”Aye aye captain.” he said grabbing the rod as it was tossed up into the air, Zek seemed to have the fighting handled. Which only infuriated the shifter more having fought most of Zek’s battles for him when they got into things. The grey woman vanished as did the lights and music. Again Carrick was more upset his friend wasn’t taking a few more hits. The amount of times Carrick took a punch for the guy....

Ignoring the blood that was dripping out of his shoe Carrick hefted the mace over his shoulder again then studied the no longer mystical disco stick. He never had a chance to study before but the more he looked at it there wasn’t any magic here whatsoever it was just a giant light show and sound system all in the shape of a walking stick. Maybe he was outgrowing magic.... the shifter laughed to himself knowing that was impossible then tossed the mace with one hand so he could focus more on the walking stick.

The mace went up and then came down hard into the jellyfish lady and seemed to penetrate her jelly flesh then pin her to the ground causing her to faceplant on the ground below. Carrick didn’t notice it as he blinded himself with the disco stick making the mistake of looking into the area where the lights came out. He saw a screw then nothing but bright lights, the stick kicked on and then started to play country music his least favorite genre.

”My eyes!!! My ears!!!!” there was another button his thumb found and he pressed it. Nothing happened other than some fog being generated from the magical stick. ”What can’t this do!?!” he shouted as his eyesight started to adjust again.

Well it was about time that Cuzco started acknowledging Zek’s authority and clear superiority! Zek nodded austerely and solemnly in return, as one must when addressing one’s subordinates. It was always best that they knew their place at all times. Sucking up was greatly encouraged though, and flattery would get you far. Food would get you farther.

His mace came sailing from the sky. “Watch it!” he shouted at his soon-to-be-demoted flyboy. Zek tramped over to the mace. “Ew, you got jelly-lady all over it!” he moaned. He dropped a ball and the flailing woman vanished just a moment before she could lash Zek with her wavy tendrils. The mace was untouched.

Zek bent over and picked up his mace (now free of any jellypeople). Doing so meant the last person, the crab guy, missed swiping Zek’s head off with his claw.

Zek returned to an upright position and swung the mace back until her could rest it on his shoulder, like one of those British guys with the big poofy black hats and rifles. He heard a crunchy, squishy sound and blinked. He turned around but nothing was there. He shrugged and stepped over the crab guy’s who now had a huge dent in his head’s carapace.

He had more important things to focus on. Like that dead-gods-awful music!

“YOU BROKE IT AGAIN!” he shrieked in horror at Featherbrain. “Make it blippety-bleep-bork stop!” he wailed. And then…smoke started pouring out of it?! “Stop it stop it stop stop it stop it!” he said in a panicked manner and threw a golden light up. His disco staff was in danger! That’ll teach him to let other people play with his toys!

”No... No... no...” Carrick said shaking the disco stick and pressing a few more buttons. The fog stopped and the music changed to an A.M. radio broadcast about horse racing. Well at least it was more useful now. It had been a while since the teen bet on the ponies.

”No.” he said again this time flapping once and avoiding the golden ball as it shot upwards. ”You can always just rinse the goo off!” he said about the mace as the gold ball started to slow and then speed up as it terminal velocity. Carrick watched gravity take over to the shiny ball and brought it downwards on the jelly head lady who was slowly reforming the dent.

”Look out behind ya!” Carrick said pointing the stick to behind Zek. A beam of light erupted outwards in a kaleidoscope of color blinding the shark guy who was charging with his mouth open. Carrick liked the fact that he could fly less teeth to deal with when you were airborne. Sharkman’s eyes dilated and he looked around confused still opening and closing his mouth.

”Ya think he makes necklaces out of his teeth?” the shifter asked as he hit another button. The stick echoed, “Dispatch.... there is something happening at the aquarium... might want to send another unit to help me out.... Looks like some kids are throwing a party.... ****ing millennials.”

”Wait am I a millennial?” Carrick asked shaking the stick until the radio frequency was changed out for some heavy drums. Carrick knew the song. This would work.

STUPID COREY DODGED HIS BALL! AGGH! WHAT WAS UP WITH EVERYONE AVOIDING HIS BALLS TODAY!

