Spiraling out of the tunnel of colored lights, Hunterborg crashed into a slope not covered in, but made of bones. He skipped down the slope twice, before he managed to land and turn his tumble into a slide down the massive hill. He looked to his left mid-descent, and saw many more bone hills ruled the landscape, lit by a pale orange moon in a black sky devoid of stars.

“Wait, what…?” He said as he reached the bottom of the hill, skipping off a short ledge and landing in thick, knee deep sludge. Standing upright quickly, Roland looked around at the uncountable bones surrounding him, and realized that they were almost all rat-like.

“Where am I? What is this place?” He murmured before he heard a hiss. “… Ayo–!”

Beams of energy shot from the dark, blasting Hunterborg in the chest, shoulders, and head. Snake Head–sans Heavyznake–kicked him in the back, then bicycle kicked him forward. Spin-kicking twice to end the chain of blows, he fired his eye lasers–which propelled the green Beetleborg into the side of another mound.

Slowly, Hunterborg got up. “Oh, so we’re sneaking niggas, now…?”

Snake Head landed in the sludge and folded his arm as the liquid rippled with the stirring of serpents around his feet.

“Welcome to my trophy room,” he hissed.

Back at Echo Creek Park, Brantley looked at the scorched ground where Marco and the Beetleborgs had been standing, then looked up the hill at Typhus and Vexor. Typhus was scratching the side of his mutant head, puzzling over what just happened.

“So are we just gonna wait for Snake Head to finish, or what…?” He asked.

Vexor hummed and shrugged his shoulders, moving his whole upper body with the effort. “We could always watch and see what happens.”

“Hey!” Brantley yelled out, and they both noticed the karate teacher walking up the hill towards them.

Vexor stared at Brantley and spoke aside to Typhus. “Who’s this?”

“Just some guy,” Typhus said.

Brantley took offense to that. “My name is Brantley, and I’m the teacher of that kid you zapped. Where is he, damn it?!”

Vexor called forth a scrying circle, forming it in the air above him and Typhus. “Would you like to see?”

Brantley looked up at the circular viewing screen into another world and saw the Blue Stingerborg on it. “… Whoa…”

Drew scanned his surroundings. He appeared to be in the middle of Echo Creek’s scrap yard surrounded by its piles of stacked up compacted cars. The path he stood in was much wider than normal, almost as big as a two-lane highway. Okay, another new ability, this time from Vexor.

The buzzing of motorcycle engines pulled his attention upward, and he saw four Scabs on dirt bikes riding down towards him, brandishing their swords. Without delay he pulled and fired the Input Magnum at his attackers, the beams bouncing off the front and handlebars of the bikes as their Scab riders reached him. Two passed closest to him, slashing him with their swords, while the two on the flanks of the formation peeled off in separate directions.

Grunting from the hits, Strikerborg faced the rider to his left that peeled off. Coming back around, the rider did a wheelie and three more dirt bikes with scabs on it appeared with it. The riders opened their formation and attacked one by one, slashing at Strikerborg with their blades as they passed him.

“Argh!” Strikerborg tried to turn back to shoot the retreating riders, when more came from the other direction, three slashing him with their swords while the last one did a wheelie and drove its bike up his front.

Sent reeling, fell to the ground and the Scabs closest to him leaped off their bikes and fell upon him in a heap.

Brantley gasped, as the Scabs swarmed Drew. “Oh no.”

Vexor was pleased, though it was hard to tell. “Not as extravagant as Jara’s but still clever. Where’s the other one?”

The scrying circle changed to the shopping district of Rodeo Drive in the middle of the night, where Strikerborg stood on the famous pedestrian street lined with staggeringly expensive shops. Looking at the shops, she grew indignant.

“I better not be here because I’m a girl!” She yelled before an expensively dressed woman walked past her. “Huh?”

Another passed her in the other direction. Despite it being the middle of the night, the walkway was populated like it was the middle of the day–and there were sales going on. Looking more closely at the women and scanning them, Jo realized they were mannequins with their faces drawn on by someone who had to do it in a hurry.

