A/N: Hey y'all! ^^ This is my very first attempt at writing a Xiaolin Showdown fic, since I just got into the show a couple of weeks ago. My favorite character is definitely Raimundo, but Jack Spicer comes in a veeeeeery close second, which is why this story has more to do with them than any other characters. It focuses more around Rai, but in later chapters, it deepens into what I have planned for Jack's part in this. ;) So I hope you enjoy! And I hope I get everything right! I've watched through the entire series on YouTube twice now, so I'm pretty sure I have my knowledge, but... I might make a mistake. I apologize ahead of time! XD

Disclaimer: I do not own Xiaolin Showdown or any of its characters. If I did, there would already be a fourth season and Rai and Kimiko would have kissed by now. ;D

P.S. - Also, just to let y'all know, this story is based one month after Raimundo was promoted to Shoku Warrior. This information is presented in the chapter itself, but it's pretty brief and I thought I'd just let y'all know ahead of time anyway. XD

1. The Darkness to Your Light

Raimundo was the first to notice Dojo hurrying towards them, even before the little serpent started calling their names.

"Shen Gong Wu alert," he stated calmly, lowering his left leg down from its 90-degree angle out to his side. The others heard him, noticed Dojo rushing towards them, and immediately ceased their training exercises.

"Hop on, kids," Dojo told them, growing to his full forty feet. "We have no time to lose with this one." As if to prove his point, the dragon kicked off into the air without warning and without letting the monks properly situate themselves on his back. All four of them held on for dear life as Dojo raced through the skies.

"Dojo, are you okay?" Kimiko asked over the wind rushing through all of their ears.

"I'll be fine once we get this Shen Gong Wu under lock and key," the dragon replied, flying straight through a flock of geese.

"Which Wu are we rustlin' up this time, Dojo?" Clay asked in his thick Texan accent. He wasn't fairing too well with Dojo's immense speed; he could only hold onto the serpent's back with one hand as his other stayed planted on top of his head, preventing his beloved cowboy hat from flying off.

"It's called the Yin-Yang Divider," Dojo began. "I didn't have time to grab the Sacred Scroll, but I didn't need to for this one."

"Great, another Shen Gong Wu having to do with the whole Yin-Yang thing," Raimundo complained. "What's it do?"

"It splits its victim in half, so to speak. What it really does is make a duplicate of its victim that is pure evil and nothing else, and the duplicate does whatever the person who used the Shen Gong Wu says."

"What if the victim is already on the side of evil?" Omi inquired.

"Doesn't matter," the dragon responded, dodging an airplane. "Even Chase Young or Hannibal Bean would have trouble fighting a duplicate created by this Shen Gong Wu."

"Alright, now I see why you're so unnerved by it," Raimundo said, tensing up a bit himself. "We can't let it fall into the hands of anyone on the Heylin side."

"I can't even imagine how bad it would be if Chase Young or Hannibal Bean had their own, pure evil duplicates of us…" Kimiko murmured.

"The world would be theirs," Omi concluded.

"Which is why it's not going to happen," Raimundo told them, turning around to face them all. Ever since he had been appointed Shoku Warrior, whenever they rode Dojo he was always in front of the others. He carefully held onto the dragon behind his back as he sat facing the others. "Is Jack still working with Chase?" he asked.

"I don't know if I'd say 'working with'," Kimiko answered. "Every now and then, they'll team up or something, but Chase hates Jack's company."

"You are very knowledgeable, Kimiko," Omi commented.

"I do my research," the Japanese girl responded, smiling.

"Well, with Wuya as his own personal tracking device, Chase no doubt knows which Shen Gong Wu has activated, and, judging from his past records, this may be one of the few he's actually interested in," Raimundo said. "We have no idea what happened to Hannibal Bean after that Cosmic Clash Showdown a month ago, so he's probably nothing to worry about, but keep your eyes peeled regardless." The three other monks nodded their heads. "Jack will no doubt be there, whether he's with Chase and Wuya or not, so Clay, I want you to take care of him. Omi, Kimiko, focus your efforts on the lizard and the witch, and I'll try my best to get to the Wu."

"What if they have already retrieved it?" Omi questioned.

"Then we all need to do our absolute best to not let them use it on us. I wish we had the Scroll so we could know how the thing works, but since we don't we'll just have to wait and see."

"Sorry," Dojo muttered from up ahead, starting into a dive towards some mountains.

"If Chase and them don't cooperate, we'll all just fight until one of us can reach the Wu. Oh… and watch out for the Jack-Bots that will most likely be there. I'll try to blow them all out of our way, but no one ever knows what Jack has up his sleeve."

