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The arctic wind whips and howls, its ceaseless moan slowly being drowned out by the roar of Dynomutt’s engines. It was cold enough that frost was forming on the outer layer of his armor plating, but there was no choice. A signal was detected on long-range scanners that seemed to match the energy signature of Dick Dastardly’s rotten robots, which meant it had to be investigated. It was probably just a rogue lost robot, surely the dastardly doctor would not be all the way in Antarctica. Being the most durable and fastest member of the team, it fell on Dynomutt to investigate. Even as he angled his approach and descended towards where the signal was detected he saw a message appear on his heads-up display. “Warning, battery power 50%.” That shouldn’t be right. He’d charged just before he left. He focuses on his internal schematics and sees that the icing on his plating has not only increased his weight but also caused significant drag. Just to move at the same speed he’d been using 30% more energy than he calculated. And to make matters worse, the cold was also causing issues with his Quest X power source, causing more strain than he’d anticipated. But it shouldn’t be a problem. He’d swoop down, take a quick look around, de-ice and then take a more energy-efficient route. Little did he know that down amongst the ice and snow there was a hidden danger lurking. Dick Dastardly hefts a shoulder-mounted rocket and takes aim, pausing briefly to twirl his mustache.
“This should make that mechanical mutt think twice about interfering with my plans. Eh old boy?” He looks to his stalwart companion only to find Muttley wearing two massive, overstuffed jackets, four scarves, gloves, mitts and boots. Despite the many layers the plump dog is shivering and his teeth are chattering.
“Keep it together Muttley, we’ll be back in our secret Antarctic base sipping coco in no time, putting our feet up on a brand new robot-dog-skin rug” He fires his rocket and it tears through the sky like a shooting star. Dynomutt is so preoccupied with his power systems that he completely misses the rocket until his systems are blaring out but by then it’s too late. The impact explodes one of his two rocket engines and he plummets into a tailspin, twirling and spiraling as he falls. He just barely manages to point his thruster down at the last moment but it hardly softens the blow before he slams into the ice and breaks through. Cold water floods into his chassis and he switches from jets to propellers, pushing himself up and through the thin ice before it can refreeze. He lands on all fours and skids along the ice, spinning and sliding as he shuts down the propellors. Ice is already forming all over his damaged armor casing and the cracks and water are causing his batteries to drain far faster. Sparks come out of his ears and his body twitches and shudders. Dastardly and Muttley come strolling confidently out from behind a snowbank, Dick’s hands clasped behind his back as he towers, looking as imperious as he can with a frozen pupsicle following behind him.
“Well well well. If it isn’t Dynomutt, here to find my secret base and spoil all my fun. All alone are we? Shame really. If you brought Dee Dee and the Blue buffoon you /might/ have had a chance. But as it is-”
“G-g-g-go-go-gadget gatling gun!” Dynomut shouts in a voice that didn’t sound much like his own. The armored plate on his back pops open, sending ice scattering everywhere and a menacing weapon with multiple barrels emerges from his mechanical back. Dick Dastardly shrieks and jumps behind Muttley, but then quickly regains his courage when he realizes the weapon didn’t fully emerge, too frozen to do anything. Not only that, but Dynomutt didn’t sound normal, he’d never heard him talk like that before. With a few trepiditious steps he emerges from behind his grumbling pooch and advances on him.
“Ohhh Dynomutt, something wrong with your system boy?” Dick Sneers, realizing he has the advantage. One well placed rocket and he’d brought low his long time nuisance.
“C-c-c-ritical POWer f-f-f-failure. PoweRRRRRRRR C-core casing computer flood purge CAPacitor caACItor capacitor…” More sparks fly from his casing and his eyes shine with a blue screen and text. He struggles to take a few shakiy weak steps towards Dastardly but it’s clear he’s malfunctioning badly, sparking and twitching as his voice modulates uncontrollably.
“Looks like my little rocket shook you up quite a bit eh? Heh, good, That’s going to make this all so much easier.” He looks up briefly, eyes scanning the sky for the Falcon fury, blue falcon or that drated Dee Dee. But there was still no sign of any of them.