“… This is weird…” She muttered, before one of the mannequins walking up to her from behind pulled out a knife and slashed her across the back. The hit was immense, tearing off pieces of Strikerborg’s armor. “Urk!”

She stumbled into another slash, this time from the front, and went backward in a shower of sparks–only to be slashed again, and again. As the mannequins walked by her, they kept cutting, giving her no time to recover, let alone counterattack.

“Ack! Hey! Quit it!” She shouted with each hit.

Vexor watched, wondering what to make of this. “Snake Head isn’t the most creative of your works, is he?”

Typhus shrugged his shoulders. “I made him to do two things, baby: Hunt, and go fast.”

“He does it well,” Vexor changed the image of the scry, and Roland was in trouble as well.

Firing the Input Magnum in Crashing Mode from atop a bone mound, he sprayed beams at a high rate of fire, shooting at Snake Head. The monster moved like a blur, weaving in between each bolt and closing the distance.

Behind his mask, Roland grit his teeth. How is he moving like this?!

Snake Head punched him in the head, making him stagger to the side, then kicked him off the mound.

As Hunterborg fell Snake Head struck him from above, sending him into a spin, then came up from below in a rising kick to his stomach, folding him in half.

The blow knocked the wind out of him. Felt that through the armor…!

Snake Head grabbed him by one of his helmet’s horns and threw into the sludge. Lying in it, he looked up to see several Heavyznake’s rear their heads from the liquid and glower down at him. “And they’re jumping…?!”

They fired their eye beams in succession, each hit pushing Hunterborg towards another mound. Just as he reached it, Snake Head came down on him from above, punching him in the gut where he’d kicked him before.

“Ngh…” Roland grunted from the pain and looked up at the monster. Snake Head slammed its foot–armored with a pointed greave–into his face and shoved his head under the muck.

“Ssss… a paltry hunt.” Snake Head said.

The Hunter Claw shot from the sludge opening to clamp on his waist. Snake Head vanished, and Hunterborg stumbled forward through where he’d stood.

Snake Head appeared and spin-kicked him in the head. “I have hunted monsters…”

Appearing behind him he clubbed Hunterborg on the back of the head. “… Demons…”

Snake Head grabbed his shoulders and kneed him in the stomach, then elbowed his back to drive him down into the muck. “… Even Gods.”

A Heavyznake shot up from below Hunterborg, grabbing him in its jaws and lifting him above the sludge. With a whip of its head, it threw him high into the air. As he ascended, a single thought passed through his head.

I’m getting cooked!

He reached the top of his flight beneath the orange moon–framing him as a perfect target for dozens of Heavyznakes and their laser vision.

Seeing them, Roland braced himself best he could. “Ah shit…!”

The green Beetleborg was juggled by the beams, bouncing to and fro, spinning and flipping, before he finally fell away from the assault and crashed–trailing smoke–before the skeleton of a much larger rat-like creature.

Panting, Hunterborg slowly pushed himself up to his knees and looked up at the skeleton of the rat-like creature, different from the countless others besides its size with the massive, curling horns that sprung from its skull.

He’s actually tough with it, Roland thought, The fuck I’m gonna do…?

He looked up higher and found Snake Head standing on the broken end of one of the horns, framed by the moon above and behind him.

“Ssss… this has been a much needed vacation,” Snake Head admitted.

Hunterborg stood, the sludge dripping from his damaged armor, and he ignored the pain he was in from all the impacts to point his Input Magnum at Snake Head. “What did you… just say…?”

“Hmph… ssss… my Master, Bio Lord Typhus, has told me all that you are capable of.” Heavyznakes burst from the sludge, two grabbing his arms and two grabbing his legs, holding him in place.

“And I can taste your power. Great, but untapped. Dangerous, but ignorant.” Snake Head stuck his tongue out for emphasis. “That is why as prey your only worth is to capture more prey.”

