//------------------------------// // 187. Fall Apart. // Story: Baa-Ram-Ewe! // by Darkonshadows //------------------------------// -Equus, Airship Mauled, Jaded- “Yes Silvers, yes you are, my precious little kitten!” My little chimera babbled happily as I playfully teased them, I sat up with them in my lap and turned to Fizzy and Maries. “So anyways the summit can no longer continue, we’re done with that and hopefully you’ve caught the last of those Grogar cultists because now we have to rely on everything slowly falling into place.” “Okay yes, but if the world summit is over and we’ve done all the border discussions… then why are all the world leaders here in mom’s restaurant?” Fizzy asked flatly “I am Fortitude, the fantastically fragrant!” Fortitude was the same as ever, leader of the Minotaurs and everything. That strange yak is still one of our greatest friends. “I am always here, because I live here!” “I meant the other delegates and world leaders that don’t normally live here.” Fizzy, my storm queen, explained with a sardonic tone. “The summit can only last so long and there’s a rule against filibustering, but there isn’t a rule against chicanery apparently. Since we’re technically only having an after party for finishing our summit… even if it’s going to act like a summit, it’s not an official summit.” “Don’t know what you’re talking about, I’m just here for the good food and to trade recipes with Kuril.” World Delegate Gilda of the griffons was stuffing her face with honey roasted sunflower seeds, alongside a catch of the day fileted by Blade Bright the thestral, baked and seasoned by my mother Kuril and delivered by the ever lovely Brenda Springer the Diamond Dog waitress known for her friendship with my kitten sitter 'Savannah, The Wild'. The atmosphere inside the restaurant was bright and cheery and Silvers was flopping into Fizzy’s hooves, so we were holding an informal summit and I hoped no one called my mother out on bribing the world leaders. “Jaded.” Mom stated as she approached and placed some food down, Silvers was immediately on the fish jerky risotto. “How are thing going behind the scenes?” “The Quarrelsome Quartet say that since business can’t happen and they can’t be evil on purpose if thing are out of order, they are actually doing their best. Also I hate politics and would prefer to do things the more explosive way next time… ” As an Abyssinian, my little petty kitty mind could get easily bored unless there’s a yarn ball or a speck of light to chase… there’s also always my cardboard box collection with various comics books. I’m a little bit more complicated than that though, being an intelligent race as a part of this world I had to uphold to the standards that some people might expect of me…. then my bowl of fish risotto was pushed beneath my nose by my smiling mother. “Darn you and your food old witch!” “Is that any way to talk to your mother?” Mom said sweetly, we grinned at one another. “Knowing you… yes.” I said and then dug into my food next to Silvers in a similar display of violent food rending pleasure. Gallus gave us disturbed looks from across the table and just shook his head dryly. “Now we need to prep for several things to happen Jade and… right you’re not going to listen to me.” Glancing at the lovely Fizzlepop ‘Tempest Shadow’ Berrytwist, I noted that Silvers had stopped too as I continued to chew my food. “Ugh…” “Why… why is this so tasty?!” Bemoaned Twilight, I think she just learned to never let my mother bribe her with food. “You’re a growing alicorn Twilight, you need more nutrition than most people to grow into your role!” I shouted across the room, then quietly turning to Fizzy I added a quieter statement. “Also we’re leaving it up to luck and my luck hasn’t always been the best.” “We’ll get through it somehow Jade, even if you can’t solve the problem… you’re at least not making things worse.” Nuzzling against Fizzy for trying to be the optimist in our group of go getters, I purred lightly because I knew she liked that, Maries did the same on the other side and Silvers cuddled up to her too. “Hope our family is that functional.” Arizona said from nearby and next to Velvet, Paprika was sitting across the entire room from them with a pair of binoculars and holding up a sign that said ‘hello’ with a pink heart. “You don’t abuse me anymore, WAHHH!” Velvet had problems, apparently spousal abuse was something she wanted from Arizona and Arizona refuses to hit her back now on principle of things. Our world needs its weirdness. Good thing there’s plenty of it, even here in our town between Appleloosa and Ponyville. A local zebra family came in and half the room in the restaurant greeted them like old friends. The other half was taken up by world leaders, also giving cheerful and warm greetings. -Earth, Theme Park Security Desk, Quackerjack- “Wait, I think I’m hearing something important.” A quiet voice whispered to me, I slowed down and looked to Mr. Banana Brain and then to the nearby monitors of the empty security station as we passed by. “There’s a bomb in the robot ma’am and I need to gain access to it!” I looked at the screen at my toppled robot, nobody was chasing me and they were more worried about my once upon a time hostages. Darkwing wouldn’t have stayed to hear about the bomb, but to be fair to him, even I didn’t know about it. Would he have gone back for the bomb and would he have made it in time? Yes, believed