Comics by Shaenon II

Michael sat inside a prison bubble, his legs folded and his arms crossed. "This is typically why I stay out of these affairs. They're hectic and disorderly and everyone uses them to further their own personal agendas." He had considered attempting to escape, but it wasn't a very intelligent idea, since the bubble itself was slowly drifting back to the ground that would have otherwise broken him into many broken pieces. Actually, the trip downward was somewhat relaxi-

Then Xerox soared past his prison, an infuriated expression on his face and a staff in his hands. Michael's eyes widened in horror and sheer terror as the commander of M swung his bludgeoning implement downward, sending the bubble plummetting to the surface at a horrifying speed. The bubble itself wasn't broken upon impact, but rather it bounced off the dirt and careened into a nearby wall, spinning and eventually landing in a corner. The passenger inside received the worst of it: Michael was jostled and tussled and extremely disoriented, and it had been absolutely impossible to look dignified during the ride! "Dang that man and his Neon Green hair!" he scowled as he pushed himself up off the floor of his prison. "Well, nothing to do but find a way to escape from here, I suppose." He rolled up his sleeves and began sciencing.

The gray disabled his nanobots. Overwhelmed flamma fell through the dying green body.

flamma felt the poison pierce his side. It began it's work traveling his circulatory system shutting down his organs. flamma was dead before he hit the ground, and disintegrated like all of his bots when he reached it.

A few seconds before his brain shut off, a high frequency radio pulse shot out of flamma.

-so i am dead now then-
-I'll build you a new body when we get home.-
-wait didn't you have to turn me over-
-I had to hand over your base AI, but it might take them years to replicate the protocols I fed you. Be calm, you own yourself my friend. Or you will.-
-you will still employ me i hope-
-Of course Flamma. I could use some more muscle. Mr. Guy I keep for his intelligence, just don't tell him that.-


"Tha' wu's fun. Now le's have owr nex' monster," said Radcliffe with guns in hand and a insane smile on his face.

With a bound, Jane's monster shot out of the box, running towards the pit. The... thing was reminiscent of Frankenstein's original monster, but only if some twisted matter-creator had spliced it with the incredible Hulk. The figure, 10 feet tall, spliced of body parts sewn together, was guided by the machinery embedded in its back.

The machinery consisted of a large backpack-like device, with a pole-and-line arrangement that hovered over the monster's head. A small, fluffy rabbit hung from the pole, just out of reach. As the crowd watched, inertia brought the bunny close enough, where the monster quickly grabbed and ate it. At this, the 'backpack' glowed for a second, then another rabbit emerged, was levitated over the monster's head, and settled down on the end of the line.

As it got to the edge of the pit, the monster spoke.
"Me GuG. gUg LiKe TaStIeS. YoU TaStieS?"

No one said anything.

"MuSt Be TaStieS... fRoZeN likE bUnNy. gUg LiKe BuNnY. gUG EAT YOU!!"

Gug jumped into the pit, roaring as he went.

Another monster. This one seems to eat rabbits. Yes, I could blow it up. But there's an interesting distraction over there...

I walk over to the man in the green bubble- I think he's Fredric's hench. "Hi! What are you doing in that bubble?" I wonder why Jennifer did that... probably to confuse someone...

~Jennifer~

She rolled her eyes. Claire had such a short attention span...

Michael didn't pay her any heed at first. He was examining what he believed to be the release mechanism for the prison bubble. "Hmm... a pop-o-matic prison... terribly ingenious, but not incredibly complicated. All it seems like I have to do to get out is pop these various bubbles in rapid order of the color they flash in. Like an old Bop-it toy." he looked up at Claire, momentarily gazing into her eyes. "Hm? Oh... I'm just breaking out. Ah...um...how about you?" he raised his arms, rapidly popping different colored bubbles as he replied to her.

As he finished, the prison bubble exploded, and Michael landed on the ground, feet first. He chuckled. "There we go. Much better now that I can get let myself stretch a bit. So what are you up to, Miss?"

