Biker Mice from Mars

Slime Mold Song and Dance

The Hard Luck Trilogy

The Epilogue

Pt 11.

The Sun was out and Shining in a Bright Blue Sky over the City of Chicago. It was a nice warm late spring day outside. The floodwaters were receding quickly. The Last Chance's Garage Floor was now almost completely dry. Even the birds had returned to Chicago and were chirping away outside. If the city had not just spent nearly 24 hours in Monster Filled Stormy Night, it would have been a nice Sunday.

Charley let out a long slow groan as her body let her know how stiff and sore it was after nearly 10 hours of being asleep. Sleeping on the shop's floor probably didn't help but there was nothing that could be done about that. The Ladder leading up to her loft apartment had been destroyed by the Slime Molds and none of them was in any shape to go dig out a spare.

So, a bed had been made by piling up a few large blankets on a dry (ish) section of the floor next to the TV and Couch area. She sat up from her place on the blankets and looked at the two large furry bodies that she had been asleep in between. Throttle and Vinnie were still sound asleep and snoring peacefully. The Guys had spent the night at the garage seeing as how the Scoreboard Hideout was basically trashed.

Throttle was on her right, and Vinnie was on her left, on the other side of a barricade of a few pillows, and blankets. Those had been placed there after Vinnie had Oh So Innocently tried to roll over on top of her in his sleep a few times. He was lucky her punching arm was in a sling or he would have gotten PUNCHED right in His SLEEP!

She was also glad she had slept in her full Masked Ryder Leathers. One for the tightness of them kept her sore shoulder from moving around too much, and the other for the extra protection they offered from furry fingers roaming in their sleep. She had taken her boots off though.

She looked at the Mice again. Throttle and Vinnie had taken off their boots and upper garments as well. Clad only in their trousers. Their odd mice feet were about the only parts of them that didn't have a bandage slapped on them somewhere. The same went for their tails. Modo was asleep sitting propped up against the couch his blue-furred little brother was laid out on.

Modo too had removed his chest plate he always wore and his big boots, and his massive chest was also covered in quite a few bandages too. Hard Luck was once more a Martian Mummy by comparison. She carefully got to her feet and tiptoed away trying not to wake any of them up.

She crept over to the couch to check on Modo and Hard Luck more closely. It was a good thing she had shoved a pillow under his big head, or he would have woken up with a stiff neck. Hard Luck was in his normal pose of his mechanical leg half on the couch and half on the floor. His right arm and the heavy gauntlet covered paw on the floor.

Hard Luck's bandaged body looked OK for the most part, only a few places looked like they would need to be changed soon. The nasty wounds staining them. He had gotten messed up badly. She recalled what he looked like in the truck when he reset her shoulder. His trip thru the Tower had apparently not done him any good. Who ever bandaged him up knew what they were doing, because they did a surprisingly good job?

They still had no idea how he even survived that, but when they found him asleep on the couch last night, none of them had the heart to wake him up and ask him. Dently, his motorcycle's ever alert camera eye, slowly spun up to look at her. His tail fender wagged at her in a slow friendly way. She and that loony cycle had been thru a lot in the last few hours. She was getting quite fond of the loyal machine.

She sneaked over to a corner of the garage and turned on a portable radio. She slipped on some headphones so as not to make any noise. She wanted to find out what was going on in the city after the horrors of the last night. The announcer came on and in the typical news reporter, had a very insincere happy tone in her voice.

"This is Tara Tadiddle Live from Chicago City News!" She said sounding happy to be standing in the middle of a disaster area. "Chicago is slowly but surely starting to rebuild after the unexplained Invasion of Monsters that nearly destroyed the city!" She said. You could almost tell she hoped for it to have been worse. Ratings of course. "Big relief for the city is the welcoming arrival of the Illinois National Guard and Army Forces arriving in the city to fight the monsters!" She said, making it sound like an upcoming movie.