Zek fumed and raged as Featherhead flitted out of the way of his orb. And the music kept changing!

Zek yelled something wordless and whipped his morningstar around until it crashed through a small display case with replica fish heads in it. That felt amazing! So he whirled and smashed a similar display. Then Stupid Beakbutt yelled something and Zek flipped another bird up at him before spinning around.

Sharkface was just standing there, blinding by the (admittedly amazing) lights. So Zek walloped him with the last of his balls. This guy didn’t dodge it, because that was how things were supposed to work! Zek had a third of a mind just to throw the Sharkface up at Carter. Best case scenario, Sharkface ate him. Worst case, Sharkface fell down from a great height and horribly hurt himself. Actually he was likely to do that either way so really it was a win for Zek no matter what…

“Why don’t you ask him yourself?” Zek said sweetly before hurling a red ball way above Cristo. Then it flashed and suddenly Sharkface was there. Then Sharkface was falling right above Birdbrain.

“Nah, you’re no way rich enough to be a millenial. Maybe a tennial. If that.”

Carrick never wondered what a millennial was until the radio said it for one he was Carrick and two there was a bunch of slang he seemed to miss out on when he got older and then deaged himself. Instead of trying to catch up the last few years he figured it was a tomorrow Carrick’s problem. The today Carrick had more to deal with. Like a red ball appearing overhead.

”Hey! Keep this up I’ll toss this in the shark tank!” he dodged the red ball but not the shark-man who jumped out of the ball of light and ended up falling on top of him. Luckily Carrick was used to carrying extra weight, unfortunately not this much. Trying to stay aloft he flapped harder as the massive person fell on him. The shark-man was still dazed only for another moment before he started to drool on the shifter.

”Fer **** sakes! Do sharks get rabies?” he asked flapping a few more times trying to stay aloft only to flap into the nearest tank. The tank Carrick said he’d toss the disco stick in should Zek keep it up. The shark tank.

Seemed like the Irishman was getting a bad deal out of this.

“Yes!” Zek cried, jumping into the air and pumping a fist! He nailed Karrigan with Sharkbreath! Balance in the universe was being restored! And it was giving Zek a bit of a show, too! “I thought birds and cats ate the fish, not the other way around!” he snickered up at his friend. “I guess in this aquarium sushi eats you!”

His laughter turned menacing. “If you drop it in that tank, you’re going in after it!” Zek promised. Of course he only had one free ball at the moment, but there was a lot you could do with just one! And they were inside, too, so it wasn’t like Cuckoo could just easily fly out. Dead air, ceilings, tunnels, and such would probably make that tricky.

“How should I know!” Zek shouted back chipperly. “I’m not a sharkologist!” THen he held up a golden light over his head momentarily. “Oh I know! Why don’t you wait a few days and see if you get rabies? Then we’ll know for sure!”

A resounding bong! echoed from the tank as it was crashed into. Fortunately it was very tough glass. It’d require a much higher impact to crack. The sound was enough to attract the attention of a fairly large shark though, and it loomed into view, a massive silhouette in the eerily lit water. “Oh hey! I think you made another friend!” he pointed with glee and cheerful unconcern.

The Gryphon shifter’s legs moved with the shark man’s nose and mouth as Sharkman tried to bite a chunk off of Carrick. His eyes closed for a moment, glad he didn’t have to deal with contacts. They would have fallen out at this point probably, even if everything was blurry he couldn’t imagine having to try and find two little round discs that went on top of his eyes.

”@@@@@@ @@@@ @@@@ blub blub blub.” Carrick shouted underwater as he was trying to move his wings so they cut through the water as shark man kept snapping. All he had was a stick and a shoe full of blood and the handful of seahorses in a water bottle. Everything else in his pocket was useless underwater. Carrick tried calling out for help underwater but knew his friend and probably wouldn’t get much of it.

More blood started to form with his struggles as he kicked the shark man as hard as he could to try and get him some altitude in the water. Unfortunately something bumped his wing as he pushed up. They flapped pulling water under him as he kicked with all his might till he broke the surface.