"Oh, I think I'm supposed to be doing something with fighting some sort of giant monster who's trying to kill everyone. I just got distracted by the protection-bubble. It's not a prison bubble, by the way- those are much more difficult to get out of. And they're blue." I glance back at the monster, then toss a large number of explosives at it. Not terribly effective, but it does a lot of collateral damage. And it's fun. "You're Fredric's hench, right? I don't think I recognize you. I don't suppose you know why you were in the bubble in the first place, by the way? I was kind of curious."

"Weh'll this looks like s'um fun," said Radcliffe.

He put on his best roguish smile. (Hm. Wonder what happens if I take the bunny away...)

He pulled out two guns. He ran quickly up to the creature and jumped on its back. "It's Gug is'it? So, howdya like this."

He shot the bunny with a laser obliterating it. He took the other gun and aimed it carefully.

Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-

He busted the bunny serving mechanism with a short burst from the gun. Jumping quickly from Gug's back he rolled to his feet and ran away.

He had a feeling Gug wouldn't like it that his bunnies were gone.

At the loss of the rabbit, Gug went beserk, throwing his body around in a massive swipe at That Guy. "GUG SMAAASH!!" he yelled.

Meanwhile, the bunny-server mechanism reassembled itself, creating a new rabbit with a flash of light. Once it was in his field of view, Gug calmed down a bit, running after the small fuzzy creature as the device guided it into the next group of people.

-Michael-

He grinned at Claire, a sinister gleam in his eye. "You seem to know an awful lot about these bubbles..." he considered building a device to stun her, tying her to a rack, and interrogating her about what she knew, but quickly discounted it. He'd seen Claire in action before, even if she didn't know who he was. And he wasn't entirely sure he wanted to antagonize her over something that she may not actually know much about. He turned to stare at Jane's monster. "Anyway, there'll be time for rampant paranoia later. And I mean that... I'll freak out over it when I'm NOT currently in life threatening danger." he was actually a bit disappointed. It didn't even seem like Jane had put that much time or effort into her monster at all. It wouldn't actually be that difficult to get rid of. I just need a few things..." He looked around, and began building. In about a few minutes he'd managed to put most of the junk nearby him together into two significant things: One was a small yet powerful catapult, and the other was a box just large enough to fit over an adult-sized human, with the words "Transmogrifier" written on it, and a little dial fastened to the side that could be set to "Eel", "slug", "dinosaur" or "bunny."

With a malevolent grin, he turned to face Claire. "Miss, how would you like to be a guniea pig for my latest invention... all you'd have to do is put this on for a moment and then lead that monster over onto my catapult..." He hefted the box aloft, setting the dial on the side to "Bunny", and approached Claire...

I don't protest as he slams the box over me. I've never been a bunny before, and I kind of wonder what it's like. I just hope he didn't-

*ZAP*

-give it too weak a power source. I tend to be rather difficult to transmogrify/mutate/what have you. I look down at myself as he pulls the box off me. Fuzzy, with the ears and the tail. Ooooh, and claws. Fun. But I still have thumbs, and I'm bipedal.

"Hey, I'm a Fredric! Neat!" He blinks. "I think your machine needs more power, by the way." I reach into my pocket. "Superbattery? Or do you think I'm bunny enough to distract that thing? What, you've never seen a semi-human with self-correcting, resilient DNA?"

Michael blinked. "Huh." Whatever he had been expecting, it wasn't that. He shrugged. "Well, go...to...it... I guess." Hmm... self-repairing DNA. An absolutely fascinating concept. He shooed Claire off onto her task. "Here... I'll try to get it's attention focused on you." He waved and shouted over at Radcliffe. "HEY! Mr. Purveyor of highly dubious substances! How about you shoot that thing's bunnies away again, ok?"

I run toward the monster. Maybe a few explosives to start with... how do bunnies normally get people's attention? Hmmm... Fredric usually just calls the name of whoever it is...

"Hey, Gug! I'm a bunny!"

Adrew grinned, dowging a blow from the monster. he actiually couldhelp, here! From the bottomless pockets of his coat he produced a little vial.

"Claire! Catch!" she yelled tossing the vial *right* t her. It broke, of course, showering her with his own little concotion...

Biologists never overlooked pheremones, after all. Claire could probably now convice anyone from a werewolf to Fredric himself that she was a lagine life form.