wholeheartedly that Darkwing wouldn’t let people down even if it kills him, not that the guy doesn’t make mistakes. “The hostages said that Negaduck put it in there. If it’s as high yield as they say it is, then half the park will be gone if it goes off.” “Something doesn’t feel right about you… does it Quackerjack? Something big is up and we need to figure out what before the jokes on us. For we’re the ones that should making the jokes here!” Mr. Banana Brain was always right about things, he at least knew when something was wrong. “Also, Negaduck tried to kill us, we’re definitely not friends with him Quackerjack.” “You’re right Mr. Banana Brain, I need to find out what’s going on and why I can’t remember some things.” My memories were strangely hazy, but I knew who I was supposed to be and what I liked to do at least. I don’t quite think I was quite them though. “Also Negaduck has some things to answer for for messing with my toys! I’ll show him, if he wants to play ball with my life, then we’re going to return the favor and play hard Mr. Banana Brain!” “At least make sure get an acid spewing unicorn toy, I have a feeling we’ll need it.” Mr. Banana Brain always had the best ideas. “The toy would make for a good water squirting device too...” “Ooh, nice idea Mr. Banana Brain!” I grinned as I ran from the park, ignoring the moles in my way to the nearest place where I can produce some toys. -Fun House Arena, Pom- “Wait… who are you?” I asked because the yellow rabbit in the blue shirt and headband hadn’t introduced himself. “Oh right, I forgot that part, how’d it go again?” The rabbit looked to be thinking of something deeply. “Hello there my new friend, my name is Fall-apart, nice to meet you~! I’m a Fall-apart Von Rabbit, Saint Canard TOON Division, it’s nice to greet you~!” He held out his right arm and before I could shake it, it fell off of his body making me jump. I knew I had seen him doing something weird around the cage and… wait… this guy was the mascot of the theme park! “Oh sorry about that, while that’s not very rare, can I shake your paw, while it is already down there~?” The arm animated on the ground and Dolly shivered slightly, but she still raised a paw and shook it with this guy that didn’t seem concerned that a part of him fell off and was still moving. Dolly for her part looked a bit weirded out to be shaking her paw with the arm that fell off the guy. “I’m a police officer of TOON DIVISION bomb squad, yes my name is Fall-apart, nice to meet you, nice to greet you, and I’m at your service ma’am no refusal, you currently have the world’s best expert in bomb defusal~!” He raised his other arm to try to shake my hoof and it too fell off, instead he detached his leg from his hip and socketed it into his left shoulder and saluted me with his foot. Unfortunately he kicked off his own head in doing so. “Fall-apart Von Rabbit, at your service, don’t you worry, or be so nervous~! I can help you, just give me access to the bomb, and I’ll take care of it, before its been too long~!” He said as his body sat on his own sideways head. “I’m Fall-apart Von Rabbit~! Here to help you take a stab at it~! The bomb will not last for too long, if I’m given access and things don’t go wrong~!” I could almost feel the sound of wonky accordion, drums and other strange bits of music playing around this guy and he seemed to be a cheerful fellow, despite all his body parts falling off or rearranging. “What exactly does TOON stand for in Toon Division, Officer Rabbit?” I asked, a little worried when his nose fell off his face and started to bounce around. “Also Dormarch, I need you to scan for where the bomb is so we can find it quickly and figure out what to do from there, are you too busy with Ms. Shuttle?” “Give me a minute, coordinating an assault like this at this range when reception is lousy is not easy.” Dormarch answered from the back of my head. “Ms. Shuttle, Launchpad and Maui are really kicking some butt in the bayside area, but there’s this water dog guy giving them problems. I’m sure if you were there you could manipulate him into not drowning our friends… his name is Liquidator? Okay, thanks for the update Ocellus, at least Maui’s team is doing well. As for Darkwing, their team is still MIA or silent due to interference in the region of the Arboretum near one of the pillars holding up the sun blocking cover over the city.” “Hey again, Leap Lamb was it, thanks for coming to save us.” Sniffled, Sneeze Master who blew her nose on a large torn off bit of tissue paper as she approached. “It’ll take me a minute to get my sinuses cleared up without explosively sneezing on anyone, hard to control my sneezes sometimes. Really don’t want to hurt anyone or get them sick by accident.” “There are antihistamines here you know, maybe you could balance out the use of your powers with them?” After I said that Sneeze Master wiped her nose again, got a look of sudden realization on her face and quickly ran over to the antihistamines to clear up the head cold she got from her powers. Apparently blessed with suck is a common thing with super powers around here, even Rubber Chicken was greatly affected by hot and cold temperatures. Stegmutt had a childish disposition yet still somehow managed to hold down a job as a food vendor and be a hero on the side with. His transformation into a big hulking invulnerable bulk of a dinosaur biped made him a bit slow on the uptake of