”I swear to god, I’ll jam this disco stick so far down this guys throat if he eats me you’ll never get it back!” he was pulled under again after inhaling a hand on his foot grabbed him and yanked so hard Carrick flew past him and sank to the bottom. The shifter put his foot on the ground and jumped backwards pressing a few buttons on the only thing he had in his hands.

The inside of the tank lit up with lights and muffled music along with a string of bubbles that became smokey when the escaped into the water giving a bad lightshow. Fortunately for Carrick it showed that there were other sharks nearby. Unfortunately for Carrick these didn’t seem like the type to make a deal.

Dead gods, this aquarium was amazing! They had everything! Maaaan, there hadn’t been a mention that day that they sometimes hosted sharkman and birdboy battles! And Aaron had been holding out on him the whole time because he knew how much Zek loved surprises!

A tear almost formed in Zek’s eyes. “You’re such a good friend,” he said. “You really get me!”

Some water had splashed over the edge and a small amount had splattered Zek, but he didn’t pay it any mind. He had a front-row view to a really cool fight! There was blood, there was violence, and...well...Featherbutt really wasn’t doing too well. Honestly, he fought like a wet bird mixed with a drowning cat. And his trash talking could use some work.

“That sounded very homoerotic!” he called out. It made Zek think for a moment if he would even want his staff back after Craig had been playing with it. He shrugged. “Maybe you should just stick to air battles!”

But then Zek’s eyes widened with glee and lights began dancing and dazzling in the tank and Zek just started jumping. Talk about next level entertainment!

“Ten bucks said the birdhead loses to the sharkman!” he called out, pulling a handful of brightly colored candies from a pocket and popping them like pills. “Twenty says all the sharks win. Especially the one on the left with a wicked glint in its eyes.”

Nobody took Zek up. He glanced around. “Oh, right.” Everyone was paralyzed, vanished, or knocked out with a cracked carapace around the head. Zek shrugged and did the next best thing to betting.

A few flashes of light later and the crab guy and the remaining paralyzed guy had been turned into something that vaguely looked like a throne and Zek perched on top of it, eating more pocket candy. “Go Parry! You can do it!” he shouted, spittle flying. He leaned down and stage whispered to his throne. “He can’t do it.”

Between the water and his movements under the water Carrick only managed to hear Zek with muffled hearing. He looked over to his ‘partner in alleged crimes’ and shot up a familiar hand gesture they both threw to each other often. ‘Whatever you make of it’ he said but through the water it was a ”Blub blub arrrgggghhhh”

One of the buttons he pressed was a smokescreen which was odd considering he was underwater and that the device still worked. Between that and the music that echoed underwater he was suddenly grateful he had selfishly hung on to the thing. The mace would have been more useful probably but Carrick prided himself on his creativity and resourcefulness.

The tank started to turn black with smoke, as it exited from the stick. A shark swam overhead and Carrick slowed his ascent to the surface till it passed overhead. He started to swim upwards then felt the hand tug him back down. It seemed the shark man had no problem fighting him surrounded by other sharks and distractions.

”@@@@ off!” he shouted underwater again ”Blub blub” the water translated poorly as he took the odd weapon of mystics and jammed the thing down hard aiming for the eye of his attacker. The hand pulling him under released at once as the shark guy grabbed his eye as black ooze ejected from the wound. One of the sharks picked up the scent and shifted it’s attention from Carrick to the shark guy.

Carrick kicked to the surface with his wings and feet and exhaled and inhaled quickly. His wings trying to lift him out of the water but failed because they were water logged. ”@@@@ @@@@ @@@@” he shouted as he started to swim to the nearest edge of the water. Now out from under the water the music started to blast clearly throughout the aquarium. “Exit ligggggghttt, Enter Niiiight, Take my hand, we’re off to never, neverland!” the drums matched his strokes as he beelined for the ladder of the tank.

“Boooo!” Zek shouted as the fight began to become obscured by ink. “Who let the octopus fight?!” A cloud of blood was exciting and aesthetically pleasing, a cloud of darkness was boring. “Booo!” he yelled again.