Radcliffe looked at Michael. "Sho'." Then he smiled: calculating trajectories as Gug moved, finding ways to fire the laser at the target without standing still long enough to get eaten. It was just his kind of party.

"Whoooooooo Hooooooooo!" he shouted as he began to pull out guns and throw them in the air firing them at the rabbit.

He blasted as fast as he could inside what appeared to be a cloud of automatic weaponry flying around him. He moved as fast as he could to keep up with the rabbit regenerator.

Gug suddenly sped up, throwing his body around, sending Claire flying into the wall. A few seconds later, Radcliffe got just a hair too close as he made another pass at the bunny machine, and Gug sent him slamming into the wall right next to Claire. However, they had had some effect.
The pounding the monster was taking was gradually slowing it down, the dents on its skin becoming bruises. Though the device on its back could repair itself, the monster didn't have long...

It seems like I keep getting slammed into walls for some reason...

Gug doesn't hit as hard as that robot did, though. I sigh. And he doesn't seem to be trying to eat me, even though I'm a bunny now.

Of course, that just means I should just keep throwing explosives. Who am I to complain?

I stand up. Nothing's broken. I nudge the Guy with my foot. "Please don't tell me you can get killed by something like that. It would make me look bad for not having killed you yet." I glare at him. If he wouldn't fight me *and* he dies that easily... And if he's dead I can't even kill him out of annoyance...

Lagos flew low and zoomed in circles around Gug. "BuNnY!" Gug reached out to grab her, but couldn't close its fist fast enough to catch the darting rabbit. "Come on," Lagos begged, "get dizzy, you ginormous waste of intelligence. Maybe then you'll stop eating and smashing."

Michael grinned as Lagos accidentally led Gug over to the launch pad of his catapult. "Perfect. Time to waste this thing." he pulled a lever and the catapult itself fired, sending Gug moving at a ridiculously, improbably, ludicrously fast speed through the air. It began to soar off into the stratosphere, until it was beyond the reach of anyone without telescope-vision. Michael grinned and folded his arms. "At that speed either the forces affecting atmospheric exit will destroy it, or it'll be launched into a low orbit and die in the cold recesses of space, or it'll somehow manage to slow itself enough to not leave the atmosphere, and burn up on re-entry. Either way, that's one monster down. Oh yeah... I do rock!" he chuckled.

A hand suddenly settled on Micheal's shoulder, startling the young genius.

"Pretty good, kid." said Xerox calmly, eyes glinting slightly under his sunglasses. His power-suit had switched off, leaving him back in his usual uniform.

"I look forward to seeing your career flourish. Just make sure to think of me if you ever get get in over your head." and with that he walked away, twirling his staff slowly. Time to see what they were in for now...

He;d never admit it... but the kid kinda reminded him of himself, when he was younger. He'd thought he could get by like that too...

Radcliffe smiles at Claire. "Nons'nse." He hopped to his feet and brushed his jacket off. "I jus' di'nt calculate 'is reach corr'ctly."

Meanwhile...

-let me see!-

-Fine. Look through my eyes.-

-oh, ouch. he can take that?-

-His kind are particularly resilient. They we're designed using faulty Jäger schematics. Left out the loyalty gene.-

High above the arena, the high-speed missile rose in the air, then somehow reversed direction. Without warning, the blur flew down, humming as the air distorted around it, then blasted back into the arena, to smash (at speed) into the floor of the pit. An incredibly battered Gug raised his head, somehow summoning the strength to get up.

He didn't make it. Muttering, "Gug sm..." the great, Frankenstein-like monster died. The mechanism bound into his back attempted to self-repair once more, managing one flash of light before it collapsed as well.

Silence. Stillness. Then, suddenly, a small motion caught everyone's eye. From the wreckage of the machine, a small, fuzzy rabbit crawled out. Claire went over to it and picked it up.

After several minutes had passed without the bunny attacking her (or doing anything but making tiny cooing noises), Claire passed the creature around the group. From where she was watching, JN smiled.