"Um… pardon my interruption, but isn't his arm in his sleeve?" Omi asked. Clay smiled and chuckled, Kimiko rolled her eyes with a smirk, and Raimundo just gave Omi a grin.

"It's an expression, bro," he told him. Omi's mouth made the shape of an "O" and he cocked his large yellow head to the side.

Dojo swirled down to the ground and landed softly, turning his head back to watch the four monks slide off of his back. They were all still in their Xiaolin robes, as they hadn't had the time or warning to change into their usual street clothes they wore to retrieve Shen Gong Wu. Raimundo's only black attire stood out amongst the other three monks' red robes, but that was how it was supposed to be. The leader was supposed to be able to be spotted easily by his team.

"Over there!" Kimiko yelled, pointing at a tree as Dojo shrunk back down to his usual size and slid up to wrap around Clay's hat. The three boys followed Kimiko's finger to a tree a few yards away. A bright glint came from one of the higher branches, sparking their curiosity. They all ran over to the tree and Raimundo launched himself up to the branch with a gust of wind. He casually walked across the branch as if he did it every day and was surprised to see the glint coming from what looked to be a regular old black glove. He knelt down next to it to inspect it closer, and then picked it up slowly.

"How ya' doin', partner?" Clay called up to him.

"Is it the Yin-Yang Divider?" Kimiko asked.

"I… think so," Raimundo responded. On the side of the glove that was facing up on the branch, there was a Yin-Yang symbol, and when Raimundo tapped his finger against it, he discovered that it was hard and glossy. He figured that the symbol was what had been reflecting the rays from the overhead sun, since the rest of the glove was black leather.

The leader was about to slip the glove onto his hand when something hard hit him in his side, knocking him off balance. He did his best to keep his grip on the glove as he grunted from the impact and began to fall towards the base of the tree, but it slipped from his fingers as he fell. The branch hadn't been too high off the ground, and Raimundo didn't have enough time to stop his descent, so he landed on the hard ground with another painful grunt. The glove landed a few feet away from him. He could hear his teammate's footsteps running towards him as he looked back up at the branch he had just been on.

"Ha, ha, haha!" an ever familiar laugh echoed out of nowhere. Four pairs of eyes were up on the branch now as Kimiko kneeled down next to Raimundo. "Shroud of Shadows!" A portion of the air began to move, and then the familiar form of Jack Spicer was revealed. The sheet-like Shen Gong Wu was clenched tightly in his right hand and he glared down at the teenagers, a big smile on his face.

"Shoulda' guessed," Clay muttered. "I thought it smelled like cow pie around here."

"And I thought it smelled like a big ol' can of butt-whoop!" Jack replied with a sneer.

"Yeah, for you!" Kimiko yelled up at him. Jack shook his head as he lowered himself down to the ground with his heli-bot, making a "tsk, tsk, tsk" noise with his tongue.

"Oh Kimiko, when are you going to finally just admit that you're totally crazy for me?" he asked when he landed in front of the monks. Kimiko's face turned red, and then scrunched up in anger.

"Not even in your dreams, Spicer," she spat.

"Jack Spicer," Omi proclaimed, stepping forward, "prepare yourself for a most humiliating defeat!" Jack snorted.

"Yeah… right," he said. "Jack-Bots! Attack!" What looked to be about fifty of the familiar brown robots flew over the top of the tree and immediately descended down upon the four monks. Raimundo flipped himself back up onto his feet and raised his arms in a fighting position.

"Shoku Star, Wind!" the Brazilian yelled, throwing both of his hands out in front of himself, open palms facing the oncoming robot army. A large, strong wave of wind stormed towards the robots, and it blew them down just as a wave of water would. Some of the robots were broken because of the force and strength of the wind, but others made it out unscratched and continued charging towards the monks.

"Wudai Mars, Fire!" Kimiko screamed, jumping a few feet into the air and spinning in quick circles. She was soon just a rotating ball of fire hovering two feet off the ground. "Fire!" her voice came from within the blaze. At her second command, fire bursted from the bottom of the ball, launching it up into the air. It would hit one robot, then bounce into another, and then another, and another, and so on and so on.

"There's a game of Pin Ball for ya'," Raimundo chuckled, watching the rapid orange blur bounce from one robot to the next, blowing one up at a time. Then the leader turned towards his other male teammates. "Clay, Omi, go help her. I'll deal with Spicer."

With a nod of their heads, the cowboy and the cheese ball ran towards the army of robots. Omi purposefully moved in front of Clay while they were running, and then suddenly jumped, bending his legs up. Clay cupped his large hands together and caught Omi's feet in them, brought his bald partner down a little, and then swung his arms up, releasing the yellow monk's feet. Omi soared up through the air and exploded through a robot before landing on top of another one.

