Chapter 10: Desperate Measures

Lori was the first to react, and she was already moving even as the first shots were fired. She quickly ducked under the gunfire, and swung low with her leg, aiming for Jazz’s ankles. However, her brother was one step ahead of her, and he leapt into the air high enough to clear Lori’s whole body, let alone her foot. He came down with such force that if he had landed on Lori’s leg, she would have been crippled for the rest of her life.
Coppertop went after Spaz. Instead of going under the hail of white-hot bullets, like Lori, she went over, and grabbed Spaz’s shoulders to flip herself over his head, in a difficult but effective maneuver she had used once before. It put her behind Spaz, perched on his back, with her hands gripping his shoulders and her feet on the backs of his calves.
However, Spaz was much quicker than he looked. By clinging to his back the way she did, Coppertop put her head directly behind Spaz’s, which proved to be a costly mistake. Without warning, he suddenly lunged upward, butting her in the face with his head. There was a sharp crack as the mercenary’s nose was jammed backwards; thankfully, her nose bone was not broken in two by the vicious headbutt, nor did it reach her suddenly vulnerable brain. However, she was forced to let go of his shoulders as the blood began to flow from her nostrils. She fell heavily on her back, one hand clamped over her nose to stifle the bleeding, as Spaz turned to face her. She had to dodge out of the way as he sent a rain of bullets at her.
Canadian and Acid, the latter of whom had discreetly borrowed Coppertop’s blaster again on the arrival of the Turbulents, both leveled their weapons at the third rabbit, Vaper, and pulled their respective triggers. The grey rabbit smirked as the bullets flew from the barrels of their guns at a speed that no normal rabbit would have been able to dodge.
However, it had been repeatedly established that Vaper was no longer normal, in any respect.
Vaper suddenly disappeared from view as the bullets approached, and re-appeared at point blank behind the duo. He swung an overly forceful right hook at Acid’s head, and knocked him askance even from the only glancing blow that landed; if the attack had been accurate he would have been dead before he hit the ground. As it was, Acid staggered a few feet, reeling from the blow, and Canadian was left to deal with him.
The steadfast rabbit dropped to a crouch as the blow was thrown, and lashed out quickly with one of his long legs. It caught Vaper off-guard, but he didn’t recoil far from the strike; the strong kick only moved the unyielding Turbulent an inch backward. Instead, Canadian was the one who was stopped short, and he shivered as a shockwave of painful, freezing cold rolled up his leg. Before he could react, Vaper smashed an elbow to the small of his back, flattening him completely, and nearly paralyzing him on the spot.
Lori was fighting with all she had against Jazz, but she simply could not match his brutal fighting style; he fought to kill, and Lori simply could not find the want inside her to kill her brother. Coppertop was almost incapacitated by a completely unexpected headbutt, and her blood marked the stone floor as she frantically evaded the blasts from Spaz’s gun. Canadian had been temporarily immobilized by the fierce blow to his back, and his legs tingled with a painful numbness as he tried to move them. Acid was the only one who was not occupied with one of the three Turbulents, nor seriously injured by them, and he had both his rocket launcher and Coppertop’s blaster at hand.
Vaper turned his attention to Acid as he called out to Coppertop, standing up slowly. She caught the blaster he threw to her, with a slight stumbling uncertainty that was unusual for the mercenary’s imperturbable nature; however, she used it with the matchless, flawless proficiency that only she could muster, and rapidly switched from defense to offense against Spaz.
Acid stood to his full height, with an almost maniacal look in his eyes as he glared angrily at Vaper. He lifted his red rocket launcher onto his shoulder, pointing it unwaveringly at the gray rabbit, and the Turbulent saw the silvery glint of the powerful rocket loaded deep inside its barrel.
Lori gasped as Acid propped his rocket launcher onto his shoulder. If he set off one of his warheads in the tight confines of this cavern, he wouldn’t only kill himself, but everyone else as well. She had to do something to stop him… but what?
Thinking quickly, she launched a powerful flipkick at Jazz. It came when he wasn’t expecting it, and her foot connected with his chin. The sheer force of the kick sent him flying straight up, and his neck made a sickening crack as he slammed headfirst into the solid rock ceiling of the cavern, before he collapsed, with a dull thud, to the ground.