"Now the real fun begins."

~~~

Meanwhile, in the Security Room

"Sir! Sir!"

"What is it?"

"We've found Timmy."

~
The MIB had been stuffed into a trash can, in such a way that it was impossible for him to pull himself out. When removed, he let out a loud groan.a

"*aaaaagh* What took you so long? I've been sitting in here for days!"

"Days? We last saw you just over 24 hours ago. How did you recover from being turned into a girl?"

"What are you talking about? My last memory is of that witch Jane Narbon looking over me in that hotel room! Then, after I woke up, I've spent several days in here."

The MIB-in-charge looked perplexed. "Then who..."

Understanding struck.

Flashback: Mz. Williams providing a stack of quarters to the Madness tester... A stack of quarters that had been hollowed out and filled with something very special.

Flashback: The auburn-haired MIB patrolling the auditorium, keeping out Mads... but occasionally stopping to rub something on the seats herself.

Flashback: The team of MIBs going to Jane and Claire's hotel room, demanding Claire's weapons. At the back of the group, one female MIB makes hand signals that are projected above the group's head.

Flashback: Jane Narbon's complete and total disappearances... coinciding with the activities of one special security person.

Flashback: The hotel room, right after Jane knocks out Timmy. Jane and Claire quickly swing into action, applying disguise materials and putting on duplicate clothing in record time. Timmy is removed from the bed, Claire sticking a small device on him that makes him go invisible, and is hidden under it. Finally, Jane gets onto the bed, Claire locking the chains around her limbs right before the other MIBs bust the door in.

"Sir, are you feeling all right?"

"FIND JANE NARBON RIGHT NOW!!!!!"

~~~~

"Watch this," said Jane to Frederic, as the Mads passed the small rabbit around. "Now the fun starts."

Frederic shot Jane a dirty look. "What are you talking about?" he asked.

"Watch."

By the time the Mads in the pit noticed they were transforming, it was too late to do anything about it. Limbs shrunk down, ears lengthened, fur grew on exposed skin.

Soon, except for Saya, Lagos, Claire, Chic, and Professor Tinker, everyone in the pit had transformed into a small, furry animal.

Jane gloated to Frederic, "Gug was just the decoy. That's my real monster. Oh, and here comes the finale!"

A door at the edge of the arena opened, letting in the final phase of Jane's plan. Flanked by their mothers, over a dozen 8-year-old girls entered the arena and walked down to the pit. Claire perked up.

"Hi!" she said. "OK. Everybody gets to pick one pet." Acting like she was thinking, she said, "I choose Fluffy!" and picked up Jane's special rabbit. Immediately, the girls charged forwards, searching for new vict-- er, furry companions.

After they left, Jane smiled, turning to look at the crowd.

"And that, everybody, is my monster."

(Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo! I'm a cute kitty-cat. This day couldn't possibly be worse.)

Little hands grab Radcliffe and ferry him off. He doesn't know where. He can feel their rough grabs and poking and especially the petting.

And now he has a pink bow. (Alright, so it can be worse.)

I watch the children take the animals away, feeling a bit disappointed for some reason. Sure, it was an amazing evil scheme and successfully humiliated everyone else. Sure, it was neat seeing everyone else get turned into animals. Sure, now I'm holding the monster responsible for everything, and we still get to fight one more monster before the competition's over.

But I really thought there would be time to beat his head in or stuff an explosive down his throat...

Grrr... this is starting to get on my nerves... No matter, though... I walk over to Mister Tinker and grin determinedly. "I'm a Fredric now! And I can *smell* stuff! Neat, huh?" I twitch one of my ears. I can stay like this for a little while longer- it isn't starting to hurt yet. "And Fredric's monster is next, right? I can't wait!" I hug the monster-bunny and giggle. "It's fun working for Mistress- she's so good at everything!"

Michael the Meerkat whined, as a little girl was carrying him off. Mentally he added a new rule to his list of obsessively-paranoid rules to live by: "NO touching any animal associated with Mad Science!"

Truth be told, they were really more guidelines than rules, but they worked and he really ought to have known better. And of course knowing the MSO they'd force people to fight like this, or automatically declare Frederic's monster victorious of the little girls walked off with all of them. He sighed. While he wouldn't mind Frederic winning, this was an affront to his dignity that he couldn't tolerate. Scrambling in the arms of the little girl who had "Adopted" him, he hopped out of her arms and scurried back over the pile of his former clothes. Rustling around in them, he withdrew a cell-phone and fiddled with the buttons until he found what he was looking for, and hit the autodial button.