He threw a golden light at the tank and it smacked into the glass like a baseball. It bounced off and vanished. He threw another couple of balls, each one striking with a bang. “Someone come fix this for me!” he yelled. Where was a maintenance person around when you needed them? “The reception on this thing is stupid!”

The smoke was spreading and more and more of the tank was vanishing. Occasional flashes of light from the staff punched through but nothing that actually revealed the action. So Zek said there watching a super boring television screen.

And what did you do with TVs that refused to work? You hit them again.

“Boooooo!” he yelled and threw another ball, just as sudden music began blasting clearly and audibly and a familiar voice shouted expletives. The ball crossed the distance and struck the glass.This time, however, it didn’t bounce off like a baseball. This time it vanished and so did a car-sized section of glass and smoky water.

“Booo--CRAP!” Zek shouted as the water started rushing out.

He ignored the boo’s from his ‘friend’ as he furiously fought through the water when he got to a certain point of the surface his wings tried to kick off but were still too water logged to get anywhere. Knowing he was the best suited for the water he ignored the cries from the other two voices in the back of his head. Both thought they could handle the situation better.

Luckily for Carrick were busy fighting who was better in the water. ”**** off I’m handling it!” he said to himself as he grabbed the ladder and started to pull himself up. His hands were still on the stick. No way in hell he was letting go of the thing.

The stick kept playing music, “Something’s wrong, shut the light heavy thoughts tonight and they aren’t of snow white.” he was almost out. He could hear the boo’s still coming from Zek who had been less than helpful. Even after he fixed the magic ‘do random ****’ stick. Two fins appeared behind him in the water. One was at a constant diagonal and the other was going straight for him. A webbed hand erupted from the water and grabbed on to Carrick’s foot and pulled. It was shark-man with a latched shark-shark on him.

”@@@@ off!” he leaned forward and held his death grip. Shark-man gave a yank and Carrick responded with a kick of his other foot. One that was perfectly placed for the nose of shark-man. Shifting his grip he went back under with one of Carrick’s shoes and the other shark. Carrick rolled from the ledge and laid on his back. ”**** sharks.” his heart was racing and his pupils were complete slits. ”I want ta go home.” he said looking down to his socks one with a large hole that revealed his big toe.

After a moment, ”Yer boos mean nothing ta me. I’ve seen what makes ya cheer!” he shouted to Zek clearly exhausted.

Who cared what Featherbutt was now doing? Zek had a waterfall rushing straight for him, right out of the giant tank he’d cracked open!

“Why am I so amazing at breaking into things?” he wailed as the wall of water struck him, knocking him off his people throne and sending him hiney over teakettle into a couple of displays. He got out an “oomph!” and then water was rushing into his mouth and nose and shoving his head back into the base of a display.

The water level in the massive tank began rapidly depleting as the pressure began forcing it out through the car-sized hole in its side. The shark man and the attracted sharks were sucked out into the geyser and Zek’s eyes bulged right before the shark man plowed into him. Bubbles flew from his mouth, censoring an expletive as Sharkface’s body drove all the air out of Zek.

Within seconds the floor was submerged in five inches of water and it was growing. Zek and Sharkface sat stunned, blasted by the water and the sudden collisions.

Well, stunned for maybe a second. Sharkface started to move and Zek, gasping for breath smashed a ball into Sharkface’s head. But it didn’t vanish. No, the red orb just winked out. “Ack,” he wheezed in surprise. Somehow he still had his morningstar in his hand. From his awkward position he tapped Sharkface’s head with the spiky end several times. “Gahhhh!” he warbled. He tried smacking harder.

The shifter coughed slightly spitting out a little more saltwater from his lungs as he inhaled finally catching his breath the pain in his foot was still there but it hurt a lot less than it did while he was swimming. His clothes, shoes and wings were all water logged. Sitting up slowly then standing he looked back into the tank and saw it was pretty close to empty as a few of the sharks sat at the mouth of the exit of the tank.

”**** ya waited till after I was out ta do this?” Carrick shouted snapping open his wings and shaking the water off of them. Between the music and the light show someone could have enjoyed him cleaning his wings off. The small droplets reflected the light as he took off.