Outside, Brantley looked away from the scrying circle to scowl at Vexor. “Whatever you’ve got planned, you won’t get away with it!”

“Are you volunteering to stop me, or are you going to continue to stand there like a pissant?” Vexor asked.

Brantley’s shoulders slumped. “Well, no, because I’ve, like, read your comic and I know you’re super strong and you’d splatter me all over this park in a second.”

A long, awkward silence passed, and Vexor tilted his head to him.

“You’re brave to admit that.”

“But…” Brantley added. “… I also know that I don’t need to do anything. Because you’ve already screwed up–you took my best student with you into your weird dimension.”

Vexor hummed. “Oh, that warrior boy. Let’s see how he’s faring.”

The scry changed, to Marco rolling along the tatami mats of the dojo to stay ahead of Jeremy, whose powerful stomps smashed holes through the mats into the floor beneath as he tried to crush him.

Rising onto onto his hands and feet, Marco sprang away from a heel drop that carved through one of the VHS shelves and landed a short distance away.

Marco assumed a fighting stance, as Jeremy chuckled and turned to face him. “Hahaha! So what happened to all that talk, Marco?”

Brantley recoiled. “Jeremy?! Wait…”

He looked around and saw no sign of his troubled other student. He looked back at the scry. “Oh no.”

Grabbing the destroyed shelf, Jeremy lifted and threw it at him, but Marco flipped out of the way. “You’re so big, bad, and strong, come on! Take me out like you said!”

Marco landed. “I’m not going to kill you.”

Jeremy snorted and jumped across the room, flying like Superman to punch Marco down. Instead of evading, Marco parried the blow and circled around Jeremy’s back. Jeremy turned and blocked Marco’s chop with his raised forearm. Then spun in place, lashing out with his arms in a whirling strike that Marco slipped under.

Turning to face him, Jeremy punched and kicked with his newfound reach and power, forcing Marco back one step with each attack. “Yeah, because you can’t!”

Marco crossed his arms to block a straight kick from Jeremy, and grimaced. He hits so hard!

His massive opponent capitalized, grabbing Marco by the shoulders and throwing him across the VHS Store/Slash dojo. “WAAAAAAHHH!”

He crashed into the bleacher and winced when he felt something break under him. Fortunately, he found only the wood splintered and cracked, and rolled out of the way before Jeremy’s hammer blow smashed the bleachers in two. The benches being wrenched down at the middle and up at the ends flung Marco into the air, but he caught himself on a rafter and held on.

Jeremy emerged from the broken bleachers and looked up to see Marco swing and throw himself off them to perform a flying roundhouse kick that connected with his jaw. Turning away into a spin, Marco back-kicked Jeremy, but only got his foot caught in a massive hand.

“Seven years, Marco. You’ve been doing karate almost as long as I’ve been…” He swung Marco around and threw him into the cashier’s counter. “… ALIVE!”

Coughing, Marco sat up and looked up at Jeremy as the giant advanced on him. “You’ve been a Green Belt for over half my life!”

He grabbed Marco by the throat and lifted him off his feet. “And I shot past you like the nothing you are!”

“Humans have such delusions,” Vexor noted to Typhus.

Typhus shrugged his shoulders. “Snake Head said to not sleep on ‘em, boss.”

Vexor sighed. “Well, I’m getting rather bored.”

Jeremy leaned close to Marco’s face, huffing loudly through his nose, high off adrenaline and conquest. “You will never come close to me, and you’re gonna die wishing that you could.”

Brantley shuddered. “Mr. Birnbaum, what the heck dude?”

Marco struggling against his grip to keep his airway open, spoke. “I’m not gonna kill you… because… you’re not worth it…”

Jeremy stopped. “Huh?”

“Why would I kill someone… as pathetic as you?” Marco asked.

The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

He gripped Jeremy’s massive fingers and laughed. “You’re eight years old. You bought your belt and private lessons, but bully other kids at a McDojo just to feel better than them. You have no friends, no one likes you, and I bet your own Mom lets you do whatever because she gave up on you. Killing you would be doing you… a favor…!”