"Wudai Neptune, Water!" he cried, and he took a portion of a nearby pond and used it to short-circuit the robots one by one, hopping from one to another.

Clay skidded to a stop down below as a group of the robots flew down towards him, and he merely smirked. "Wudai Crater, Earth!" he shouted, and he lifted his leg. The Jack-Bots coming towards him seemed to know what he was doing, for they came to a sudden stop before him. Clay wasted no time in kicking his foot into the ground, and sharp spikes of earth erupted from the ground under each of the robots that had come after him, blowing them all to pieces upon contact.

Jack fell on his face yet again as Raimundo sent a current under the redhead's feet. Jack had almost gotten to the Wu earlier but Raimundo had blown it further away from him, and then proceeded to trip him. Spicer was persistent, however, and was soon back on his feet… but was again brought down to his stomach. Now Raimundo bent down and grasped the glove in his hand, holding it out in front of Jack's face to taunt him.

"Come on Jack, everyone knows you have to remember to tie your shoes," the tan teenager mocked, smirking. Jack narrowed his eyes and pushed himself back to his feet. Raimundo slid the glove onto his right hand and stuck his arm into the air. "Yin-Yang-"

Just then, a crow flew by his hand and ripped the glove off of it before turning and flying back into a different nearby tree's branches. Jack pointed and broke out into laughter as Raimundo lowered his arm and observed his hand, narrowing his eyes at Jack.

"You got jacked by a bird!" the pale 18-year-old laughed. Ignoring him, Raimundo looked over to the tree where the crow had disappeared into, and narrowed his eyes further. When a red light became visible from within the branches, the leader's eyes widened. He twirled around to see his teammates finishing off the last of the Jack-Bots, satisfied with themselves.

"Get down!" he screamed at them. They all turned towards him in confusion, but then dropped to their hands and knees as a red laser shot from the tree. Jack screamed in surprise, whipping out his Shen Gong Wu from where he had stored it wrapped around his belt.

"Shroud of Shadows!" he yelled, and then covered himself and disappeared. Raimundo ducked as another laser erupted from the tree, and when it was clear he ran over to where the other Dragons were knelt down together.

"We have to get out of here," he told them urgently, and Dojo peeked out from under Clay's large hat.

"What about the Wu?" the little dragon asked.

"Chase has it," Raimundo replied. "I knew I recognized that crow."

Before they could move or even notice it, another red laser shot out of the tree towards them. Omi was the first to notice it coming.

"Observe your fronts!" he shouted. But he was too late. The red laser beam made contact with the whole team of Xiaolin Dragons, causing all of them to yell in pain. The laser disappeared, but their bodies all remained with a bright red aura surrounding them, and they were on all fours with their eyes squeezed shut and their teeth ground together. The red aura began to separate from their bodies, taking with them a hazy grey glow from their victims' bodies, until there was another red-grey form next to each of the monks. As soon as the aura was no longer connected to their body, each monk gave out a sigh of relief and released their hold on the grass beneath their hands. Each opened their eyes, and each tried to see around the black dots dancing across their vision.

The four red auras all moved away from the monks, across the small clearing they were in, and one more aura slid out from under Clay's hat to join them. The monks pushed themselves to their feet once their heads stopped spinning and they all looked across the clearing. Even Dojo dared to poke his head out from under Clay's hat, though he was trembling like crazy.

The red auras had taken on the shapes of humans by now and were pushing themselves to their feet as well. The grey was now beginning to overtake the red, and soon each monk saw an exact replica of themselves standing across the clearing, though their skin and clothes and hair were all different shades of grey. The dominant feature of all of them were their pure red eyes – no glare from the sun, no pupil… just pure red. One by one, they slipped an evil smile onto their faces, and the duplicated Dojo grew to his full size behind them.

The monks stared in awed silence, every one of their mouths agape and their eyes wide. Dojo had retreated back to the shelter of Clay's hat. Everything was silent as the evil duplicates and the good originals stared at each other from different sides of the clearing.

Raimundo sighed, closing his eyes. "It's 'watch your backs', Omi," he said quietly.

A/N: Whoo, cliffie on the first chapter! XD

Alright, firstly I wanna say that I did get the idea for the evil duplicate's appearences from the Teen Titans episodes 'The End: Part II' and 'The End: Part III'. I just thought they looked so cool, so I figured I'd use it too. XD;; Disclaimer right here: I do not own Teen Titans or any of its characters... or character appearences...

So anyway... I hope you liked it! It's an awful lot of fun to write these characters - especially Rai and Jack... XD;; Y'all know you love 'em! ;D Oh, also... you see that little blue button below this Author's Note? I promise you - no, no, I swear to you that I will send you a virtual cookie if you click it and leave me a little review. :)

(( Claire ))