Champions of the Omniverse - Part 8

When last we left our heroes, they had departed for Denning Military Reservation in Colorado in the X-Men Blackbird. They touch down outside an old, abandoned military base featuring some moldering barracks, sneaking up through some woods, Koga bends light around the group to reduce visibility and Spiderstrike lowers noise with his powers. The still reverie of the morning is broken by the blast of a shotgun and our heroes freeze where they stand. 
"Y'all git away now, y'hear? This here is my find and no body's gonna tak it from me!" 
It seems that an anachronistic cliche of a grizzled 1890s prospector has taken up residence in the abandoned barracks and is planning to scrap the Breeder Bomb for the metal. Whilst Koga and Spiderstrike try to sneak around to the building, Gigawatt hurls abuse at the man and Manzilla stomps directly towards him.
"I don't want no part of your mutant, gay, liberal, Jew agenda! Stay back!" the cracking voice is punctuated by another shotgun blast. Bursting through the door, Manzilla attempts to grab the gun away from the madman, but is rewarded with a shot of slat and grit directed at him. Seeing that the man is a harmless, Conservative-voting moron, Manzilla explains that they want to take the machine apart for him; he agrees. As soon as Sonic Tsunami begins to deactivate the device, however, an ominous shadow looms in the distance, the Sentinels have arrived! 

 

Knowing that they're in real danger, the team hatch a plan to gang up on each Sentinel in turn, hoping to survive the onslaught of the others long enough to deactivate the Breeder Bomb. Sonic Tsunami stays in the barracks to work on the device and the team charges the first giant, mutant-killing robot, Gigawatt ripping a door from its hinges as a weapon whilst Firestarter purloins one of the prospector's jugs of moonshine as fuel for his powers. In order to distract the second and third Sentinels whilst the team attacks the first, Koga uses the light-manipulation technology in his costume to create five duplicates, which draw the Sentinel's fire; despite this, Manzilla cops a hefty blow from one of the robots. Thanks to his powers, Firestarter manages to get one of the Sentinels ablaze, but is unable to tell how much he's helping the fight. 

Manzilla makes a charge against the first Sentinel, knocking it over with his atomic bulk and allowing Spiderstrike to run in a blast the monstrous robot apart with his "Spider's Bite" energy blasts! Realigning themselves against the next of the three Sentinels, our heroes do not hesitate; Gigawatt hurls more debris before charging in, striking at the legs of the robot as Manzilla flies at the chest. Unfortunately for our heroes, Sentinels are "learning machines" and have figured out that they have been attacking light duplicates and turn their attentions to other members of the team. Firestarter, Manzilla, Gigawatt and Spiderstrike charge in against the second Sentinel, staggering it and knocking it over, raining blows on its prostrate form. Just when the Champions are feeling confident, Manzilla is brought down by a blast from the third Sentinel. 
 

Koga makes use of his light-clones, hiding in the group for some cover from the third Sentinel. Continued pummeling from Spiderstrike and Gigawatt renders the second Sentinel into a pile of scrap and the team turns to the last mutant murdering metal monster. Koga uses the corrosives hidden in his gloves to weaken the armour of the last Sentinel and the rest of the team charges in to help. In a combined-attack splash panel, Koga, Spiderstrike and Gigawatt destroy the Sentinel in a single assault! By now, Sonic Tsunami has managed to deactivate the Breeder Bomb and the team convinces the racist, homophobic scrapper to take the wrecked Sentinels instead and they make haste back to the X-Mansion.