Jeremy stared at Marco with a blank expression, and he raised his fist. “You’re talking mad smack for someone about to lose all their teeth, Diaz.”

Space Unicorn~! Soaring through the Stars~! Delivering the Rainbows all around the Wooooooorld~!

Vexor and Typhus both looked at each other, then at the scry as Marco’s ringtone went off. Jeremy stopped too, surprised by the sound.

On Rodeo Drive, the women attacking Jo stopped and looked upward. Staggering against a wall, Jo shook her head and caught her breath. “… What?”

In the scrapyard, Drew was pinned underneath a dirt bike of a Scab doing a burnout on his face–when the bike’s rear tire stopped and the rider and the Scabs pinning him down looked up at the sky.

Far within the bone mounds, Snake Head stopped… but he looked down. “His phone? But how?”

Marco grabbed his phone from his gi pocket and hit the talk button. “Star…!”

Jeremy snatched the phone from him with his free hand. “Hello, are you Marco’s girlfriend~?”

“No,” Dipper replied. “This is a courtesy call.”

Jeremy pulled the phone back from his face. “Huh?”

“Marco!” Dipper shouted. “That’s not the real Jeremy! None of what you’re in is real!”

On Rodeo Drive, Jo could hear Dipper’s voice. “Huh?”

Drew as well. “It’s not…!”

Marco began to smile. “It’s not… real?”

“I’m the real Jeremy!” The giant shouted.

“No you’re not… we’ve got him right here!” Dipper yelled back.

Vexor grew alert and looked towards the tree Snake Head ambushed Marco at, Typhus and Brantley following. Dipper was standing under the tree, holding Star’s compact magic mirror in his hand. Next to the tree, Mabel and Misao held a squirming Jeremy still with their hands over his mouth.

“Thanks for distracting them, by the way,” Dipper said to Brantley with a nod in greeting.

“I did not sense them… are they normal humans…?” Vexor asked, before he felt like he’d been buried alive in molten lava, and liquid metal was being poured into his eyes and ears.

He felt… power…

Incredible power.

Power that turned the morning sky dark from the intensity of its shine behind him.

Both he and Typhus turned around and came face to face with Star, who stood by the edge of Echo Creek Lake, her cheek marks and eyes both glowing as the air around her rippled with power. She was looking at the scrying circle over their heads, showing Marco struggling to get free of the fake Jeremy’s grip.

“Uh oh…” Typhus said as the ground shook in waves under his feet and a wind picked up from the direction of the girl, catching his and Vexor’s capes and the leaves of the tree.

For Vexor, it was like staring directly at the sun, from five feet away.

“… The… The Butterfly…!” He gasped, his voice filled with the awe and wonder of a man beholding the cosmos for the first time.

Star raised the wand and pointed it at the two Magnavores. Red lines of light drew towards the face of the wand, before several pink rings appeared in front of it and collapsed towards the center. The darkness in the sky grew, before it became almost black. In a voice that echoed with power and shook the air, she spoke.

“Let. Him. Go.”

Then it was the brightest day Echo Creek ever saw as a colossal beam of light enveloped the top of the hill and everything on it. The jet-like howl of the beam set off car alarms, sent dogs barking, and people who’d already been chased away from the park by the sounds of lasers and explosions ducking for cover.

Inside of the Gaohm Zone, the space flickered and warped, as immense power surged through it. The fake Jeremy flinched as the surge affected him, too. “What’s… happening…?!”

Marco forced Jeremy’s hand open, and dropped to the floor, pulling Jeremy’s arm and hyperextending it. Dragging him in, he swung Jeremy around and away from him. The hulking Jeremy caught himself against the broken cashier counter, and turned around, growling.

His back to him, Marco walked to the center of the training mats with a smile dripping malice on his face.