Canadian had also glimpsed Acid preparing his unduly destructive weapon, and forced his legs to work as he stood up. The effects of Vaper’s strike were beginning to wear off, and the tingling feeling, while still present, was not as painful. He only just made it to a standing position before Acid’s rage took over.
Acid roared as the rocket ignited within the barrel of the rocket launcher, and the combined, deafening sound stopped Coppertop and Spaz dead in their tracks. The distraction gave Lori time to dash headlong at Coppertop, and she half-tackled the mercenary around the waist, carrying her as far as she could in the fraction of a second she had before the rocket detonated.
The explosion hit like lightning. Lori, Coppertop, and Canadian were literally thrown along the cavernous tunnel as the massive shockwave blasted the rocky walls to dust, and the normally dark, gloomy cave lit up like daylight as the explosion erupted. Canadian landed lightly, dropping into a quick roll as he touched down, and Lori hit the ground running, allowing Coppertop from her grip so that they could both run as fast as their legs could possibly carry them.
At long last, the roaring faded to silence. The explosion had run its course… but at what cost? Acid had taken his own life in order to save them, and now, if they weren’t able to defeat Devan, his valiant sacrifice would be for naught. Coppertop took two steps back in the direction they had just come from, searching for any sign of life.
There was a weak, painful cough from a short distance away, and Coppertop strained her eyes to see through the smoke that clogged the passageway. The choking cloud was almost opaque, and it burned and stung her eyes as she squinted into it, but she refused to give up on Acid. She was soon rewarded as the screen of smoke lifted, and she was able to see the charred form of the green-furred rabbit lying on the rocky floor, with his red rocket launcher on top of his broken body.
Acid’s normally emerald-toned fur was blemished with patches of black and gray, and there were cuts and bruises all over his body from his fall against the rough stone floor. His nose and mouth were both bleeding copiously, and his arduous coughing sounded like it was slowly ripping his throat apart. Coppertop carefully made her way to him, and knelt beside the injured rabbit, holding his head in her hands.
“Acid…” She hesitated, unsure of what to say. “I… can’t believe you did that…”
Acid coughed, and grinned. “Well, I had to save the rest of you, I guess.”
Coppertop smiled back at him, as Lori and Canadian approached. She wasn’t often lost for words, but this was one of the rare times when she was. “Thank you... You’ll be okay, we’ll get you back to Carrotus City, and the doctors will…”
“I’m fine, Copper. I don’t need to go back.” Acid’s voice was surprisingly clear, despite the guttural coughs taking their toll on his throat. He wiped his jaw with his hand, and stared at the red smear tingeing the fur on the back of his hand.
Coppertop was taken aback. Here was Acid, brutally wounded, almost dead from the injuries he had, and yet still willing to press onward. There was a valour inside him that she had no idea he had, and she smiled as she pulled his heavy rocket launcher off of him, then offered a hand to help him up.
As Acid slowly rose, Lori posed a question. “Where are Jazz and Spaz? What happened to them?”
Acid twitched, half in pain, half in reaction to Lori’s inquiry. “Well, y’see… they kinda didn’t escape the blast, per se…”
Suddenly, she had him by the neck, and he found himself kicking helplessly as she held him off the ground by the throat. “What do you mean, they didn’t escape the blast? Where are they?!”
Acid struggled against Lori’s grip, gasping as she tightened her hold on his neck. “Urk… the other… side of… the rocket… knocked clear… out cold…”
His eyes rolled back in his head as he began to run out of air, and it took both Canadian’s and Coppertop’s combined strength to pry open Lori’s grip on Acid’s throat. He dropped to the ground, holding his neck and gulping down air thankfully.
Lori was over to where Acid had indicated in a flash, and, to her relief, her brothers lay on the stone ground, side by side and mercifully unconscious. She couldn’t help but notice, to her credit, that their fur colours had, at last, returned to normal; her brothers had finally been restored, in both body and mind, to who they had used to be.
Before long, both of the Jackrabbit brothers were awake again, seemingly unaffected by their Turbulence save for being very cold. They were already armed with the weapons they had taken from Devan’s armoury, and were more than willing to take Devan apart for what he had put them through.
With the Jackrabbits reunited, and three more adept warriors on their side, they formed a fighting force that no reptilian legion could match. All that was left was to find Devan, bring his reign of terror to a dead halt, and put an end to the Turbulence Machine once and for all…