It had already been a crazy night. It had started at a rave, but then a small tyrannosaur had shown up and the party only escalated from there. When the cops finally showed up, Zek had to smuggle a very drunk dino-shifter into Zekworld (along with all the illicit yo-yos he’d been smuggling) and then he’d bolted, using his personal dimension as an alternate escape route.

From there, he’d been to seven bars, gotten into 5 fights (one of them stretched across three bars), accidentally made out with an up-and-coming celebrity, egged Li’l MacKellan’s car, drank an MMA fighter under the table (the guy really couldn’t hold his slushies), and about a half dozen other equally eventful and memorable things.

At some point he’d ran across Clarksburg, so Zek had naturally shifted plans to incorporate Featherbutt’s ideas - things could get really wild then! And they had! Zek was pretty certain they were both banned from Germany now, or at least a particular city inside it. Or maybe they were knighted? Zek didn’t speak Dutch so he wasn’t sure what the Tibetan man at the Russian embassy’s favorite Venetian bakery had been saying. It was all Greek to him.

“Okay okay okay,” Zek said as they turned down a dark alley. “So I’m thinking we should hit up a snackbar or something soon. All this running around is really making me hungry,” he complained, helpfully rubbing his tummy. He hadn’t eaten anything in like ten minutes.

The shifter was already down a few drinks, that was what happened when someone was upset and had a ‘drink for free’ label on them at one of his usual spots. He’d been led to believe he was filling in for another band, they needed a vocalist and a guitarist. Carrick checked two of those boxes. What he didn’t know was that it was just a ruse to get back at the previous singer/guitarist who was thinking about going solo. They all knew and neglected to tell the shifter. Not only getting him pumped for the spot light again but then insulted him by picking someone... less talented.

If it wasn’t for him bumping into Zek, Carrick might have said some harsher words followed by a roar or two, good luck singing in key when ya can’t hear ****.

The embassy was interesting, Carrick didn’t understand a word that was being said but then was yelled at for saying he didn’t speak Dutch. He was trying to be polite too. It was fine. Carrick got back at the man who yelled at them by lifting a wallet and some papers that were stamped ‘Important’ the documents didn't’ make it out of the building. He dropped them in a garbage can but he did manage to show off the wallet after they left said building.

”Fine by me mate,” he pulled out some money in the wallet. Most of it was cash thought there were a few bills that had a bunch of zeros on it. Carrick got excited for a second but then realized the money itself was a pinkish and purple bill with someone else ‘important’ he didn’t recognize. Tossing the ‘play’ money into the air behind him along with the wallet he kept the cash.

”Could go fer another pint as well. Got a chip on me shoulder still. Ya can start there if yer hungry.” Carrick chuckled already feeling his spirits being lifted.

Zek surreptitiously checked Connor’s shoulder and sighed a bit in disappointment. He knew it was a long shot, but there was still the slightest chance the dude actually did have a chip on his shoulder. Alas.

“Another bar? Perfect! I know this great little dive bar just a couple of streets over,” Zek said as he started scrounging around in his trenchcoat for more snacks. Most of his caches were empty - looked like he was gonna need to restock very soon. “We can get amped up for the next part of the night!” Truly, they were just warming up. MAybe Zek could instigate another bar fight at Sam’s bar…?

Footsteps started approaching from behind. There was a WHUMPH of air and suddenly a figure appeared in front of them as well. A dude appeared out of the shadows, holding up some of the board game dollars. “'eaven and 'ell, looks loike ya lads 'ave been pretty busy tonight!” the guy said in some kind of accent. Again, Zek didn’t speak Dutch.

“Sorry, I don’t speak Dutch. Could you repeat that in English?” Zek said without stopping.

The guy frowned and tilted his top hat up. “I am speakin' english, ya merchant banker!”

“Coulda fooled me,” Zek said with a shrug. “Ah well, I’m afraid I can’t understand you. Parley voo Francis Bacon?”

The guy glanced over at Crouton. “Is 'e always this rathead? ya kna wot, nevermind. Nickle and dime ter give me everythin' ya fellows got.” Then he pulled out a little gun and pointed it at them.

The metaphorical chip couldn’t have been eaten as much as he loved helping his pal out. Even if he could eat it odds were Zek still would be hungry. ”Don’t know why ya never hit up a vending machine or a grocery store and just help yerself. Really stock up on snacks.” his own stomach chimed in offering it’s support of the comment. Maybe Carrick was hungry as well.