“How cruel, poor little puppy left out alone in the cold with no backup. Even a cad like me has at least one friend” He pats Muttley on the head lovingly.
“D-D-D-Danger. Systems malfunctioning. Unable to engage C-c-c-0ombat protocols”
“Mhmm, I thought as much. Helpless as a little lamb” The dastardly villain pushes Dynomutt over easily, like tipping a cow.
“Dis-abiling anti-tamper, disabling firewall, disabling screen saver, disabling anti-malwar- disabling seeing in color. Disabling consciousness. SHUtoWN=True” And the light leaves Dynomutt’s eyes as he powers down, shutting off all but his most essential functions, becoming still as a statue.
“Ohohoho…..this changes things. I think I have far more use for you than just scrap.” He grins wickedly, rubbing his gloved hands together.
“Come along Muttley, grab that frozen wreck and bring it with us. We’re going to have such fun together” He cackles, turning back towards his base. Muttley shivers and grabs Dynomutt by the head and starts dragging him through the ice and snow, grumbling and growling and muttering all the while.
Once Dynomutt is inside Dastardly’s secret base the work begins. Dick looms over the unconscious robot, elbow deep in him with wrenches, screwdrivers, hammers, and even a jackhammer for some reason. All the while Muttley stands by his side, using a sponge to wipe his brow, rubbing his shoulders and of course, wheezing hysterically when he smashes his thumb with a hammer. But finally, their toil is finished. The cyborg canine looks shiney and polished and as good as new, but its eyes are still dim.
“Now all that’s left is to reprogram that Pygmalion Pooch to our side. The evil side!” He cackles and, after a foreboding amount of difficulty, manages to plug a USB into Dynomutt and connect it to his main computer and begin working on his coding. The screen goes almost totally black, save for bright green letters and Dick types what seems like a thousand words a minute, his fingers a blur over the keyboard. Muttley watches on looking somewhat apprehensive, massaging the mad inventor’s shoulders and dabbing his brow again with a sponge. But finally, their second toil is finished.
“There! That should just about do it. Let’s give it a try!” He presses a key on the computer and the dog’s eyes light up and then change back to normal.
“Dynomutt! System status report” He commands.
“Ymmud uoy lanoitcnuf smetsys lla” The dog barks. There’s a long moment where Dick just stares at the clearly still broken dog and Muttley laughs and laughs, having a full wheezing fit.
“Oh shut it you! Minor malfunction. When I was flipping his stupid morality subroutine, I must have also inverted the language processor. There’s not a thing ever been broken that I can’t make worse. And in this context, worse means better! It might take a few more hours but I’ll have this dog purring sooner or later.”
“Ozob ecnahc taf.” Dynomutt replies
“Hmm Or, orr, Muttley, what if WE just learn to speak backwards? Then it will be like our own secret language and-“ The overweight hairy dog winds up with one hand and smacks the cyber-canine in the back of its head with a heavy “THUNK”
“You idiot! You can’t just whack it to make it do what you want!” He whacks Muttley across the back of the head, admittedly a lot lighter than the dog had hit Dynomutt. The Dog growls and jumps on Dick, biting his leg and chewing angrily. The two of them roll around on the metallic floor of the base, wrestling and grappling in a smoke cloud when suddenly.
“All systems operational, you dummy.” Dynomutt speaks. Though it seems like he was responding to commands, it didn’t stop him from also being sassy.
“AHA! I did it!” Dastardly pries Muttley’s mouth off of his leg and boots him across the workshop before rushing to his new canine companion. Muttley grumbles and growls, upside down in a pile of junk parts that had been taken out of Dynomutt but not put back in.
“Alright Dynomutt. Shake a paw” He holds his hand out expectantly.
“Anything you say boss. Activating pawshaker.exe.” All of Dynomutt’s paws suddenly start buzzing and vibrating like a jackhammer, the robot bouncing around and the entire workshop shaking. Parts fall off of shelves, glass beakers tumble down and break, fragile robot experiments shake apart.