“This isn’t real,” he said. “Ohohohohoho… Jeremy, you have no idea what kind of a relief that is.”

On Rodeo Drive, the power surge caused the sky to grow lighter, and the mannequins turned their attention back to Strikerborg cracking her knuckles. Behind the mask Jo was grinning.

Letting out a dark laugh she pushed off from the store front and launched herself at the group. Reaching the nearest of the mannequins, Jo jumped, flipped, and dove towards the center of the crowd–punching the ground.

The force of her impact created a gigantic plume of concrete, glass, metal, and mannequin-like women as she destroyed the entire shopping district with that one punch.

Marco clapped his hands together. “Because now? Now… ohohoho! I can get me some catharsis!”

The bike pinning Drew exploded, and the Scabs that held him down were slashed through their heads and torsos by the Stinger Blade. Drawing the Input Magnum, Drew hit a new set of keys. “2-8-9! Magnet Magnum!”

As the other dirt bike riding Scabs tried to attack, Drew turned and fired at the piles of cars around him, magnetizing them with such power that the dirt bikes and the Scabs on them were yanked off the ground and crashed into them at high speed, crushing them against the piles of magnetized scrap.

The Gaohm Zone Jeremy chuckled. “So what… you’re gonna stop holding back…?!”

He ran at Marco with outstretched arms, huffing and panting like a galloping draft horse, to drag him to the floor and pummel him to death. “YOU’RE GONNA KILL ME IN ONE SHOT?!”

Turning in place, Marco performed a sharp, crisp high kick and struck Jeremy square in his chin. Its force wrenched the fake Jeremy’s head up with a sickening crunch and the rest of his instantly lifeless body followed it, his corpse smashing through the rafters until it was stuck into the ceiling up to the hips, his legs dangling below him.

Marco lowered his leg as he stared up at the dead fake.

“Yeah.”

Pounding his fist into his palm, he closed his eyes and bowed to his defeated opponent.

The realization that the Beetleborgs and Marco had overcome the traps his Gaohm Zone had laid out for him struck Snake Head with disbelief. “Ssss… impossible…”

He heard laughter behind him, and faced Roland, still held taut by the Heavyznakes. Underneath the mask, Roland smiled big as he watched the monster struggle with the sudden turn around.

“What did you say this was? A vacation?” He asked as he pulled against the Heavyznakes. “Nah, this shit was over the moment you decided what we’re worth.”

Snake Head hissed and the muck around him began to light up. One by one, more Heavyznakes reared up, their eyes shining as they charged with their potent lasers. The Synthetic Beast let out a dismissive hiss as his own eyes lit up. “Courageous last words. Prey that holds its head up high… is still just prey.”

All at once, Snake Head and the Heavyznakes fired, the beams raining upon Roland and enveloping him in a volley so large and concentrated that after enveloping him it went on to bore a massive hole into and through the bone mound behind him, vaporizing everything in its path. After several seconds of continuous fire the barrage came to an end and the beams faded, leaving nothing but a gaping tunnel that stood for several seconds before it collapsed under its own weight to seal it.

As bones tumbled down into the sludge at his feet, Snake Head flicked his tongue into the rancid air and tasted death, decay, and power.

He let out a hiss of satisfaction. “Prey slain, the hunt continues.”

Hunterborg’s armored hand caught the extended tongue and held it in his grip. “Nah, nigga, we’re running this shit back right now.”

Snake Head’s pupils dilated in his eyes with the shock. “Ssss…?!”

The Green Hunterborg pressed the Input Magnum against Snake Head’s left eye and pulled the trigger, shooting him with a wad of birdlime and sending the monster reeling in pain–his hand groping at the sticky, caustic substance to claw it off.

“… You… how…?!” He snarled.

Twirling the Input Magnum in hand, Hunterborg set it to Beam Mode and aimed it at Snake Head. “Don’t get it? Aight Snake nigga, let me put you up on game.”

Snake Head yanked his hand from his wounded eye and entered a fighting stance. “I will slay you in the name of Bio Lord Typhus, stubborn prey!”

