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Date Posted: 22:30:06 01/06/04 Tue
Author: J.T. Magnus
Subject: Chapter 55: "Act the Hero."

With all the risks and blows I've taken in my life, I should be long dead, but I'm not. At times I wished I was dead, but no longer. Not just for my classic reason of not giving all the pricks I've encountered in my existance the satisfaction, but because I have to, I'm needed.

Kay needs someone to harness what he has to offer and direct it to a goal, without that he becomes destructive of himself and others.
Jessica needs someone to love and to love her, otherwise the rose in her heart will wither and die.
Bahamut ZERO needs someone to guard this Earth, simply because old lizard-puss has developed a soft spot towards it.

And freedom and reality... They need their heros, and I'm always willing take a swing at things, after all, if I don't do it, who will?

My mind was in turmoil, flashes of my past, of futures with Star, of futures alone, of futures with Jessica, weddings, proposals, denials, acceptances, fights, times of peace, they all blasted through my mind in what seemed at the time to me was the space of a moment.

And I cried out for the first person I could think of to be my anchor...

"JESSICA!"

I began to focus the flow of my thoughts, the day her J.T. met her, the mission to the United Kingdom, the talk Turbo had with Roadblock in the mess, the day I met her, that first kiss, the wonderful feeling of waking up beside her, the times she had teased me, when we told each other that the other was in our future plans, our first date, the events of New Year's Eve....

I winced from the bright lights of the hospital room, somehow I expected this, even Valron physiology can't do much against a Nine Double-M round at point blank range.

"You're awake, good, Mr. Denny."

"Where am I, doc?" I blinked again to clear my vision before turning to look at the white garbed black man that had spoken.

"And cognizent, also good. To answer your question, Bethesda Naval Hospital recovering from gunshot wounds to the chest and left arm."

"English, please, my head hurts too much to decipher 'Medical Profession.'"

"You put yourself between a hardhead and some lead."

"And here I thought I had been on a bit of a sugar binge, Doctor...?"

"Greer, Carl Greer, and for a civilian, you certainly act like one of the cannonballs the government loves to employee."

Carl Greer? Doc is right, in another reality, that's who he'd be, codename: Doc. Splinter Theory rears it's head again...

"And I must say, I'm not used to having armed bodyguards like your friends seem intent on being around here."

Yep, that's Blaze and Athena all right...

"Could you show them in, Doc?"

"I'm sorry, I'm afraid that's against the rules, besides, with your genetic mutations we don't know how you'll heal."

"Show. Them. In."

"Excuse me?" Appearantly Doc hadn't dealt with that many high ranking or high-ranking attitude soldier, and attitude was one of the things I had plenty of.

"I've been shot, what will talking to my brother and girlfriend do, kill me?"

He flipped through the papers on his clipboard, "According to this you're an only child..." He paused, "Of course, according to this you're an entirely different person, but your parents say you're the same person."

"It's a long story, Doc, maybe one day you'll have enough time and security clearance to hear it." That got a strange look, a civilian talking about a captain in the army not having high enough clearance, but he walked out the door, muttered something to three people outside my room, and left.

And as strange as it sounds, I actually preferred Blaze's slow stride into the room with his shotgun in hand to Athena tossing her single drawn Desert Eagle to the side as she ran towards the bed.

"What the hell were you thinking, Turbo?!"

I winced again, this time from the volume of her voice. I'd suffered from several kinds of hangovers in my life, too much sugar, too much caffine, and even admittedly a little bit of underage alcohol consumption, but the kind you have from getting shot is worse. Much worse.

"I think I was on automatic 'Protect higher ranking officer' mode."

"Oh, yeah, I'd say higher ranking officer is an understatement, 'Sir John.'" Blaze smirked.

Sir John? Only Sir John that Blaze would know or know of and similar events would wind me up in the hospital was... Oh no... I DIDN'T...

"Please tell me I didn't..."

"You did, oh, boy, you did."

Magnus or Denny, I'm still Irish-American, I can't even take a damned vacation without something happening to me...

**==

Oh, it had STARTED innocently enough, my parents were making one of their numerous political-based trips to Washington D.C. and had asked if we wanted to go along, a chance Jessica and I were glad for, simply for a change of scenery and that Kay was accepting of since his project was at a stage where he couldn't do anything until it finished its part. So the five of us went in two vehicles, my mom's car for them, my van for us. The first of the two weeks to be spent there was the usual: Sightseeing, and in mine and Jessica's case flirting. Paris is ok if you don't mind being surrounded by cheese and cowards, but D.C. is the U.S.A.'s most romantic city if you ask me. After all, you just can't take moonlight walks by the Potomac or the Reflecting Pool anywhere else. The highlight of the second week was that the Old Man had gotten us all into a political function where a prominant government offical was the main speaker, I hadn't really paid any attention to who it was. I had always habitually paid only half attention at these things during the speeches (No attention the time it was Ted Kennedy, I think I'm STILL imfamous on Capital Hill as the only one whose not only WANTED to, but was actually ABLE to pull off sleeping through one of his speeches without looking like I was out.) and this was no exception: I was thinking about the drive from the hotel...

