May's fingers close around Valeria's wrist as Batgirl's grappling line carries them upward through the torn ceiling. The service shaft is a throat of corroded metal and sparking wires, humming with the death rattle of the bunker's power grid. May's Spider-Sense is screaming — not a single warning but a wall of noise, every collapsing beam and ruptured conduit feeding her a fresh jolt of danger-danger-danger until the signal blurs into static.
"Left!" Valeria shouts over the groan of metal.
A pipe bursts to their right, spraying steam. May yanks Valeria sideways, her free hand finding a pipe to steady them. Joltik clings to her shoulder, its tiny claws digging in, sparks flickering across its fur like a live wire.
JOLTIK: "JOL! JOL JOL!"
"I know, buddy," May gasps. "I know it's bad."
Batgirl is already ten feet above them, her cowl lights cutting through the dust like twin searchlights. She fires another grappling line, ascending with the mechanical efficiency of someone who's done this a thousand times. "Keep moving! The shaft narrows in thirty feet — we'll have to go horizontal!"
"Great," May mutters. "Claustrophobia. My favorite."
Valeria's gauntlet flickers with pale blue light, casting her face in ghostly relief. She's reading something — energy signatures, structural integrity, May can't tell. "There's a power junction ahead. Main line feeding the containment unit. If Joltik can overload it—"
"We go dark," May finishes.
"We go fast," Valeria corrects. "Joltik. On my mark."
JOLTIK: "TIK!"
They reach the junction. It's a box of humming metal bolted to the shaft wall, cables thick as May's arm radiating outward in every direction. The hum vibrates through her bones.
"Now!" Valeria shouts.
Joltik launches from May's shoulder. The tiny Pokémon hits the junction feet-first, and every spark in its body converges into a single, blinding point of contact. Thunder Shock — not the playful zap from the bank job, but a sustained, screaming discharge that turns the junction into a miniature sun.
The shaft goes dark.
Batgirl's cowl lights snap on instantly, two cones of white cutting through the black. "Nice work, Joltik. Now move."
May doesn't need to be told twice. She grabs Valeria and follows Batgirl's lights, climbing hand over hand through the darkness. Joltik scrambles back to May's shoulder, its body warm and vibrating against her neck.
The sounds of battle filter down from above. Cosmic blasts. Shouting. The heavy thud-thud-thud of boots on metal grating.
Then they burst into the chamber.
It's massive — a cylindrical space that rises three stories, its walls lined with catwalks and machinery. At the center, Zapdos's containment unit ascends through a shaft in the ceiling, bathed in sickly purple light. Cables snake from the unit into the walls, siphoning the legendary bird's power like parasites.
And anchored to the unit's base, half his body fused with the machinery, is Zola.
His digital face — that flat, screen-mounted expression of cold intellect — turns toward them. His eyes are camera lenses. His mouth is a speaker grille. When he speaks, the voice comes from everywhere and nowhere.
"Valeria Richards. May Parker." A pause. The lenses focus, whirring. "Your arrival is... within projected parameters."
"Within your what?" May says.
"Shut up," Valeria hisses. "He's stalling."
On the upper platform, Crossbones fires stun rounds downward. The crimson energy bolts streak toward Franklin, who stands at the chamber's far side with Ralts floating beside him. The little psychic Pokémon throws up a barrier — shimmering, translucent — and the bolts shatter against it like glass.
RALTS: "RALTS!"
Franklin's hands glow. He sends a focused beam of cosmic energy back at Crossbones, who ducks behind a support column with a grunt.
"You missed, kid," Crossbones calls out.
"Wasn't aiming for you," Franklin says.
The column explodes. Crossbones rolls, comes up firing.
Below them, Harley Quinn swings her mallet into a cluster of HYDRA operatives with the enthusiasm of someone at a carnival game. Houndour darts between their legs, nipping at ankles and sending agents stumbling into each other.
HOUNDOUR: "HOU HOU HOU!"
"Down, boy!" Harley cackles, bringing the mallet down on a dropped stun rifle. "Oh wait — that's me who's down! Get it? Because I'm—"
"Harley!" Ivy's voice cuts through the chaos. "Focus!"
Ivy stands near a breach in the chamber wall, her hands pressed against the stone. Roots — thick, thorny, alive — snake through the opening and across the floor, ensnaring agents who try to rappel down toward the containment unit. Roselia floats at her side, its roses raised, launching volleys of glowing leaves that shred equipment and pin operatives to the walls.
ROSELIA: "ROSE! ROSE!"
Kamala, embiggened to twice her normal size, uses Eevee as a living projectile launcher. She scoops up the little fox Pokémon and hurls it at a group of agents. Eevee hits them like a furry cannonball, Quick Attack blazing.
EEVEE: "VEE!"
"That's my girl!" Kamala shouts.
Doreen zips across a catwalk with Emolga clinging to her back, both of them cackling as Emolga drops acorns wired with static charge onto the agents below.
EMOLGA: "EMOL! EMOLGA!"
Then Crossbones spots May's team.
His eyes lock on Valeria. He drops from his platform, landing on a lower catwalk with a heavy clang, and starts moving toward her. Tactical. Deliberate. He's seen the gauntlet. He's seen the way Valeria directs the Pokémon. He knows who the brain is.
"The little genius," Crossbones says, raising his stun rifle. "Kingpin's gonna love you."
May's Spider-Sense screams.
But it's not Crossbones.
The pheromones hit like a wall. One second May is alert, focused, ready. The next, her thoughts are cotton. Her Spider-Sense flickers — not a warning but a dying radio signal, static eating the edges of her awareness.
Viper steps from the shadows near their ascent point. Her emerald eyes are half-lidded. Her lips curve into a smile that doesn't reach them.
"Hello, little spider," Viper says softly.
Joltik's sparks dim. The tiny Pokémon sways on May's shoulder, its chirp fading to a confused murmur.
**JOLTIK: "Jol... tik...?"
May stumbles. Her hand slips on the catwalk railing. The world tilts.
Batgirl is already moving. She pulls her gas mask down over her face and hurls two EMP batarangs in a single fluid motion. The first hits the catwalk near Viper's feet, exploding in a shower of sparks. The second arcs wide — a feint — drawing Viper's attention for half a second.
That's all Frogadier needs.
The ninja frog leaps from Batgirl's shoulder, hits the ground, and fires a Water Gun directly into the air above Viper. The water catches the light from Batgirl's cowl, creating a curtain of mist and refraction that scrambles Viper's line of sight.
"Smokescreen!" Batgirl shouts. "May, breathe through your mouth!"
May sucks in air through her teeth. It helps. A little. The fog in her head thins enough for her to think.
Valeria gasps beside her, shaking her head like she's trying to dislodge water from her ears. Her eyes clear. She looks at Crossbones, who's fifteen feet away and closing.
"Metang," Valeria says. Her voice is steady. "Intercept."
Metang doesn't hesitate.
The evolved Pokémon launches from Valeria's side like a missile. Its metallic body catches the purple light from the containment unit, gleaming. Its red eye locks onto Crossbones with the precision of a targeting system.
Crossbones raises his rifle. "What the—"
Metang hits him with Iron Head.
The impact is enormous. Crossbones is slammed backward into a support column hard enough to dent the metal. His rifle clatters away. He slides down the column, dazed, and Metang hovers in front of him, its body humming with magnetic energy, daring him to get up.
METANG: "METANG."
"Stay down," Valeria says quietly.
***
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