"Hello?"

"Squeek squeek sqeeek, squeek squeeken." Michael tried to sound as annoyed as he could with his meager meerkat voicebox.

"Say no more! We're on our way."

It took mere moments before the MSO operatives found themselves besieged. A legion of angry people with clutching pithy signs were beginning to swarm into the arena section of the stadium, chanting loudly and screaming. Eventually, a ringleader stormed forward to glare straight into the uncaring eyes of Unkillable Eddie.

Eddie scowled. "What exactly do you guys wan-"

"We are the PETTA: People for the Ethical Treatment of Transformed humAns!" The man was practically foaming at the mouth as he ranted. "And we loudly object to the transformation of humans in your hate-competition! It is horrible and twists the minds of children who are watching it!"

Unkillable Eddie sighed. "Oh geeze... stupid Mad activists... Look: We're all consenting adults in a private environment, so..."

"That's being broadcast publicly around the world! We're prepared to launch wave after wave of lawsuits at you until your corporation folds entirely!"

Eddie felt a headache coming on. "Fine, look, whatever. If we change them back will you shut up and go away?"

"Perhaps. But make it quick!"

Eddie gave the word, and several MSO agents broke off from what they were doing and received transformation rays. Walking towards the pit, they fired in rapid order, and changing people back from animals to humans. This caused the lamentations of various little children. However, one person in particular was pretty happy about it.

"YES!" David grinned. "I'm human again! Whoo!" He grinned and cheered before someone shot him with a clothing ray, resulting in him being dressed in a thick fur coat and mismatched khaki pants.

Unkillable Eddie rolled his eyes. "Anyway, with you guys leaving, can we get Frederic Tinker to-"

"NO! We're not done!" The man snarled. "We demand restitution for this abomination!" MSO agents started moving forward to drag the crowd of Mad Activists out of the area. "YOU'RE ON OUR LIST, NARBON! YOU'RE ON OUR LIIISSST!"

Eventually everyone of them was pulled out of the arena region, and Unkillable Eddie motioned for Frederic to unleash his creation.

Andrew twitched slightly as he pulled his clothing back on, shuddering slightly. Oh, dear god how he hated being transformed....

Up above the pit, Fredric sighed, turning to his creation, petting hs head and smoothing a stray cloud of glass-gold-stuff down.

"Now, you do your best, okay? Jes try an' subdue 'em... remember what I toldja, an' be careful. I'll always be proud of ya, Allan Adric Zeta." he said, hugging his first Creation tightly before Al happily dived into the Mad Scientists.

"... *sigh*, they grow up so fast. I just 'ope he dosn't get hurt." he said wistfully, chugging a little can- an energy drink of his own concoction that he was pretty sure was potentially deadly to huma- well, except maybe Claire. Heck, she'd probably *like* the stuff- it tasted like electricity and cherry soda with a hint of plutonium.
... he'd been shooting for a refreshing alfalfa-clover flavor... but whatever kept him on his feet.

Slowly, a soft golden mist drifted into the pit, sparkling and twinkling in the light. For a second it simply hung there, idly floating around.... but if you could see it, something was happening. Little bursts of octarine light blinked in-between the specks, carrying information.

AL was gathering information. He was still pretty new, and he wanted to make his daddy proud. If the goal was to disable his opponents... then first step was destroying weapon capabilities!

Suddenly the mist formed into the smiling little chibi-figure, hovering in mid-air.

"Hiya! I'm Al! Allan Adric Zeta. Now, I'm only a few hours old... but my maker explained to me about fighting fair an' honorable discourse of intent." he said cheerfully, crossing his arms.

"And I'm not havin' any of it, so this is the first and only warning ya guys get. HEADS UP!!" He announced happily, suddenly whipping swirls of razor-sharp particles at every visible weapon- the catapult remains were teh first to go, dissolving in a spray of tiny particles.