things, but he got there eventually. There’s Neptunia who was poisoned with toxic waste to end up with her powers of becoming a biped fish that could walk on land, but still dehydrated on land and its little wonder that she’s angry at what happened to her due to the environmental pollution causing her current existence as a mutant. Morgana’s magic sometimes had random unintended side effects from what she wanted it to do, but she tended to fix those problems whenever she caused them. Ocellus was flabbergasted that her use of magic was always so slapdash and chaotic when she met Morgana the other night, even called out the fact that Discord might be Morgana’s patron god. That was a shudder and a half from everyone who knew of Discord from Equus. Banana Boy turns into a giant flying limbless banana with a cape, I wished I could fly without effort like that. Plus being able to fly is useful despite not being able to do much else as a giant banana, at least he could change back at will. Glue Girl just need to control her powers a little more an she can create all kinds of neat traps on just about any surface, she was a no nonsense person and she tended to accidentally cause nonsense because of her powers of making things sticky. Somehow these people still managed to be super heroes while going about their lives and were good friends of Darkwing Duck. Nothing was wrong with Gizmo Duck, Darkwing just disliked everything about Fenton Crackshell in general. Drake never even explained it, but I’m sure he’s probably just jealous of the cool looking armor and the media attention Gizmo Duck gets… despite the fact that Fenton doesn’t like that stuff, but has to ham it up for the cameras because it is quite expected of him to do so. Mostly to help keep his private life and his hero life separated by acting entirely different outside of his costume, his police officer mother was in on it. Wait… six? Well if you include Quiverwing Quack as part of the main Justice Ducks team, then… huh… maybe I should mention that to Ocellus when I know we’re not about to be blown to 'kingdom come' by a bomb. “Not being very bright is she?” Shanty said with a hop in her step as she played with a sword stolen from one of the destroyed puppets creating multiple cutting arcs as she swung it. “Shouldn’t we be going after that Quackerjack guy?” “No, I’m sure he’ll turn up again later, maybe Darkwing will deal with it. Right now we need to free the hostages and get them to relative safety. Caper Canine, take Dormarch and start scanning over the robot to find out where the bomb was placed.” I passed Dormarch to Dolly and she immediately skated to the fallen wooden robot. “Cut-Lass, go to Sneeze Master and help her figure out how to get the hostages out of the cage once she’s cleared her sinuses… or at the very least find a way to protect them from the ensuing explosion.” Shanty saluted me and made her way over to the Sneeze Master with the small sword across her back. I turned back to Fall-apart, he was a jumbled mess his tail where his head should be, his right arm was now his left leg and this guy was slowly beginning to remind me of Veles the god of confusion. His head was sitting upside down on his butt. “So... my question and… where did you get that slice of pizza from?!” I hadn’t seen where he got the slice of pizza he was idly eating with his left arm… currently backwards in his right arm socket. Even his nose and ears were in the wrong places on his body. “Sorry, got hungry and pulling myself together can take a while, can you help me out ma’am?” I sighed and started to rearrange the rabbits parts, it was surprisingly easy to get his body back together and looking normal. “Thanks, the pizza still goes straight to my stomach, but it disturbs quite a few people when I eat while I’m jumbled up.” “Now can you tell me what TOON Division means before we get distracted again Mr. Rabbit?” This guy was just so plain weird, I’m surprised that I’m not panicking about the bomb possibly going off at any second. “Also, what are your super powers exactly? I can already kind of guess with the way you act like a Mr. Onion Head toy I had when I was four of five years old, before the canines started coming into my life. I miss Meadow Hills, my grandpa and my brother sometimes… but who I really miss right now is Tianhuo and my god puppies…” Dolly looked at me and gave a slight whine and then continued to carefully move Dormarch along the surface of the wood scanning around for the bomb that’s said to be in it. “Please, call me Fall-apart! As for my powers, the ability to fall apart and rebuild my body… however if you cut my appendages they will still bleed… really didn’t appreciate the internal bleed they gave me testing that out.” Fall-apart shivered and hugged himself, he then continued eating his pizza slice. “Anyway, no matter the orientation of my parts, they all work the same way regardless. I’m a Tactical Officer Obstructing Nefariousness or TOON for short. Got big time criminals thinking strategically, observing areas to start committing a crime or beginning an offensive? Then TOON division is always a proactive preventative by being on the lookout for big problems building up while handling normal police cases. I’m the best bomb specialist on this side of the world, never died to an explosion before in my life and if you’ve ever heard of an old criminal named Bomb Voyage… well he definitely hates me as