There was someone following them. The wind changed and rushed past the pair as they walked to their next destination. The money he just threw away was now in front of him. Being counted and fanned as if it the holder was some sort of victorian era duchess. Carrick smirked as he spoke. Someone else from across the pond. Well, this should be interesting... as long as his father or brother didn’t hire someone to try and ‘collect’ him or more likely kill him.

”Busy enough mate.” the shifter said honestly enough, ”Though it’s about ta get a bit busy it seems. We were looking ta find a place ta get a pint. If ya don’t mind getting out of the way.” Carrick chimed in before answering, ”Nah, he’s no banker. Zekky can’t count to well.” his tail flicked behind him already knowing where this was going. The thief had been on the other side of this a few times before, though he was less direct.

‘Fight’

Ignoring his instincts he saw the gun and started to chuckle. ”Zekky, this guy... he’s pointing a gun at us!” the shifter busted out laughing, not because he was being held up but because there was a small blanked out orange tip on the gun. It was a toy. ”Mate, wrong pair ta be hold’n up. We don’t got much on us and unless ya deal in cards I doubt it’s worth yers or our time.” he said between wheezing with laughter.

Zek sniffed snootily at Chrichton. “I’ll have you know I have very good and most excellent reasons for not hitting up vending machines and grocery stores,” he said most haughtily. “But now you don’t get to hear them.” In the meantime, Zek could come up with those reasons while also mentally calculating the distance to the nearest vending machines. Why hadn’t he thought of that before?!

But at least now there was a guy with a gun to distract Birdcat. Good ol’ gunmen, always around when you needed them! Even if their guns were fake!

Mirth bubbled up in Zek and spilled out over his lips, which stretched gruesomely wide. “How adorable!” he cooed, tears nearly forming in his eyes. “Careful little boy, it’s way past your bedtime! Mommy is gonna be looking for ya soon!”

He clapped a hand on Craig’s shoulder as he joined him in laughter. A good twenty seconds later, Zek tried slapping him on the back again and realized something. His hands felt a lot of air. “What’s this?” he said, holding his hands up. His customary fingerless gloves were gone. So was his trench coat. And the rest of his clothes, except for his boxers that were covered in cartoon hamburgers.

“Oi!” he shouted at top-hat dude. “I liked that trench coat! It’s where I kept my snacks!”

“Then maybe you should’ve paid more attention to it!” said an oily, nasal voice from behind him. Zek twisted his neck around in a flash and a guy in dark clothes was now wearing Zek’s trench coat. The rest of Zek’s clothes were gone. But even worse, the guy was pulling the last of the gumdrops out of his pocket and eating them!
“AAAAARGH!” Zek shouted and he lunged…

…only for the guy’s hand to blur and Zek’s foot slipped on the ground and he immediately collapsed to the ground. He pushed off the ground to get up but his hands slid over the suddenly super-slippery ground.

“What gives?!” he shouted.

“Okay China Plate, let's get aahhht of 'ere!” shouted Top Hat and then another WHUMP of air sounded and the guy vanished. Seconds later, the Trenchcoat Thief started crawling up the side of a building.

Between the pair laughing and holding their sides at the expense of someone wielding a fake gun neither of them realized all the clothes they were wearing were gone. Both of them were left in their underwear which was upsetting because Carrick already had such a hard time keeping any clothes on and in one piece.

”Aye?” looking down Carrick saw his boxers all of the hearts being shot by an arrow. His lucky boxers, only because they survived two shifts and stayed in one piece, which was impressive for any clothing.

”Me clothes...” his wallet in his pant pocket also housed his lucky guitar pick and his lucky deck of cards were in the other pant pocket. Even more upsetting was all of the magic tricks he hoarded in his clothing was being carried off. ”Me smoke bombs!” Carrick shouted patting around his now partially naked frame.

”They... stole from us!” Carrick said in shock. ”DO they know who we are!?!?” Carrick said in shock from the amount of balls they had. More so now because there might have been some ball bearings in his pockets as well.

Carrick blinked and the guy was climbing up the side of the building. Climbing... how primitive. ”Today a valuable lesson will be had. There are people ya can steal from. Pretty sure we arent’ the ones ya can steal from.” Carrick flapped his wings and went right for the man climbing the building hoping to swing on him while he climbed.