Chic casts a critical eye on Fredric's monster, then nudges Andrew. "Awww...his first monster! That's so sweet!"
Farnsworth raises an eyebrow. In a dubious tone-"'Sweet' is hardly the word I would have chosen. Professor Tinker, proud though you must be of your offspring advancing to the final round-"
Andrew beams,
"-I do belive that glittery menace won't cut us any slack."
Chic shrugs. "Okay, Andrew-since we can't win, I'd like to see Fredric make it. How do you want to play this? I'll follow your lead."

Jess is as close to the action as she can get without being part of it. This round is the other contestants against the finalists creations, after all. Xerox easily spots her, and the broad grin on her face. That damn white battlesuit....guess it was too much to hope that she missed that part.
She casually takes a bite of popcorn, (her own, brought from outside)while keeping an eagle eye on David. She can't interfere in the contest-but she did promise Andrew she'd watch out for David. His being human instead of fox doesn't change that. And she's not taking Andy Kaboom's money for this. Heh-that poodle disguise Chic slapped on him . And smuggling him out of the grounds the day before that... Heh, again. Most fun she'd had in a while.
She and Xerox are going to have a lot to talk about, when a couple of months have gone by, when futureXerox becomes nowXerox, not nonmadXerox. Time travel can be such a pain...

Prime reemerged, forming together into its graySiB shape as Frederic's monster began to throw everything at the group. The evil grin on its face told what it was thinking. It attacked, starting a powerful suction as it began to chase the thing around the arena.

Prime had made its choice.

Andrew sighed, twitching a raygun he had prepped back into his coat. He couldn't help but admire the design...

"I vote we attack as well as we can- anything less would be unsporting. But honestly... I'm not sure how to. A Nanobot Cloud would be taken down by an EMP, but Fredric's current forte is magical theory."

"Yeah, well I can't beleive he named it Allan Adric Zeta. Seriously, what is *wrong* with that kid." said Xerox, trying to pretend he wasn't blushing from catching Jess grinning at him. Gah...

Al squeaked, realizing there was someone in hot pursuit of him. AH! PRIME! Dad had waned him about this... was the suction supposed to be collecting his particles? That would be bad... he just needed to be heavier!

With a sudden 'Pip!* noise his particles re-gathered, extending his solid form from a chibi to a full figure.
"Dang. So much for just dissolving anything dangerous... I know!" he dissolved again, forming into the chibi core and... a big set of chains?

Interesting. A chibi with chains. Not that attacking it will help- it's just a collection of particles, no matter how well they're connected at the moment. I run through a few possibilities... assuming it has full energy control... but it's magical energy, not electricity like I'm used to... I wonder if it could still be drained?

"Can we try grounding... it..." My voice trails off as I remember that I'm not out Exploring at the moment. And it's not like *I* can figure out how to make an energy sink out of spare parts. Well, not on short notice, anyway. Maybe Miss Chicgeek- no wait, she's probably not to happy about her zapgun at the moment. Maybe Mister Tinker... he's good with stuff in general... he can probably figure something out...

I run over to him, avoiding the chains. I'll probably be thrown into the walls a few more times today, but it's starting to get kind of annoying... "Mister Tinker? I don't suppose you could figure out a way to build something to absorb that thing's energy? It probably only has a finite amount, and I bet it'll just collapse if we drain it enough..." Not to mention that I bet it'll collapse *before* it dies... and Fredric would probably be so sad if we killed his very first monster...

"I can distract it while you work." I still haven't demolished the pit, and we're on the last monster and they *did* give us all those lovely explosives...

Andrew furrowed his brow, dodging a swinging chain casually.
"I'm not sure... It seems like a solid idea, but I'm not sure how to go about it. Even if we assume electricity is a comparable element, mechanics aren't my forte." he explained, lumping up to avoid another chain.

"But... assuming it *is*, then with electricity you would want a lightning rod... what is comparable to copper for magic?" It was hard to think while dodging teh odd figured attacks...


Al was happily swinging the chains around, attempting to land a blow- as soon as he did, the chain would expand and bind the target. It was a solid plan- he'd just managed to slam a chain into Sayasuke- but it felt... well, kind of boring.

And he still needed to contain Prime...

Frowning, he diverted some of his mass up into a cloud into the air. Slowly, litte shining gold bubbles formed, floating breezily about...