"Without the heavy rains, the monsters themselves seem to be drying up. Making them a fairly easy threat to deal with." In the background, soldiers could be heard battling some terribly slow and sick-sounding Slime Molds. Charley found it kind of disturbing that she was acquainted with the freaks well enough to be able to tell the difference.

"Also, incredibly helpful in the battle was an anonymous tip that Vinegar of all things proved to be a Very Deadly substance to the creatures!' The reporter said. "Your welcome," Charley said. She would have pat herself on the back if she were physically capable of it right now. Oh, the thought of just doing that made her shoulder throb.

"Speculation is also running wild on as to the actual cause for the appearance of the monsters themselves!" She said excitedly. Charley looked back. All 4 of the mice were still asleep. Let them rest, she thought, seems like the Human forces have things under control for once. She turned back to the radio.

"What is to blame for the monsters? Tara said in that way only a tv announcer can do it. Pollution, radiation, the hole in the ozone layer, or violent Saturday morning cartoons, no one knows." She said. At this point, Charley turned off the radio. She was experienced enough to know that no more helpful information would be forthcoming, at least not from the media itself.

She went off into the garage to see if she could find anything more comfortable to wear and maybe some ice for her shoulder. That and to see if there was any food in the garage as well. She knew that sooner or later 3 big bear-sized rodents would wake up and they would be hungry.

"Oh Mama." Modo groaned as he slowly woke up. His big left arm going up to massage his neck. "I feel like I spent a week rolling down Mons Olympus in a steel barrel full of hammers." He moaned. "Is that where you learned to make that snoring noise?" Hard Luck asked as he looked down at him.

Modo looked up happiness bursting out of his face. "Hey, Little Brother, your alive!" He said and reached up and they fist paw punched. "Yeah, only being alive hurts this much." Hard Luck said smiling back at him. "I would hug ya if I didn't think I would snap you in half!" Modo said as he painfully got to his feet.

"Don't do that, it would make a mess." Hard Luck weakly joked. He had moved from lying down to sitting up albeit awkwardly on the old couch. "Davidson will get mad if you make a mess." Modo just made a har-de-har-har face. "Oh, oh, I got your stuff!" He said and took Hard Luck's leather aviator helmet and green bandana out of his pocket and handed them to him.

Hard Luck took them in his bandaged up left paw and held them against the metal medallion on his chest, he looked like he just got his soul back. He looked up at Modo. "Always looking out for me, huh big bro?" He said trying to blink some thick smoky tears from his eyes.

"Always Lil Bro, Always." Modo said letting his feelings show thru. "Yer bandages are coming loose." He said and leaned in to try and fix them. Hard Luck just started squirming and making ouch noises. Between them, all they managed to do was loosen up even more of the bandages.

"Are you two making a mess?" Charley shouted out as she carried in some hot dog-making supplies. She was now dressed in a comfy old, oversized sports jersey, The Chicago Nubs naturally, and old sweatpants. "Told ya!" Griped Hard Luck. "Oh, Hush up." Modo snapped back mockingly.

"I don't know about making a mess, but you are all making enough noise to wake the dead." Vinnie grumbled as he got up rubbing some sleep from his eyes. Throttle rolled over and let out a series of morning grouch noises as he blindly groped around for his sunglasses.

"See!" Vinnie said with a jokey smile on his face.

Throttle flicked his tail and either thru luck or skill, snapped Vinnie right on the tip of his nose. "Ow." Went Vinnie as he rubbed his sore proboscis. "Do you need any help with anything Charley?" Throttle asked as he painfully pulled himself up to his feet. Everyone in that garage was waking up sore and stiff. Life of a Hero.

"I do need someone with actual maturity to go warm the grill up for the hot dogs." She said. She, Modo, and Throttle all cheered out. "So, anyone but Vinnie then." They all laughed. Vinnie just blew a raspberry at them and winked. Throttle moved to the grill and prepared to fire it up. Hard Luck watched the family behavior between them and got a faraway look on his face. Dently rolled up closer to him. Hard Luck smiled down at him.