Malice flickered behind Zek’s eyes and they turned solid, angry red. “I don’t think they do, Chris,” Zek said. “The idiots. I guess we’re just going to have to introduce ourselves, don’t ya think?” And it looked like Featherbutt (who thankfully had underwear on for once [Zek had left his sunglasses in his trenchcoat]) agreed ‘cause he launched himself at the spidering guy.

Zek pulled an emergency Slim Jim from the lining of his boxers and peeled the wrapper off, eyes unblinkingly waiting for Catbird to rip the man a new one.

The guy glanced back and saw the mutant’s approach, he waved a hand again. This time the air between them blurred and it suddenly felt like you were moving through heavy sheets of sandpaper. Air friction and resistance increased dramatically and instantly in the hopes of taking out the flier, or at least redirecting him while the climber could scuttle to the top of the building.

That was the moment Zek realized he was in danger of potentially getting a glimpse up Carl’s boxers.

“Ack!” he shouted and flicked a white ball out. It expanded into a portal and he stepped through in his own personal stadium, where it was all Zek, all the time. He closed the portal and jogged forward ten or twelve feet and then stomped on the ground. Immediately a disc of ground underneath him shot into the air like his own personal elevator. About three stories up, he opened another portal and stepped out onto the edge of the building, looking down at the wallcrawler and removing any chance of seeing Craig’s birdcat bits.

He got a golden orb ready to drop over the side.

”****ing right we’re about ta fight!” Carrick growled as he suddenly hit a wall, not a real wall just one where the air shimmered around him, it was... weird. His body was telling him one thing but his senses were telling him another.

His wings moved up and down as if they were being restrained and the sound around him seemed muffled. Carrick’s first instinct was to grab his ears but then realized he wasn’t wearing his headphones. Thankfully he left those at home today. To bad for him everything else was in the clothes that were magically removed.

”Zek!” Carrick’s eyes went to look down then saw his friend jump into a portal. Good, no reason they both had whatever happened to Carrick happen to Zek. Pushing through the air even harder Carrick tried to lift himself and close the distance as the wall crawler was picking up the pace.

”Ya must have heard of us!” Carrick shouted after his prey. A light opened up above them and Carrick grinned, ”Ya can’t out run us!” he was. Carrick wasn’t going to point that out though.

Zek shouted down at the wallcrawler’s whose eyes briefly widened in surprise, “Hi, I’m Zek! Here’s a present!” Then the wallcrawler’s eyes narrowed and he grinned. Just as Zek started opening his fingers to let the ball drop, there was another small explosion of air behind him.

WHUMP!

Then a boot planted itself in Zek’s back and shoved him out into the alley.

“Aaaiiiii!” he screamed in a most girlishly voice. The golden orb bounced out of his hand and hit the side of the building. A car-sized chunk of wall vanished, including most of the bit underneath the crawler.

“Ah! Blip!” the guy shouted as there was suddenly nothing left to cling to. The air friction vanished as he began mirroring Zek’s descent.

Except there were two more rushes of air as the top hat guy appeared in midair, catching the Trenchcoat Thief, and then poofing away to the top of the building across the alley.

“That’s so unfair!” Zek shouted as the ground got closer way too fast.

”Mother ****er!” Carrick shouted as he struggled still in the air hearing a few sounds of wind rushing above him. Why was he so slow. ‘Fiiiiiiight’ his beasty instincts told him making him more frustrated in the situation. Was his instincts.... mocking him and his slow descent upwards?

There was another flash of light and then Zek was falling faster than what Carrick was doing flying upwards. ”Come on.” just then his wings seemed to cut through the butter he was flying through it no longer felt like he was flying against hurricane forced winds. (Once in the danger room... it was dumb).

His body lurched forward and he flew to his buddy as the wind blew again sending the people falling with him... gone... Carrick needed a pint. Today was... ‘meh’.

Wings snapped open and he readied the catch for his partner in alleged crime. Doing his best ‘Weather Girls’ impression, ”It’s raining men!!!” the weight dragged him down and he leaned into it sending them towards the ground and picking up speed.

Just then as they were falling barely clothed into a back ally an old man looked out the window of his apartment, not sure what he saw. Looked to the concoction of herbs rolled into the hemp wrap and blinked slowly before looking back out the window.