“No no no! You idiot! Not like that! Stooop” He shouts and Dynomutt stops shaking.
“Yeesh, you should really get a maid or something” He grins, looking around at the destruction he caused.
“Let’s try this again. Roll over” He makes a little circle with his finger, and Dynomutt.
“Oh I’ll roll over all right. I’ll even use my special Dyno-roller” His front two paws extend and then come together and his forearms turn into a huge metal drum as he becomes a steamroller that first rolls over Dick Dastardly and then just crushes a computer, a table, a stack of blueprints and more before Dick pulls himself to his feet.
“No no no! You Idiot, stop!” He shouts and Dynomutt changes back to normal. Muttley watches this whole exchange, laughing and wheezing at the lack of success. He seemed pleased that Dick’s “new dog” was somehow even less helpful than he was.
“Wow boss, you are seriously bad at this. I have to do everything you say and you’re STILL messing this up. It’s kinda sad really.” The Robotic dog looks anything but sad, he seems to be enjoying this.
“Hush-Puppy. In no time I’ll have you figured out completely, and then you'll be hacking government satellites for me and causing chaos.”
“Oh I can hack alright” A set of big sharp axes on a rotating wheel emerge from his back. The wheel slowly moves towards Dick.
“Nooo! No no no no, put those away!” He scrambles back and Muttley is now surrounded by popcorn, soda, a sandwich, granola, he’s enjoying dinner and a show.
“Oh, sure thing boss.” He retracts the axes. “Gee, it seems like it’s actually really dangerous to be messing around with a machine you obviously aren’t smart enough to understand. Maybe you oughta call it quits while you’re ahead.
“Maybe you aught to shut your trap.” He stands up, dusts himself off and looks at Muttley “And you! Quit laughing or I’m gonna come over there and WAAAAH!” He screams as he steps directly into a big cartoon bear trap that chomps down on his leg.
“Woops, sorry boss. That’s my trap you told me to shut.” He grins and Muttley wheezes even harder.
“That’s it! I’ve had just about enough of you!” He curses as he pries himself out of the bear trap, his leg throbbing and swollen.
“Think you’re pretty clever don’t you? Well you can struggle and resist all you like, but you’re still mine. You’re stuck obeying me. All I have to do is figure out the right commands”
“I’m shaking boss, truly terrified. I mean You have such a good track record with evil schemes. Remember all those times you won? Huh weird FILE NOT FOUND. Looks like you’ve never won.” The mechanical pooch taunts, he might not have control of his body, but he was still managing to resist in his own way.
“Ahhh but that’s the beautiful thing about evil. It only needs to prevail once. Whereas good has to win over and over again. This was bound to happen sooner or later. So, Dynomutt, why don’t you play dead while I figure out how to properly evilize you”
“Okay boss. If you say so. Activating self-destruct.” The chrome hound narrows his eyes, his entire body humming with power and beeping.
“Self-destruct?” His eyes go wide. “Oh. Play dead. I see” He chuckles dryly, accepting his fate.
“Ruh roh” Muttley’s eyes also go wide as Dynomutt explodes in a huge blast that totals the workshop, wrecks the computers and leaves both villains covered in soot.
“Drat, drat double drat!” Dastardly curses and stomps in anger. “Muttley! Grab a broom and clean up this mess. We’re going to rebuild that dog so evil the WORLD will fear us!” He swears, stalking out of the room. Muttley sits there a moment, grumbling and stuffing all his food into his mouth, getting crumbs of bread and granola all over himself before getting his broom and starting to sweep. Crumbs, dust, bits of granola and more get all swept up with the parts and pieces of Dynomutt and heaped into a pile onto Dick Dastardly’s work table. It takes an hour of grumbling, groaning and tidying before finally Dick is able to resume his work. For the third time that day he begins his labor, re-assembling, repairing, welding, hammering, somehow even sawing, all to rebuild the Dynomutt. Muttley meanwhile watches on, wheezing and laughing as he sees many of the parts and pieces still littered with crumbs. But he does his job, rubbing Dastardly’s shoulders and wiping his brow with a sponge. Finally, their third toil is finished and Dynomutt is once again rebuilt, looking brand new and shiny again.
