My Weekly Gag Villain Job is Pretty Fulfilling: Chapter 4

My Weekly Gag Villain Job is Pretty Fulfilling: Chapter 4

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Commissioned by Arksoul

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“Uh, yeah. I’ll leave the war mongering to you, Ebb. This place has way too much purple.” I squeezed my eyes and massaged them before stumbling back to the alien base that we conquered. The fighting was over, and all the bodies were dragged into the darkness. Ebb gave me a telepathic version of a thumbs-up while I went ahead and walked back to Earth. With my Imps over there, the portal was no longer necessary, so I had the power cut off and started the process of shipping it and all the tech we acquired away. Or, at least, that should’ve been the case. “Huh, it looks like they’ve shown up.”

What!? How did they… They must have been developing their own infrastructure. Without us ravaging the world, they’ve had time to create their Citadel of Light far earlier!

The nearest Imp stopped working and turned into a flat plane of darkness. Ebb came forth from it… clearly concerned about our new foes arriving.

We both looked through the eyes of several lookouts outside the covered island.

I gave a whistle.

“Looks like they’ve brought backup, too. That’s the IHA’s airship.” The IHA was one of the middling heroic organizations out there, but they were pretty well-funded. They didn’t interfere with any national issues or take any stances on international politics. They worked to fight against big disasters regardless of where they appeared. That gave them a lot of donations from a lot of countries, even if they didn’t have any heavy hitters. Well, with the Sentinels on their side, that’s changed. “Yep, we’ve got to go.”

“Indeed. This much firepower is too much for us to surmount without bringing in too much attention.” As soon as I gave the order, I reinforced the surrounding shell of the island while galvanizing all my Imps to get as much technology and weapons as possible. Since the alien dimension was so ‘close,’ I shunted everything we had over there. Plenty of abandoned buildings at ground zero now. “Make haste. I will continue to lead the effort on the alien homeworld.”

“Yeah, you do that.” Ebb melted away back to the alien’s doorstep to keep wrecking the place. Without any Sentinels or heroes, that nation on the other side was folding fast. They launched strategic weapons just a few hours into the initial assault, and whatever morale their people had left when the titans just waded through while barely scratched. The forces of Darkness were very well-suited towards destroying worlds. “See you in a bit.”

Don’t fail.

Since Ebb was already on the other side, the response may have been instant for me, but a few hours after the avatar of Darkness went back.

With him gone and the Imps rapidly taking apart the base, I guessed that it was as good a time as any to facilitate a crossover episode between the Sentinels and the IHA.

And, of course, crossovers are best when both of the hero teams working together have to fight against the bad guys working together.

“Alrighty, guys. You know what to do.” The Imps nodded. The aliens were pretty weak. So, one Imp was able to shift into their vaguely humanoid form and covered themselves in fake armor. In a few moments, old defensive positions were manned/aliens by disguised Imps, while they wielded alien weapons. As for my Imps themselves, they’d be overkill as melee troops against the IHA, so I had most of them keep on at scavenging the base. “Remember that regular heroes don’t have the protection of the light. We can defeat them, but that’ll just have stronger people coming after us, and the Sentinels can get better at empowering them.”

I got a vague affirmative through my shared senses with all the Imps, and I went ahead and trusted them to do a good job.

Meanwhile, I considered my own role.

The aliens are totally the ‘lesser’ bad guys in this, so they should kowtow to the Shadow Legion. However, the damage to the base was too apparent. It was obvious that we took the place over. Having a cult of aliens worshipping us would just be thematically out of place at best and confusing at worst. Pretending to be an alien leader was also out of the question. I couldn’t speak their language, and these guys were known to not communicate with Earthlings.

So, there was just one available route that allowed the Darkness to be the clearly superior evil force, which would also explain the damage to the base.

Assimilation.

I gave the Imps a mental note to look more like solidified shadows even as they’re disguised, while mentally turning my gaze towards some wrecked vehicles and artillery.

Time for some creative shapeshifting to give us some combined arms!

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Interlude: Chroma Scarlet: Aine Campbell

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The door slamming shut told me that the Tsubaki’s meeting with the IHA did not go well.

