the coldness of the cavern seemed to begin to perturb them, slowing them down. Eventually, they came to a halt, shivering like they were in a freezer.
Canadian complained vehemently. “Jeez, can’t that slimy-beaked fanatical freak keep the thermostat a bit higher? It’s like we’re walking through an icebox here!”
Coppertop shivered again. “Well, he is cold-blooded, so I doubt it really matters to him what the temperature is. But you’re right, it’s definitely not comfortable in here. I feel like my fur’s going to freeze up.”
Lori was less quiet about her sneezing, but she was polite enough to turn her head away before doing so. “What are we looking for, anyway?”
“Us?”
They looked upwards as three figures dropped from the ceiling above them. All three were rabbits, and easily recognizable.
One was the super-strong assailant who had assaulted the Jackrabbits on their first journey to Mount Whitespire. He still had markings in the fur on his right arm from the immense weight of the Hercules weapon that he had used against the trio.
The other two were none other than Jazz and Spaz Jackrabbit.
Jazz grinned insolently at Lori. “Oh, don’t look so stunned, dear sister. You saw this coming.”
Lori closed and opened her mouth again in astonishment. Jazz had suddenly acquired the bulk of grown muscles; not huge sets, but enough to demonstrate that he was much stronger than he had been before his capture. Spaz, on the other hand, was still wiry, but he was definitely taller than he was when Lori knew him.
Spaz chuckled, and looked to Jazz. “I don’t think our sister knows who we are anymore. Then again, she never did catch on quickly to anything…”
Coppertop snarled at them, defending her friend’s dignity, but said nothing. She wasn’t sure what to say to the two rabbits who she thought would have been able to escape Devan’s experiments without a scratch.
Vaper snarled back. “Nothing to say? Then prepare to die in the name of Lord Devan Shell!”
Before any of the four could react, the Turbulents already had their blasters out, and they had to scramble in a mad retreat as the guns blazed…