"Ok, I have to ask cause I can't hold it in anymore. How are you NOT DEAD Hard Luck!?" Modo asked his little bro point-blank. All activity in the garage screeched to a halt and centered on the blue mouse. Hard Luck got a panicky look on his face and he started to think fast.

"I have to ask the same thing because I kind of saw him seemingly die the other night myself." Charley added. "He did?" Vinnie gasped, jealousy ringing loud in his voice. "I got a few questions myself too." Throttle said from over by the grill he was still working on.

"How did you see him die?" Modo asked her while giving his little bro one of those looks only an older brother can give a younger one. "Well, after he got tackled by a mob of mold monsters, he crashed thru the roof of the hideout, he then fell into a big blob of the things, and then fell into a literal lake of the things!" She said excitedly. "How did you see him die?" She asked Modo. He told her about the events that took place in the tower, and how Hard Luck ran off armed only with a squirt gun, and no armor. All eyes now focused on Hard Luck.

"Uh, is there any grape soda?" He asked. "HARD LUCK!" They all yelled out, not letting him feely change the subject. "OK, sheesh, don't yell at me!" He sighed totally giving up. "I told you how I survived that. I just boot jetted back up to the hideout, which just leads to how YOU survived that bit after YOU saved the Stalker!" Hard Luck said.

"You What?" All 3 of the Mice gasped while turning to stare at Charley. "Oh, that's right, I did!" She said as she recalled the painful memory and she reached up and rubbed her sore shoulder. "I had just nearly seen Hard Luck nearly get devoured by those things, it was pretty horrible." She said as she shuddered at the memory. "When He nearly fell off the catwalk into a literal lake of the things, I couldn't stand to see that happen to anyone else, even a stalker and I think I just kind of reacted on instinct." She said slowly as if she couldn't believe she had done what she did.

"That's my babe, the big-hearted hero." Vinnie said with a sideways grin. Charley shot him a dirty look mixed with a smile. "You doing that is what saved me." Hard Luck said to break up the tension between the Mouse and the Mechanic.

"You saving the Stalker is what saved Me in the Tower." He said. They all looked at him wanting more of an explanation than that. He sighed and continued. "I got back into the hideout and found him standing over you, and if you remember he was ready to make a trophy out of your head, and you saving him totally blew his mind." He said while making hand gestures by his head to simulate a head exploding.

"I tried to explain to him why you did what you did, and he didn't understand that at all, but he really didn't want to be owing you for saving him, and ripping your head off didn't seem like an honorable thing to do after what you did." He said.

"That kind of makes a warped bit of sense." Throttle said. "The Stalkers for being Murderous Monsters, they did act with a vicious honor system. Vinnie wanted to argue that but after he thought on it, he had to agree, reluctantly.

"So, what happened then?" Modo asked totally getting into the story now. "I talked him into helping me to pay her back for what she did." Hard Luck said. "How did you do that?" Throttle asked, a hint of suspicion in his voice. A hint that Hard Luck did not miss. His antenna started sparking as he started thinking as fast as he could.

"I mean, well, it is just that, I and he, uh that is we…we…" He stumbled trying to figure out what to say, while everyone in the shop was staring directly at him, which was not helping at all. "I could REALLY use a grape soda." He wheezed.

"Tell us and I will go get you a dozen two liters of the stuff." Offered Modo, trying to help calm him down. "Yuh, you puh, promise?" Hard Luck said with a heavy layer of hope in his voice. Modo held up his paw and crossed his heart with the other. "I will get you a super-sized bag of those cheap chocolate donuts you love too!" He promised. Hard Luck visibly relaxed. Charley just rolled her eyes. She knew who was going to wind up doing the actual buying of the promised snacks.

He put his leather helmet on, which also seemed to help relax him. "Ok, let me try and think how I can tell you this, and I KNOW WHAT I SAID!" Hard Luck yelled while he grabbed his head as if it were about to burst apart. They all glanced at each other but chose not to say anything right now, but Throttle filed it away for later.

