Cars 2(23)

“Hurry, Professor!” the combat ship said.

Professor Z suddenly felt himself jolt backward. Finn had tethered him by deploying tensile cables to his rear bumper.

Finn began reeling him in. “Did you really think I’d let you just float away, Professor Z?”

But Finn was wrong. He had more than Professor Z to fight. An ultrapowerful electromagnet on the combat ship rapidly pulled both cars toward it.

“Give it up, McMissile,” Professor Z said smugly.

But Finn McMissile was not one to give up easily. He let loose every weapon in his arsenal. The weapons were all instantly sucked up onto the magnet.

KA-BOOOOM!

Flames from the exploding combat ship could be seen from miles away. There was no time to lose. Finn sped off to find Holley and Mater.

At that same moment, Mater was back down on the street with Lightning in tow. Holley was flying high above, trying to watch over them, when she heard the explosion. She tried to put it out of her mind, hoping that Finn was okay. She knew that, no matter what, Finn would want her to save Mater and get rid of that bomb.

From her bird’s-eye view, Holley could see Grem and Acer just one block away from Mater. The two Lemons were about to cross an intersection and hit the tow truck broadside.

“Oh, no,” Holley said to herself.





Agent Shiftwell swiftly dropped to the street and deliberately skidded into Grem and Acer’s path. She was putting herself at risk to save Mater. Unable to stop, the two Lemons flipped over Holley and landed in a waste-disposal truck. Agent Holley Shiftwell had just received her first dent—and she had gotten it by helping out a friend.

Quickly she turned to that friend, Mater, and electronically scanned his air filter. “We’ve got to get that bomb off you!”

“Bomb?” Lightning repeated, finally noticing the bomb attached to Mater.

“Yeah, they strapped it to me,” Mater explained. It was the Lemons’ backup plan to stop Lightning.

Lightning suddenly understood why Mater had been trying to get away from him.

“Mater,” he said, “who put a bomb on you?”

Just then Professor Z rolled up. He was completely entangled in Finn’s cables and tensile lines. Finn was holding on to him as if the Professor were on a leash.

“You!” Professor Z moaned when he saw Lightning.

Finn cut the conversation short. “Turn off the bomb, Professor Z!”

But Professor Z simply smirked. “Are you all so dimwitted? It’s voice-activated. Everything’s voice-activated these days.”

Mater had gotten a little used to this voice-activated stuff. He jumped right in and said, “Deactivate! Deactivate!”

Professor Z laughed as he saw everyone’s expressions turn to looks of horror. Mater’s voice had activated a timer on the bomb. They had four minutes—and counting—before it would explode.

“Did I forget to mention it can only be disarmed by the one who activated it?” Professor Z asked.

Holley charged up to the Professor’s grille. “Say it!” she ordered him.

“Deactivate,” Professor Z said calmly. The bomb suddenly lost a minute. It was now going to explode in less than three minutes! Professor Z grinned as the seconds ticked away. “I am not the one who activated it. Would anyone else like to try?”

Holley turned to Professor Z and hit him with a jolt from her electrified stun gun.

Finn was growing to appreciate Holley’s instincts more and more. “You read my mind,” he said to her as Professor Z fell over.

But the bomb was still ticking.

“What do we do?” Lightning asked.

“You blow up,” Victor replied simply. The head of the Hugo Lemon family had rolled next to the Professor. His Lemon relatives were blocking the entrance to the side street.

The other Lemons and their families blocked all the other streets. The Lemons revved their feeble engines, ready to charge.

Lightning took one look at Mater and sighed. “I’m gonna go out on a limb here. These are the guys that want me dead?”

Mater faced the Lemons. “Fellas, listen,” he begged. “I know what you’re going through. Cars have been laughing at me my whole life, too. But is hurting folks and making money really gonna make you feel better?”

The Lemons stopped. They looked at one another.

Then one of the Lemons in front shrugged and said, “It’s worth a shot.”

A gang of Hugos, Pacers, Zapors, and Gremlins rushed toward Lightning. The Gremlin Lemon was leading the charge when he was suddenly broadsided by a blast of water.

It was Red, the fire truck, spraying his powerful fire hose! And the rest of the Radiator Springs gang was with him. Even Flo was ready to rumble. They drove at the Lemons full-force.