**==

Kay was in Ironhide's back seat, muttering about the fact that he was riding towards one of the more dangerous places to be during a Level Orange Alert in a red minivan named after an Autobot that died and whose alternate mode was a red Onebox Cherry Vanette as he fiddled with my Casio PT-80 mini-synthesiser piano. Jessica on the other hand was again riding shotgun, this time listening as I sang along with myself.

Or rather, that is, with a tape of myself...

"~~Raging Tempest
Storms of Fury
Fight them if you Dare
Helpless children
Plea for mercy
Save them if you Care

Act the Hero
Save the world
Time is on your side
Beat the zeros
Win the battle
Only have to try
Act the hero
Act the hero

Battle Raging
Cannons Blazing
Burning up the Night
Evil villains
Harm the Children
Won't you stay and Fight?

Act the Hero
Save the world
Time is on your side
Beat the zeros
Win the battle
Only have to try
Act the hero
Act the hero

Act the Hero
Save the world
Time is on your side
Beat the zeros
Win the battle
Only have to try
Act the hero
Act the hero

Act the Hero
Save the world
Time is on your side
Beat the zeros
Win the battle
Only have to try
Act the hero
Act the hero

Act the Hero
Save the world
Time is on your side
Beat the zeros
Win the battle
Only have to try
Act the hero
Act the hero~~"

"Interesting song, yours?"

"Nah, a friend of mine named Firestorm wrote the lyrics and music, I just sang it a couple times cause I like the beat."

"And the tape?"

"Probably the only one in existance, just a recording I did of myself so I could listen to me singing without having to actually sing it."

"Okay... So, why are we going to this anyway?"

Kay piped up, "Because J.T. hates going to school and is too damn lazy to get his G.E.D.!"

I shrugged, "At the risk of destroying a world from saying it, he's right."

**==

The sound of gunfire broke me out of my thoughts to see one of the 'reporters' fire a gun disguised as a camera at the speaker, luckily he missed. But that gave Kay and Jessica time to look at me and see me nod an affirmative and for the three of us to use the Dragonfire energies to change from the semi-dressy clothes we were in to our battle togs while the crowd began to run out of the room. As the three of us ran against the flow of bodies and towards the shooter and several others who were doing as he had done and converting their cameras to guns I counted up the odds, three teenagers, trained, yes, but teenagers and two government agents against about eight on the other side. Before I realized what I was doing, my sidearm was out of it's holster and I had shot the one who had fired first. At the sound of other reports at the same time I glanced to see that Athena and one of the agents had caught him as well, scratch one. For government 'Men in Black,' the two had enough intelligence to see that we might be armed when we shouldn't be, but we were on their side, and the second agent began to escort the speaker out under cover.

Seven to four, bad for them.

I've reached a conclusion: When you gut a camera to turn it into a gun, it doesn't work as well as a good old fashioned Remington pump-action. I'm quite certain the two that were standing side by side and wound up with filchette rounds in them would agree. Ever get a splinter? Remember how much it hurt? Now, imagine if it was metal, shotgun propelled, and accompanied by roughly fourty-nine or so others.

Five to four.

When you learn to shoot, you learn to recover after firing. I've learned from others as well, but my BB-gun wielding maternal grandmother, now over a decade deceased unfortunately, was the first to teach me how to shoot, putting BBs into a dirt bank across the road from her front porch. In the time it had taken myself, Athena, and the agent to fire and recover, Blaze had disabled the other two and began to recover, meaning it was our turn to shoot again.

Athena and the agent's next shots hit, mine missed...

The two remaining gunmen refocused on their objective: The speaker. Appearantly they thought that even if they died, if he did as well it would be worth it. The first gunman shot the second agent and he fell, by the way he landed I could see he was already gone by the time he touched ground. I saw the second begin to aim out of the corner of my eye, as the surviving agent seemed to, and we both began running towards the speaker. The second gunman switched targets and fired, catching me in my left arm, my gun arm, and causing me to lose my weapon. The twin blasts from Athena and Blaze did a better job than he did. Almost by silent agreement, the agent kept running towards the speaker, as I moved towards the final gunman.