"The Stalker told me that Limburger broke them out of a prison that they were in and was basically holding them hostage here on Earth, He said they had to work for him before he would transport them off the planet, He said that if I helped to escape they wouldn't hurt Davidson, so I agreed to do that, which meant Limburger had to be distracted so they did that while I figured out how to get them near the Transporter which was behind some security levels, that I was able to erm. Uh, I got the info that allowed to get to the Transporter which they did when they acted like they were going to kill you guys!" He rattled off then fell back uncomfortably on the couch and tried to catch his breath.

They all just stared back dumbfoundedly trying to absorb the whirlwind of information that just got tossed at them. Hard Luck acted like he half expected his head to burst into flames. "Don't ask me anymore, please don't ask me anymore." He begged while he rocked back and forth on the couch.

Sympathy taking over both Charley and Modo ran over and set on either side of him and tried to calm him down. "We won't Little Bro, we won't, WE WON'T!" Modo said reassuring him and empathizing with the others that they wouldn't. "I agree, enough with the questions, it's time to eat!" Vinnie called out. Everyone had to agree, realizing that none of them had really eaten in almost more than a day at this point.

"I aint gonna speak for you guys, but my beautiful buff body needs proper nourishment to keep it running at its normal personal levels of perfection," Vinnie said with the greatest levels of modesty. Throttle, who had gotten the grill going crossed his arms and leaned back and put a good smart-alecky smile on his face.

"That is very true Vin-man, especially seeing as how you have been Burning your candle more so than normal of late." The smile just got bigger. A flash of anger crossed Vinnie's reddening face before he just slumped forward in defeat. "Ya know Throttle, ya know, you're right, you are right." He sighed and just put his arms up and fell back on the blankets and put a pillow on his head to hide from the world.

The fact that nearly everyone was laughing helped him hold the pillow down even tighter. "Yeah, if it weren't for Vinnie literally LIGHTING Our path thru the Tower, we would have been lost in the dark!" Joked Throttle. He was enjoying this. Vinnie grabbed another pillow. "Are we really going to start this again?" Modo groaned?

"Are you saying that Vinnie isn't the Brightest Burning Bro on our Team!? Throttle joked again; he was starting to get on a roll with this. Charley just fell back on the couch and let her head look up at the roof. Modo just groaned again. Vinnie screamed silently into his pillows. Throttle's sides started to hurt with laughter, but it was a good hurt.

Hard Luck stiffly got up off the couch and mummy walked away, he hadn't been paying any attention to the joking crew. "There has to be some Grape Soda in the garage, gotta be, and some chocolate doughnuts gotta be some." He mumbled softly to himself. His stiff gate caused his middle layer of bandages to start to unravel again. He shuffled away from the couch.

Dently started his engine and scooted noisily across the floor on his metal rims. He started honking to get Hard Lucks' attention that he was about to trip on his loose bandages. This only caused the already distracted Hard Luck to get distracted even more.

"Huh, what?" Hard Luck gasped and he twisted trying to turn around to see what Dently was trying to tell him, causing his bandages to unravel even more, which allowed Dently to roll over some of them, pinning them under his metal rims.

The bandages went taught, and several windings fell down around Hard Luck's knees and ankles, which put his green shorts with little yellow hearts on display. Charley let out an embarrassed gasp when she spotted this, her hands going to cover her mouth to stop her from gasping or laughing out loud.

'Yeek!" Squeaked Hard Luck as he got a good blush on his blue furry face, and he bent down to try and pull the bandages up, just causing him to trip even more and fall forward! Not noticing any of this Throttle just continued to make jokes at Vinnie's expense.

"Ha, ha, yeah, Vinnie you are the Candle in our Lighthouse for sure!" He laughed while leaning forward with his arms wrapped around his chest to keep his hurting ribs in, when a loud KLONK happened! Hard Luck and Throttle's heads very soundly connected! "OUCH!" Both cried out!