I offered her a cup of coffee in a paper cup, and she gave a grateful nod in return.

“No luck, I suppose.” I met her mere months ago. We were gathered from all over the world for one reason or another to be Sentinels of the Light. I thought that she was a posh young lady who never bent a fingernail in her life until we got into a proper fight. Now, everyone else and I knew that she had our backs… and that she was the best at actually talking to other folks. “Were they at least willing to let us share some power with them?”

“We have been permitted that much.” Tsubaki shook her head. She wore the prim, proper dresses that manifested as our armor the best of us. As easily as breathing, she smoothed her skirt a bit and sat with her legs together and a bit aside in a very ladylike fashion. She called the outfit a Mahou Shoujo uniform, and after seeing what she meant, I had to agree. “But once the barrier has fallen, they insist that we do nothing.”

“Damn, they’re being right foolish. They must be thinking that we’re out to make a name for ourselves or some such.” I shook my head. Bridget and Mehri were piercing the barrier. Lina was on the deck keeping an eye on the shadows of the ship. Five young ladies from all over the world who didn’t even speak each other’s language… fighting against a real, terrifying Armageddon that’s wised up after all our predecessors beat it. “Well, there’s nothing to do but to stay on deck and head down there when they start losing.”

To everyone else, our faces and features were obscured by our power, but Tsubaki’s frown was clear on her face.

I was more than happy to let the IHA learn their lesson. We gave our warnings, told them we should head in first, and they refused. All that was left now was to be ready to jump into the fire when they realized that they’d gotten themselves tangled up in a real, thorny mess.

“What we should do is go ahead, regardless of what they say.” Tsubaki was straightforward and fiery beneath all her training to be a lady. Past all the niceties, out of all of us, she was the most likely to draw her sword first. All her grace just covered up her willingness to throw punches. When the chips are down, she’ll ignore issues and head straight in to cut the head off of a problem without an ounce of regret in her heart. Glad to have her on our side, even though I sometimes felt that I was holding her leash. “They may be in charge of this region, but the Legion of Shadows are our foes.”

“I’ll meet you halfway. Make something up. Like all of us feeling that the barrier is trying to close so that we can be on-site more quickly.” Tsubaki frowned. She still wanted to just charge in there and deal with the Legion of Shadows. But I couldn’t let her. This whole situation set my instincts alight. My gut was trying to jump up my throat to strangle my brain into leaving. “When they find out we weren’t kidding, we’ll be ready to jump in.”

Tsubaki opened her mouth, probably to keep arguing for her point a bit more, when the whole airship suddenly shook, the lights turned red, and alarms blared.

“Enemy artillery has engaged the airship! Armor integrity is holding! All hands, brace!”

Tsubaki’s eyes met mine, and I just gave a nod.

“Looks like it’s been decided for us. Sentinels, regroup!” I made the call and went for the window. With a bit of magic, I turned into light and went through the transparent material. The transition was slow, meaning it wasn’t real glass, but I made it through. Tsubaki was right behind me. Once we were out of the ship, we were in our element and flying through the air. I gave them a place to meet with us, but my eyes took in another problem. “Feck, the whole place is corrupted!”

The alien fortress was corrupted.

I cancelled the regroup order and changed gears.

“Bridget and Merri, blast the big guns firing at the ship. Lina, get a barrier up to deal with any shadow projectiles. Tsubaki, we’re going in.” They upped the speed of the process somehow or never went as hard as they could all the other times. Da told me that if you showed off a weakness, especially if you knew they’ve got a decent brain, that weakness wasn’t one. From experience, I knew that the Legion had a terrifying brain commanding it. “Lina, give me sight on the IHA team that went in.”

Lina gave an affirmative, and in my mind, I ‘saw’ the team sent in ahead of us.

The team of five was past the gate of the fortress, in a square courtyard, and they were taking cover behind the destroyed wreckage of a vehicle.

Two were on the ground, being looked after by one of their number, as the remaining two tried to attack back.

Bursts of alien plasma were streaking towards them, burning away the vehicle that they used for cover, and a little ball of fear formed in my stomach.