Flapping once overhead he surveyed Zek smashing a mace into the shark guy who, lets face it was nothing more than a fancy punching back that occasionally tried to eat them. Poor guy was getting from all angles. Carrick touched down several feet from Zek so the shifter wouldn’t be hit by mistake. ”Think ya got him.” it wasn’t a warning telling him he had enough more of a ‘I don’t think we got to worry about him anymore’ the shark-man tried to eat him.

The elf like ears on Carrick perked when he heard more commotion echoing from the other side. The point they entered. ”Zeeky, sounds like it’s the popo.” Carrick knew when to run. When the police showed up. He stood out, and was easy to identify due to the wings. ”Time fer an escape!” The shifter was already looking up at the ceiling seeing the light illuminate sections tipping off there were people coming their way.

Zek did not enjoy whatever show Crow’s Feet was putting on. In the lights and darkness and water he kept bouncing his morningstar on sharkboy’s head. No single blow was doing much damage, since the sharkman was too far inside Zek’s reach and he had to rely on the very end of the mace to do any damage, but having a spiky metal ball dropping on your several times in succession was still going to do something.

And better Sharkface than Zek’s face!

Featherbutt butted in and Zek spared a hand to flip a bird at the Birdbrain. “I don’t tell you how to fly!” he yelled before flicking a red ball into existence and tossing it several yards away. In midair in flashed and suddenly the section of skylight he’d swiped earlier was falling to the floor. Then he smacked a corresponding golden light into Sharkface’s ugly stupid bleedy face and he was gone too.

“Gahh,” Zek gasped and slumped. He swiveled his neck unnaturally so and glared up at Conner, waving his mace at everything. “And for the record, I did this before you got out!” He turned his glare toward one of the weakly moving shark forms and pondered.

And apparently the fuzz was on the way, or so Fuzzyface declared. “All right all right, hold yer horses,” Zek said with a grumble. A light flashed and his duffle bag appeared. He tossed the bloody mace inside and started pulling himself to his feet.

The water level in the tank had finally fallen to below the edge of the hole he’d made, which had been pretty high up to start with. Maybe only a fourth of the tank had come out, but that was still enough to come up to Zek’s knees. It wasn’t enough for the giant sharks lying around though. “Gimme a sec,” Zek said before nailing a shark with a light and vanishing it. Moments later he’d chucked the ball into the tank and he’d rescued a shark. “No sense letting these fine fishy friends die. THey’re way too fun.” He quickly vanished the other sharks and redeposited them in their tank, one by one. With his final ball, he vanished his duffle.

“Okay, let’s get out of here,” he said, standing stock still in his drenched trenchcoat and holding his hands up in an easy position to be swooped up on the go.

”No, ya do.” Carrick said rolling his mismatched colored eyes. They looked tired now but still had the cat like slits searching around for another threat in the darkened areas of the aquarium surrounding them.

”Oh sure, I just happened to get out of a situation ya put me and you saved the day again.” if his eyes could roll any harder he would had to fly after them. Apparently Carrick was still upset from his comments earlier about how ‘he’ did everything and the shifter was nothing more than a glorified taxi service. He wasn’t exactly wrong but the thief thought he could show a bit more appreciation to what he brought for the group. Looks, talent, a right hook.

”Yeah, I’ll hold ‘em.” he said opening his wings as the light show continued oblivious to the actual sea horses in the water bottle from earlier. The shifter was distracted now. Freeing his wings from all the water and trying to figure out how to kill the music. ”Sorry Sandman,” he pressed a button and every thing on the disco stick shut off. ”Thing’s magical.” he said more to himself putting it in the crook between his wings.

After the sharks reappeared in the tank Carrick looked back to Zek, ”Ya surprise me sometimes.” he flapped twice and was airborne flying over and lifting Zek into the air after he did his ‘up’ motion like a big boy. ”Thought fer sure ya would have kept one of them to throw at someone.” with that they were airborne avoiding the beam of lights from below. As they exited the building someone turned on the lights to reveal what the pair left behind.