Hard Luck fell getting his arms and head entangled around Throttle's feet, which caused him to trip and fall backward! He laned with a metallic crunching noise on the object behind him, unluckily for Throttle, it turned out to be the Grill. "Oh, my head." He groaned his paws holding his throbbing forehead.

"Throttle Get Up, Get Up!" Modo and Charley cried out! "Huh, what, hey what is burning?" He asked as smoke started to gather up around his head. "YOU ARE!" They both yelled out at the same time!

"Huh, what?!" He stammered and looked down. His backside had caved in the cooking grill and the seat of his trousers and base of his tail was firmly seated in the flames of the grill, a black scorch mark spreading across his trouser seat. "Ow, ouch, hot HOT!" He yelled as he squirmed around trying to push himself off the grill!

Charley and Modo tried to jump up and help but Dently had rolled in front of them and inadvertently blocked their attempts to help. Vinnie with his head still buried in the pillows had no idea what was going on. Throttle had just about managed to push himself free when Hard Luck, who was underneath him tried to push himself up off the floor, too bad he was right under Throttle's feet!

Throttle laned on the rising Hard Luck which caused Hard Luck to fall onto the floor again and Poor Throttle to fall back into the grill! "YEOW, HOT, OH HOT, OUCH!" Throttle yelled while he painfully squirmed around! Smoke and Sparks flying up from beneath his behind!

"YEEEOOOWWCHH!" Throttle bellowed and with one mighty push, he freed himself from the grip with a smokey pop! He jumped down and started hopping across the garage, smoke and flames curling around the seat of his pants and tail!

"Water, water, where is the water!" He cried out, his paws slapping at his bottom! Ironically looking for water that the city had been literally flooded with mere hours ago was now almost scarce. "The Sink, the sink in the corner!" Charley pointed out while still trying to crawl around the panicking Dently! Throttle spotted it and made a smoking behind beeline for it! Vinnie at this time had finally come out from underneath the pillows and watched what was going on full-on gawk-eyed!

Throttle reached the big metal sink attached to the wall, he spun around and dropped his flaming backside down into it, his legs falling over the side, he reached back and cranked on the water spigot, frantically waiting for the cooling water to shoot out!

Nothing happened at first but then the pipe gurgled and chugged before anything started to come out, Throttle was on the verge of panicking at this point when POW!" Outshot a short stream of greasy green slimy water! It was more slime mold residue than actual water!

The green goo coated Throttle's backside, and it did put out the flames, but it just kind of replaced one burning sensation with another kind. He squirmed around in the sink as he bit back a howl as this happened! The spigot rattled some more and fortunately, a stream of cold water eventually shot out! Throttle finally got to let out a big sigh of relief as he finally got some relief!

"Aaahhhhh!" Throttle sighed as his arms and legs dropped over the sink rim, all the energy flowing out of him like the smoke rising from the sink he was sitting awkwardly in. Charley and Modo got up the couch and managed to navigate their way around Dently. Modo stopped and picked Hard Luck up off the floor and carefully deposited him back on the couch and then He and Charley turned and looked at each other.

"I'll get the first aid kit." Charley said. "I will get the ice." Modo said. They nodded at each other and then moved off to different parts of the garage to get the necessary items. Hard Luck gave Throttle a very embarrassed and guilty look before he pulled a Vinnie and buried his head under a pillow, trying to hide from the world as best he could.

Vinnie just casually got to his feet, and acting very nonchalantly strolled over to Throttle, and turned and leaned back against the counter next to the sink. He then crossed his arms and gave Throttle a Very Big Cheesy Smile!

Throttle blurrily looked up at him and let out a humiliated sigh. "Oh no." He said. "You finally came up with some comebacks didn't you!? Vinnie's cheesy grin grew a few notches. "Oh, I have, and I just KNOW you have been BURNING to hear them!" Vinnie said with a lethal level of smirk in his voice.

Throttle buried his head in his paws and shook his head. An awfully familiar Martian phrase was running thru his mind. It was terribly like an Earth phrase about Karma! It was going to be a long, long day. A Long Sore Day in….

The End!