The Legion was using military tactics. Overlapping fields of fire. Constant bursts of smaller ‘caliber’ red plasma with streaks coming out of bigger guns. They were using an L-shaped formation so all their fire was on their opponents. When fire came from one of the IHA positions, in perfect synch, fire intensified from all other positions as the creatures who were fired upon reoriented.

It reminded me of the giant lizards armed with melee weapons in the candy factory. They were bestial and menacing at first, but they retreated. They struck from the shadows. Then, eventually, they had us cornered with dozens of the smaller ones supporting them.

We barely managed to win, and only Tsubaki and I were on the battlefield still thereafter.

Everyone else had to be recalled before they were hurt.

So, without a doubt, if we didn’t act quickly, the IHA heroes were going to die.

I sent the location to Tsubaki, we caught each other’s gazes, and then nodded.

“I’ll go high.” I told her.

“Low.” She replied.

Then, as motes of light, we streaked towards the alien base corrupted by the Legion.

Fire from the base was sent my way in an instant. Smaller Legion soldiers stared up at me with their yellow eyes for a moment before forming wings and leaping to gain altitude quickly. Knowing that it’ll take them time to reach me, I fired onto the battlefield with simple bolts of light. Throwing them like fastballs, using memory and experience to empower and guide the magic, gave them the extra oomph that they needed to swat the smaller soldiers out of the sky and hit some of the Legion-Alien’s firing positions.

Tsubaki was on the ground. Her hand flashed with a sword made of light. She was the most gifted at enhancing her body and reflexes. When she moved, she was half-light and half-substance, and she batted away the deluge of scarlet plasma surging from the enemy towards the IHA.

The IHA thankfully withdrew without questioning her appearance, and she surged forward into the fray.

Or, she would’ve, if not for the rumbling of a massive vehicle coming forth from a burning gate.

The gate broke open, and an alien tank came forth. It was destroyed, parts of it hanging on only thanks to the bindings of shadow. Glowing spots, eyes of the smaller creatures, were all over the tank as its tread was forced to move. The remaining alien copies rushed towards the tank, and soon enough it was bristling with the alien weapons and firing at Tsubaki. She ran, outpacing the traversal of its turret, and with a hand wielding a blade of light, she swatted away the smaller weapons trying to destroy her.

That gave me an opening.

I took a breath, condensed myself into the smallest ball of light that I could, and launched myself towards the tank with all the speed that I could muster.

At the last moment before impact, I undid the transformation and used my power to create a barrier around myself while reinforcing my body.

Tsubaki was the best at improving her speed and reflexes.

I was best suited at enhancing my strength and durability.

We both agreed, however, that I was the sledgehammer while she was the scalpel.

Alien composite steel broke beneath my foot, and shadows were cast away. They dissipated against the barrier that I made, and I ‘wrapped’ it around the tank. I made my strike ‘small’ on a single area while holding the vehicle still. As alien armor parted around my boot, I made my light ignite, and there was a flash of power. A bright amber similar to a rising sun formed, and the barrier caught it and contained it, shaping all the strength I exerted into the corrupted vehicle.

One moment it was there, then there was a flash, and the vehicle was gone, and a long tunnel into the underground of the alien came to be.

I released a breath, feeling sweat on my brow, as the attack took its toll.

My strength was already returning, though.

Tsubaki came to my side with sword at the ready, while I gathered my breath.

Then, just as I was about to check on the situation, I froze in place.

At the end of the tunnel, past multiple levels lit up by red lights, an abyss entered my vision and caused a cold sweat to break across my body.

My senses told me to run, while Tsubaki froze as well, as at the end of the tunnel we saw the Legion of Shadow’s Emissary.

A robed figure with pure white eyes on a featureless face that cast a darkness so deep that it swallowed the light.

Just being in its presence told me that if it wished, the whole region, not just the island, would be covered in an army of Shadows.

And that army would pale in comparison to its own personal strength.

My eyes met with it, and for a moment I thought that I was going to die without even being able to lift a finger.

Then, it sank into its shadow and disappeared, finally letting me breathe and hear the sound of alien alarms and the crackling of fire in the destroyed alien base around us.

No wonder our powers told us to fecking get laid and pop out kids!

Even if my kids were twice as strong, I’d want a soccer team to send out against that thing!