he can’t build a bomb that I won’t be able to disarm in a timely manner. Well me and a chicken in a fedora. I’ve already been caught in hundreds of blasts with my best friend Bonkers D. Bobcat. He has the opposite problem, his body is too well built and he’s been shot and stabbed quite a lot, he heals from any injury really fast, it’s kind of comical. He’s even had people keep asking him why he won’t die, but that’s because his power is he’s held together too well, completely opposite of my problem of not being held together well enough.” “If only you could meet the mother of my friend Arizona. ‘Mad-Cow’ Maggie is an explosives specialist too… for a given definition of it as a bounty hunter. She really should stay away from dynamite while hunting bounties in Huoshan.” Wait… could it really be the same Bonkers as in that guy we all met in Sobaka right? “Wait, is your friend an Orange furred bobcat, police hat and shirt with tie… doesn’t wear pants in a freezing weather?” “Yeah, that sound likes him alright.” He smiled at me and threw an arm around me. “Small world we live in huh? Any friend of mine is my friend. Also, judging by the way to talk about your friend’s mother, she sounds like fun at parties.” “Found it!” Dolly shouted attracting our attention to the fall wooden robot with a bark. “Caper Canine has found the bomb, also my name is Pom when I’m not acting as the hero Leap Lamb.” This Fall-apart guy seemed nice enough, but he was giving me all these weird vibes about him. “I may or may not have annoyed your friend bonkers, but I think he took it in good humor, but we aren’t exactly friends.” “Oh, we always take things in good humor.” Fall-apart said with a smile as we made our way over to the robot, ignoring whatever Shanty and Sneeze Master were doing over by the cage with the hug tissue box. “Also, you’ll never meet a more upstanding and friendly guy then my buddy Bonkers, I’m sure he’d call you a friend too since you’re my friend now even if you aren’t his!” “The bomb is in the neck, and lower back, I didn’t notice it at first since its spread out. It doesn’t look like there is an activation wire for it going off if we open it up, we’re going to need Cut-Lass over here to get access to it.” Dormarch announced in Dolly’s paws. “Provided she could make the precise cuts without hitting the bomb.” “Cut-Lass, we need you over here!” Shanty came running at my call and then looked between us. “Where does she need to cut Dormarch?” Several slashes later, with the aid of Sneeze Master, Dolly, Shanty and even Fall-apart we managed to expose the bomb. Fall-apart whistled loudly and in appreciation as soon as he saw it. “Whoo… this is a bad one, I might have to disarm it by blowing it up!” What?! Fall-apart noticed our panicked looks. “Oh don’t worry, I’m a professional, but this bomb is going to blow up either way given how it’s designed, here cut this wire for me would you?” Shanty does so and Fall-apart continues on as if he were talking about the weather. “So yeah, this is a really nasty piece of work, it’s a Negaduck build for sure. Totally nasty guy really, hasn’t managed to kill anyone from TOON Division yet, but he almost got Fawn Deer that one time. She’s our secretary and medical expert, really made Bonkers mad the day he tried. Negaduck certainly regretted that, but still got away to lick his wounds. There was a lot of licking judging by how many he had.” As he talked he was manipulating parts of the bomb and we were all sweating as he sometimes detached a body part to work on certain pieces of the bomb in a unique manner. “So what I’m doing here is modifying the bomb to explode in a much safer manner, have you heard of shaped explosions? So instead of taking out half the park, one that I helped build you know and want to keep standing, it’s only going to take out… that wall over there and will safely hit thin air on the other side… but all of you may want to tilt that tissue box up on its side and get behind the cage. The projected path of all the wood shrapnel from the explosion will not hit anyone there, also I can’t remove the bomb and it’s going to blow up in sixty seconds… well thirty now I guess, you know, since I asked Cut-Lass cut that wire. Needed to be done really… you have twenty five seconds… so you really might want to move for this. I need to be here manipulating the parts until it explodes. Don’t worry about me, I’ll be fine in the epicenter of a high yield explosion… I’ve had worse times disarming other bombs than this cakewalk.” In a panicked scramble, I hopped off the wooden robot and ran for the cage yelling at everyone to do as the bomb expert said. I barely got behind the cage when the whole world shook and flashed. -A minute later- I blinked, and oh goddesses was that bad, but… I looked around and saw all the hostages slowly standing up. Looking around the destroyed fun house arena, there were sharp splinters of wood everywhere. Right in the middle of the blast zone I spotted the scorched Fall-apart standing proudly with his back to a relatively small hole in the wall for the massive amounts of force that just shook the entire fun house arena. “See… I’m definitely good at my job, even got the shrapnel projections right!” Fall-apart then fell over and his pieces scattered across the floor. “Uh, a little help please, I don’t want the rest of my pizza slice to fall on the floor… and no, I don’t care if it’s a little extra crispy now.”