Hunterborg fired the Input Magnum, but to Snake Head the yellow beam crawled out of the barrel of the weapon and began a slow, leisurely flight through the air towards him. Letting out a hiss, Snake Head stepped out of the muck and onto its surface to walk towards Hunterborg, each footstep leaving a frozen ripple on its surface.

He stormed past the beam, now fully left the Input Magnum, and up to the Beetleborg. You will not escape me this time!

With all his might Snake Head lashed out with a front kick at Hunterborg’s stomach, to launch him into the collapsing bone pile behind him and bury him in it.

It didn’t connect, passing through Hunterborg’s afterimage as so many attacks had passed through his own.

Snake Head hissed with disbelief.

“Like I was saying.”

The Synthetic Beast was shot in the back with rapid fire bolts from the Input Magnum’s Crashing Mode.

“What…?!” He turned back and only saw a smear of green disappear into his new blind spot on his left.

“You think you know enough about us, that this is light work.,” Roland’s voice echoed out before Snakehead was struck with more Crashing Mode bolts, on his right, hitting his hip, side, and shoulder.

Snake Head leaped away, jumping onto a bone mound to his right. He landed hard, the bones kicked up into the air by the speed of his landing coming to a standstill around him. “When did the prey gain this speed?”

Hunterborg appeared in front of him, swinging the Hunter Claw hard and wide and scattering the bones. Snake Head ducked under the slash and counterattacked, his punch deflected by the Beetleborg;’s free hand. The claw came back around, and Snake Head rolled under it to get behind him and kick him in the back.

The Green Hunterborg blocked the kick, turned and clobbered him in the snout with a punch before kicking him in the chest.

“But I’m gonna tell you straight up: we don’t care.”

Snake Head was sent tumbling through the air, skipping off the sludge like a thrown rock before he landed on his back cut across the surface like a speed boat through the sheer force of his momentum.

Looking in the direction he was launched from, Snake Head flared his eyes with power and fired, burning through the bird lime to lash out at Hunterborg with two deadly rays of light.

Hunterborg disappeared from the path of the beams, before he appeared on Snakehead’s right and punted him into the side of another pile of bones, sending hundreds of them scattering through the air.

“Because no matter how strong you think you are? Me and my mans are going to run that fade!”

Lodged against a particularly large vertebrae twice the size of his own body, Snake Head hissed angrily and fired another blast at Roland and swept it through the air, disintegrating the bones.

“Power… rot… death… nothing has changed!” Snake Head seethed before he was shot in the chest, left shoulder, back, and right arm by the Input Magnum.

The shots battered him into the bones until they shattered, and he was falling down the other slope of the bone pile. Looking up at the scattering bones and fragments, he saw the Hunterborg and his open claw before he plunged into Snake Head’s mouth and clamped down on his head.

“That’s right nothing’s changed, nigga! It’s been me the entire time!”

Snake Head’s pupils dilated from slits to nearly occupying the entire space of their eye. He remembered his own warning to Typhus, and his own condescension towards Hunterborg just moments ago.

The hunter’s folly… I underestimated my prey!

It was a revelation that came an instant before Roland charged down the bone mound and drove his body into the slope. At tremendous speeds, the bones tore at his durable hide, some impaled his shoulders and the coils wrapped there, a large sharpened bone tore off his left arm at the elbow, another sheared off his left leg, before he was lifted from the mound and thrown towards the sludge below.

Near the end of Snake Head’s flight, the Green Hunterborg appeared in front of him, showing him his back, and the Hunter Claw spinning as its turbine spun.

The world slowed down. Everything was dark, the bone mounds were gone, the sludge they rose from, and the rot and decay that he tasted with them had vanished as well. There was nothing else except for the Green Hunterborg standing there, radiating the tremendous power that he’d tasted all along.

Only Power. And Death.

“What are you?” Snake Head asked.