Hell, if everything else failed, I carry two grenades on my vest for a reason: To blow the enemy up and leave nothing but cloth scraps if it comes to that.

The others couldn't draw a bead, I was in the way, but I was NOT in a good mood. Being shot does that to people. By the time I reached him, his gun was pointed at me, and I was still moving towards him. At what seemed to be the exact moment I was within arm's reach of him, he pulled the trigger and the bullet slammed into me. I crumpled to the ground as the slug hit me, but not before my good arm swung with the force of my forward motion in addition to everything else, catching him hard in the shoulder. I later learned that between adrenalin and physiology I had swung with enough force to break it.

The last things I saw before I blacked out was Athena kneeling beside me and EMTs entering and moving toward me...

**==

Normal human time to heal from two gunshot wounds: Two months to operational level, more to full functionality.

Normal Valron time to heal from same: Two months total.

Valron time to heal with human stubborness and an Elixer from my brother's stash of Final Fantasy items: I was fully healed by the next day.

And glaring at the guards outside the speaker's office as I handed over rail gun, pistol, katana, grenades, the same as Jessica and Kay were doing, but with a much more annoyed attitude. I had no respect for government agents in the first place, and after the events of two days before there was only one whom I felt was worth the air they breathed, of course, when you're in a firefight alongside someone, you gain at least a little respect for them. Finally, when all three of us had handed over our weapons, elicting whistles of awe from the guards I might add, we were shown in and we sat down on the opposite side of a desk from the speaker.

And we told the story. All we knew, from that first saturday almost a year ago to the attack on his life by what turned out to be Cobra Vipers, and he listened.

Then he asked a question that was simple in words, but carried a weight far greater that those same words implied, "What can be done to help?"

I leaned back and smiled, those were just the words I'd been wanting to hear.

"Three things: First, we'll need the paperwork and IDs for Jessica and Kay to be put into the government computer systems so they'll be legal residents of the country and at the same time my data to be adjusted from my former self to how I am now. Second, we'll need access to Bethesda when injured, there because the doctors there are also soldiers and can be informed that our medical records are need to know basis and no one needs to know. Finally..." I paused, mentally wincing, I had long since figured out what we'd need if we ever got the chance, but that didn't mean we wouldn't be pushing it.

"Finally?"

"Sanction."

"That's all? Done."

"Sir?"

"Young man, if it's a choice between legalizing two teens and supporting the actions of them and others or letting the world get conquered or destroyed, it's no choice at all. And that's not counting the fact that it's an election year."

"Tha-thank you, sir." I stuttered.

"Normally he only gets like that around me." Jessica smirked.

The speaker joined us in laughing at that. Then he pushed back from his desk and stood, "If you all will excuse me, there's other matters I need to attend to."

"No problem at all, sir, sorry for taking up your time." I responded as the three of us also stood.

"If you hadn't helped, I wouldn't have any time to take up."

As he turned to walk out of the room I said one last thing, "Thank you, Mr. President."

"We're even." And President Bush left the room.

The three of us turned and headed out when Kay said something that made me facefault against the doorframe...

"So THIS is what the Oval Office looks like."

**==

The next day we were called back to the White House to be given the offical document granting us the full backing of the government of the United States of America.

When all was said, done, and we were outside again and almost to the gate, I took the time to actually read it... and groaned...

"What's wrong, J.T.?"

I turned the open leather folder so that they could read the parchement, Dubya had one-upped us...

"Oh, no..."

"That's what we get for having a TEXAN in charge..."

I took a second look at the paper...

By special order of the President of the United States of America
there now exists, as of the date inscribed below, a new department of
the United States Government and division of the United States Military
hereafter to be known as the Reality Preservation Task Force,
Codename: "G.I. Joe."

As the first head and first agents of this unit, the President hereby
appoints three young Americans who have proven under fire that
they are fully able and willing to undertake this duty with all the
risks and rights thereof regardless of the danger to themselves
and focused solely on the protection of this planet and the universe
it resides in.


And underneath that it was inscribed with that day's date, stamped with a smaller version of the same Presidental Seal that was on the outside of the folder, and signed by George W. Bush, President, United States of America.

I closed the folder and shook my head, this worked, wasn't QUITE what we had in mind, but it worked. Tucking the folder under my arm, I joined the rest of the Reality Preservation Task Force in walking out of the gate surrounding the White House and onto the streets of Washington D.C.

And we just couldn't resist, well, in my case it wasn't the urge to do it that I couldn't resist, it was Jessica's sad-puppy look, but we drew stares from both guards and civilians when we shouted out the only fitting thing to say:

"YO, JOE!"


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