“Alright. Finally! Now, let’s fire him up and finally get back to crime! I’m sure this time he’ll be much happier to comply now that he’s been stripped down to his bolts and rebuilt.” Dastardly re-activates Dynomutt and looks on expectantly.
“Now then Dynomutt, listen carefully, I want you to-“
“GEAR JAM, SERVO MECHANISMS UNABLE TO FUNCTION. GRANOLA CONCENTRATIONS EXCEED OPERATIONAL THRESHOLD. PISTONS 8 AND 12 NONFUNCTIONAL. HYDRAULIC FLUID CONTAINS MUSTARD. System shutting down” The dog’s voice booms and then suddenly he goes entirely still.
“Granola….and mustard eh?” He looks at his nefarious canine and a sheepish smile crosses the dog’s face and he gives a nervous chuckle. The stains of mustard and crumbs are still plainly visible in his shaggy fur.
“You furry flockabout! You huge hairy hazard! You dopey dog! You greedy grotesque glutton!” He bashes the big dog on the head and Muttley growls, leaping on him and biting his leg. The two roll about, punching and biting eachother in a great dustup while Dynomutt sits there, watching unmoving. Finally, Dick Dastardly shouts at the top of his lungs
“Eeeeeeenough! Enough. This isn’t getting us anywhere! Truce?” He dusts himself off and offers his hand to Muttley. The wicked dog shakes his hand and then once his back is turned Dick slaps the dog upside the head before walking over to Dynomutt.
“Alright. I’ve had it with this wretched bucket of bolts. There’s simply no fixing it, especially since it destroyed my equipment and computer. I say we take it outside and bury it in the snow and consider ourselves lucky to have one less problem to deal with.”
Mutley looks at Dynomut and wheezes, nodding his head with a big grin.
“Splendid, then you just let me know when you’re done.” He hands Mutley a shovel and strolls off. “Don’t forget a scarf, it’s awfully chilly out there. I’m off to make coco.” He struts out of the workplace leaving his canine companion behind to grumble and growl. The obedient hound bundles up in layer after layer of coats and scarves. Finally, he drags the lifeless robot out into the cold and using his shovel buries him beneath a mound of fluffy snow. He wipes his brow, grumbling the whole time and heads inside, hoping to curl up by the fire. Once he’s entirely gone back inside Dynamutt’s eyes light up and he pulls himself from the snow. He checks his readouts.
“Battery: 99%, system integrity: 86%, programming: intact.” Systems looked good. A smile spread across his muzzle. Everything went smoothly. Once he took that rocket blast Dynomutt knew he wouldn’t be able to make it out of there. He was too damaged and used too much power, so he made a plan. He intentionally faked a total system failure and stated his programming safeguards had failed. He knew the bait would be too much for Dick Dastardly to resist. He anticipated Dick would take him in and repair him and try to reprogram him. All he needed to do was create a shell of his programming and let the mad scientist muck around with that while his reprogramming stayed safe. Then it was just a matter of causing as much damage to their laboratory as possible. Destroying their computer and projects and tools. Not to mention leaving a little surprise on Dastardly’s hard drive. Even if he did fix the computer he’d find the hard drive erased, all his plans and files transferred to the Falcon Fury. Of course, it was true, the cold and rocket had done some pretty major damage to his systems. But between Dick’s best efforts at repairing, and a little, fortunately-placed Granola everything was working smoothly. Dynomutt activates his distress beacon and takes to the skies, flying on minimum power to keep his battery from draining too quickly. It’s less than an hour before he’s picked up by Dee Dee in the Falcon Fury and reports on his successful mission. With Blue Falcon and Dee Dee on hand they manage to complete the repairs, cleaning out all the crumbs and mustard and getting his systems fully operational again. Of course, the time would still come to arrest Dick Dastardly, but for now at least they would leave them be. It would take them days to get anything in their base working properly again, and even Dick Dastardly and Muttley deserve the chance to sit by a warm fire for a quiet evening once in a while.