The Green Hunterbog turned towards Snake Head, bringing his arm around for the killing blow as he answered.

“The Hunter.”

Snake Head realized then, that he had not just lost.

He was the prey all along.

And what a fine Hunter you are. With that comforting thought, Snake Head embraced his defeat.

“RAGING SLASH!”

With all his might, the Green Hunterborg slashed through Snake Head, the spinning Hunter Claw mangling the monster’s body in two. Sliding to a halt, Roland stopped the turbine and steam erupted from the Beetle Battler and various vents across his body.

“Prey Slaughtered,” Roland said sharply and mockingly back at Snake Head, before the monster’s destroyed remains exploded–the blast shattering the world of bones and rot like it were glass.

With a disoriented yell, Roland found himself falling, entering the tunnel of light and color that brought him here.

@@@@@

The light from Star’s spell curved off and into the sky, scattering several high clouds before fading away harmlessly. On the ground, Dipper opened his eyes and found he was behind the tree with Mabel, Misao, and Jeremy. Brantley had dragged him there.

“Oh good,” Dipper said, seeing him in one piece. “I thought she would’ve gotten you.”

Brantley looked back at him. “I have seen enough anime to know… that you do not want to be standing in the sight-line of an angry magical girl.”

It was wisdom to live by. The top of the hill was gone, shaved completely off at the top by about three meters by Star’s attack. On the new edge of the hill, Vexor stood with both hands held forth, and a crumbling shell of magic falling in front of him and Typhus.

The Magnavore’s pristine white attire was scorched black in places, and his white chitin was cracked and split, revealing a purple and yellow glow beneath it. Behind him, Typhus’ body was fully red and badly scorched, regenerating slowly from the tremendous damage that the spell had inflicted on him.

In front of them, Star lowered the wand, and panted heavily. While the glow had left her eyes, her pupils were still shining, as were her cheek marks.

“In… incredible…” Vexor whispered, as glowing orange fluid dribbled from his mouth. “… The power of Mewni… undiminished by the ages…”

“I have so much left in the tank, too.” Star said as she raised her wand. “Now let my friends go!”

Soon as she made her demand, the sky opened up above her head, and the Beetleborgs and Marco all came spilling out of it. With a yelp, she dodged and weaved to not be crushed under the armored warriors, abd with even greater reflexes she caught Marco before he had a bad encounter with the ground.

“Marco!” She gasped, hugging him tight.

Marco smiled and returned the hug. “Hey Sta-aaahhow!”

And regretted it when she squeezed him tighter. “Ow! OW! Ribs! Ribs! Back! Everything!”

Gasping, Star pulled back. “OhmygoshI’msorry!”

Typhus saw the perfect opportunity and grabbed Vexor by the arm. “We’re outta here, baby!”

“W-wait…!” Vexor gasped, clawing at the air towards Star. “… The Butterfly…!”

Ignoring him, Typhus nodded and the two disappeared.

Star saw the burst of flames. “Shoot!”

She almost dropped Marco, then remembered the state he was in. “Ahh… is anything broken? Do you need to go to the hospital?!”

Marco shook his head and pulled away, but not too far. “Nothing’s broken, I’m just kinda banged up from that fight. All I need to do is lie down some.”

“That sounds great right now,” Roland said.

Marco was more than relieved to see the Beetleborgs were back in the real world, too. “Hey, you made it out.”

“Yep,” Strikerborg called back.

Stingerborg sat up. “Hey, did all of you end up in some weird place fighting something strange?”

“Yeah,” Roland said. “I fought Snake Head in some kind of swamp filled with rat bones. What about you?”

“I got the scrapyard,” Drew said. “And fought guys on dirt bikes like Dipper did.”

Jo seethed. “What? You got to have all that and I fought a bunch of mannequins with knives on Rodeo Drive?! Screw him, I’m gonna mess him up like I rocked that whole block!”

“Nah, no need, cuh. I clapped that nigga.” Hunterborg assured her.

Strikerborg got up and faced Hunterborg. “Deadass?”