”I want his top hat now... dibs!” swooping down then upwards he used the speed to propel them upwards to the next building over making sure he could dive at them. It was bright in the city at night and he would have preferred his sunglasses. Unfortunately a thief who wanted to die stole them.

With a turn Carrick and Zek were looking down on the pair as they jumped to another building roof top. ”Give ‘em the drop?” Carrick asked smirking, his pasty skin reflecting the moonlight and light pollution almost giving him a glow.

“Hallelujah!” Zek shouted into Callisto’s ear and he was handily saved from life as a pancake. And speaking of hands… “Oi, watch where ya put yer hands! Not until the third date!” Zek made a mental note to check his trench coat once he’d skinned it off the thief. He’d left a slap in one of the pocket’s with Cameron’s name on it. It was about time to give it to him.

As they climbed into the sky, Zek grinned nastily. “You can have the hat! I want their heads!” he said. He stuck a hand into the air and a white orb appeared for a brief second before expanding into a foot tall portal….that they swiftly flew by before Zek could reach into it.

“What? Hey! Get back here!” he said even as he shut the portal down. He tried making a new one but the same thing happened. “Grumble grumble grumble, this is your fault,” he complained to Featherbutt. “You don’t have snacks on your flights and now I can’t get my own.”

Which meant Zek was thoroughly annoyed and irritated by the time they’d reached the sky above the dead men walking. “With pleasure!” he sneered and he dropped a scarlet, glowing ball of doom upon the guys. The ball flashed and the car-sized chunk of masonry ripped out of the prior building appeared in the air, parallel to the rooftop. Gravity locked on to it and called it down, summoning hundreds of pounds of brick and stone and mortar down onto them.

“Dang, that might rip the coat and hat,” he said.

”Not me type.” Carrick stated letting out a slight wince wishing his ears weren’t so close to Zek shouting. Even if it was the correct timing and everything for the song. While he was happy about that his ears were pretty sensitive to sound. Especially now that his adrenaline was pumping.

‘Hunt! Prey!’

”Yeah, blame the guy that caught ya.” he was used to not having snacks on his flights. Most of the ones he carried were either eaten by his portal wielding friend or got smashed anytime he started to shift. It was a wonder why he kept anything in his pockets. Maybe he should just start wearing a backpack might go against the image he had of himself but at least he’d keep his stuff safe... and well snacks. ”More motivation ta get a hold of ‘em!”

They dodged two of his portals, out maneuvered his flying and were making them look bad. Them! ”I think I found our archenemies.” the light show that came next would have brought a tear of joy to his eyes if it wasn’t for the fact that the hat was going to be smashed, ”My new hat!”

The pair looked up and sidestepped the boulder as it came crashing down almost cartoon like and Carrick started remembering all the Saturday morning cartoons he watched last weekend. The one with the hat looked up to them and mocked bowed and then continued to run off. ”Hey!” with that Carrick dove for them. ”That was cool.” he hated to admit.

Zek tearfully mourned in advance for the coat as the building bits fell, but he stiffened his lip. They would die for a just cause, namely, the death of the thieves. Trenchie would’ve wanted it that way.

But then they just sidestepped. Like, they didn’t even have to use their powers to escape. “Aw, come on!” he shouted. “That’s not even fair!” The Trenchcoat thief shoved a couple of fingers into the air in a very rude gesture before spinning around to follow his cohort.

“No, they’re not archenemies,” Zek said balefully. “They’re dead men walking! Even if that was way too cool,” he pouted.

He twisted his head and blinked owlishly at Mr. Airline. “We need to regroup,” he said plainly as he started wriggling in Birdcat’s grasp, attempting to extricate himself from his buddy’s nearly-naked hold (which he suddenly wasn’t sure if all that moving was better or worse, the eye contact definitely wasn’t helping).

He dropped another white ball and a portal to the locker room of Zekworld opened up beneath them. “Alright just drop me in, I need a change of clothes. You coming?” he said.

‘Kill!’

It was clear his beast form agreed with Zek, they were dead men walking. How could they keep their reputation if they kept getting shown up like this? If it continued others would start questioning who really ran this part of town. He felt a roar well up in his chest as if to proclaim that this was his turf territory but that faded when he felt his friend struggle in his grasp.