Hunterborg got up slowly, his whole body felt like he’d just run a marathon, after he’d already run an entirely separate marathon. “I just wish you could’ve seen it.”

Stingerborg pumped his fist. “All right!”

When he patted him on the shoulder, he flinched. “Ow! Ow! Ow! I may have won, but nigga got me all fucked up. My ass needs to lay down.”

“Yay, me too. We can be pain bros,” Marco said.

Hunterborg gave him a thumb’s up. “Aight, cuh.”

He laughed weakly, before he remembered. “Oh yeah, I found my special power, too.”

Strikerborg brightened. “What, really?!”

Stingerborg was just as stoked to hear it. “What is it, man?”

“Super Speed, like… really super speed.”

The McCormicks looked at each other, then Drew spoke. “So Super Strength from Jo, Roland has Super Speed.”

Strikerborg nudged her brother. “I wonder what you’ll get?”

“Who knows, but I can’t wait to find out,” he replied.

Dipper, Mabel, and Misao walked over to the group, and looked around at the burning, scorched, and vaporized portions of the park. “So as usual we need to get going. Flabber won’t be able to clean this one up for us.”

“Yeah, good idea,” Marco agreed.

Strikerborg looked around. “I can’t wait to watch the news report on this.”

Star handed Dipper the Dimensional Scissors, and he quickly cut open a portal that would take them to Shermie’s back yard. Drew looked at the portal, then at Dipper, Mabel, and Misao, then at Sensei Brantley–who was carrying a squirming Jeremy under his arm, with his other hand over his mouth.

“Well then…” He said to his non-suited friends. “… If everything is in order, we’re gonna be on our way.”

Strikerborg butted in. “And let this be a lesson to you civilians to stay out of ours. The Magnavores are way above your pay-grade.”

Dipper scowled at her but nodded. “You’re welcome, I guess.”

“Let’s go, I hear sirens,” Misao warned them before she hopped through the portal.

Dipper nodded to the Beetleborgs again, who went through the portal, and stepped through the portal himself, with Mabel right behind him. Star was about to bring Marco across the threshold, when Brantley called out to him.

“Mr. Diaz!”

Marco looked back. Brantley, still carrying Jeremy, walked up to him.

“You don’t have to but… like… come to the dojo Monday? I promise it’s nothing bad, or me jerking you around. I have a lot to say, and I wanna do it without having to worry about cops asking me a bunch of questions.”

Marco nodded. “I will. You be safe getting out of here, Sensei.”

Sensei Brantley tried to not tear up, but he was bad at it. “Now go! I need to find Jeremy’s butler and then soak my hand in like… a gallon of sanitizer.”

Jeremy glared up at Sensei Brantley, then delivered a harsher glare at Marco as he and Star stepped across the threshold and the portal disappeared.

On the other side of the portal, Roland transformed back slumped against the picnic bench, exhausted. “And now I think I’m gonna need to lie down for six hundred years after that.”

Mabel called over. “You guys can chill here place for the rest of the day while I patch you guys up. You earned it.”

Looking over at her brother, and then at Roland, Jo smiled. “I’ll say! This is our third fight we’ve won against the Magnavores, guys!”

“Yeah, and did you see?” Drew asked. “Star hit Vexor hard.”

Star looked at her wand. “Yeah, I’m not even tired after that one.”

Marco turned to her. “How’d you do that?”

A blush spread across Star’s cheeks. “I was, um… motivated.”

“After that, I doubt Vexor will try to come after us directly like that again,” Roland noted.

“No, but if we can find out where he is? It won’t matter,” Dipper said.

Jo agreed. “That’s right.”

Vexor wasn’t invincible, and for all of their experience and abilities the Magnavores could be beaten in a fight. They were by no means experts at it, but when they combined their determination with the powers they had and the people with them who were experts at fighting monsters, they were able to win.

“For now though,” Drew finished, “Let’s just hope we can enjoy this victory… and get some rest.”