Anyone else Carrick would have gone lower so the fall wouldn’t kill his passenger, Zek however. The thief’s arms opened and Carrick dropped Zek like a bad habit knowing full well what he was going to do. A orb of light appeared and then a portal formed. ”Ya have ta ask?” Carrick sighed and dove in after him.

The locker room, where all the good stuff was stored. ”Gonna be honest, they came out of nowhere. Hell didn’t expect anyone ta challenge us on our turf. Ballsy of ‘em.” Carrick opened his locker and pulled out his tunic, a gift from the princess and shook his head. If they were going to fight he’d need something that offered a tad more support.

”Ya think they knew who we are?” he questioned wondering if this was an intentional attack. Pulling out one of his shirts he slipped it on and slid the wings through it. It was tighter than his normal shirts, hopefully that meant his clothes couldn’t be stolen again. At least his shirt. The pants were his standard.

”I mean, we do enough for the community right?” maybe he should stop serenading the area in the midnight hours? No, the he wouldn’t punish his fans.

”Well, they had us in the first half. Let’s go out there and win this thing!” Carrick started checking pockets for items to use. Luckily his spare pants always had a deck of cards and a smoke bomb or three. His hand thumbed a baseball bat and hefted it over his shoulder. Half time was over.

“It was rhetorical!” Zek said as the Winged Wonder dropped him over the city and right into Zek’s own little world. It was a fall of only a few feet, really, but the portal opened up perpendicular to the locker room floor, so as soon as Zek crossed through the portal, the direction of gravity switched and he suddenly jogged a dozen feet before he could stop.

Well, since they were both here, it was time to get their game faces on.

As Zek accessed the military fatigues locker, he scowled. “I know, right? I can’t beleive we fell for the ol’ ‘make them laugh at my wee little pistol and then pants them when they’re incapacitated’ trick! I mean, we practically invented that!” he fumed as he pulled on some urban camouflage.

“They’ve gotta be new in town,” Zek said. “Everyone knows who we are. Or they’re stupid.” He slid into a gray and black flak jacket and snagged the swimming goggles. He didn’t really need the goggles anymore, he just liked how they looked - the neon blue really offset his tongue rather nicely. “Or both. They’re definitely stupid, to mess with us. How about we give them an introduction they’ll never forget?”

Zek pulled out some duffle bags that he’d been steadily loading up over the past few months with all manner of odds and ends. They were versions of what he used to use before he created Zekworld - bags full of things from comfort food to blood-crusted weapons of violence. He rarely used them nowadays since he always had a locker room within arm’s reach, but he decided he didn’t wanna take any chances. Besides, he might need to arm Cuttlefish at some point. He flashed away two of the duffle bags, right as the locker room doors opened up and a dozen holographic Zeks and a half-dozen faceless Catbirds double-timed it into the room.

They were all wearing matching baseball uniforms and equipped with various medieval weapons and following them up was a Zek in a wheelchair with a cotton candy.

The seated Zek said, “Well, boys ... I haven't a thing to say. Played a great game...all of you. Great game.” He tried to smile. “I guess we just can't expect to win ‘em all.” The Zek paused and continued more quietly, “I'm going to tell you something I've kept to myself for years -- None of you ever knew George Gipp. It was long before your time. But you know what a tradition he is at Notre Dame…”

There was a gentle, faraway look in the Zek’s glowing blue eyes as he recalled the boy's words. “And the last thing he said to me -- ‘Zek,’ he said - ‘sometime, when the team is up against it -- and the breaks are beating the boys -- tell them to go out there with all they got and win just one for the Gipper…’”

The Zek’s eyes became misty and his voice was unsteady. “I don't know where I'll be then, Zek’, he said - ‘but I'll know about it - and I'll be happy."

There was a hushed stillness as Zek and the crowd of Zeks at each other. In the midst of this tense silence, Rockne quietly says "Alright," to the men beside him, and his chair is wheeled slowly out of the dressing room.

Zek number 12 said, “Well, what are we waiting for? Let’s go kick some butt!”

With a single roar, the Birdcats and Zeks went charging for a portal that the one true Zek opened up, right at the spot in mid-air where they’d left dullworld. He pulled down the visor of his murderbucket helmet and hefted his morningstar mace. “You heard the Zek! Let’s roll!”

Then he flung himself out the portal and into the night-time sky of NYC.