It had been several months since their adventure on Mata Nui and having tired Wotzit out chasing his ball, Sherrie was just putting the last touches to the backstitch on a cross-stitch of Aikane, while he snored flat out on his beanbag.
Suddenly her hand felt as though it had been plunged into a bucket of ice, and she yelped with surprise, startling Wotzit, who looked at her before going back to sleep.
Peering at her hand, Sherrie blinked in surprise as the symbol on her palm had turned from slightly darker than her skin tone to a strange silvery colour. Rubbing her hand until the sensation passed she then peered at the colour that remained. While looking at it and wondering what it could mean, a strange lethargy came over her and she relaxed into the chair, unable to keep her eyes from closing.
...
Slowly, Sherrie became aware of a familiar voice saying, "...that she'll wake soon, how's Wotzit doing?"
"Macku, Jaller and Hewkii are keeping him amused Turaga." came the reply, as Sherrie opened her eyes to see Turaga Nokama and Hahli watching her and that she was currently lent against the side of a canoe.
"Turaga, Hahli, how did we get here?" she asked with surprise, "You and Wotzit were lying here sleeping when we landed." Nokama replied. Hahli piped up as she offered the human a water canister, "That image of Toa Aikane is very realistic."
"Thanks, I had fun stitching it." the human grinned before glancing around as she realised that it was no longer on her lap, "It's alright sister, I've got it." Aikane's 'voice' reached Sherrie as she stood up and looked around, to her amazement she realised that they weren't on Mata Nui, but had awoken on the island of Metru Nui.
Nokama and Sherrie walked over to the Toa and the rest of the Turaga while Hahli went to help her friends keep Wotzit occupied, "Just where on Metru Nui are we Nokama?" she asked, "We landed at Ta-metru and were quite surprised to see you both here." came the blue hued Turaga's reply as she chuckled at the dog's antics.
When they reached the Toa, Aikane passed the cross stitch to Kopaka, then turned and caught her human sister up in a bear hug as the others gathered round to greet her, "We were starting to think you would sleep the day away." Takanuva said smiling, as Aikane put Sherrie down. "What brought you here this time?" Vakama asked curiously, "This I think." the human replied, showing everyone her hand, the symbol shimmering slightly in the sunlight.
As Sherrie moved her hand round, the symbol suddenly brightened then dimmed. Startled she moved her hand back to where the glow was brightest and felt a slight tug in that direction, "Er Turaga, what is over there?"
"The Great Temple, are you feeling alright?" she replied, watching the human closely, "I feel like I'm being...er called to it." she said looking perplexed. Gali looked closely at Sherrie's hand, "When did the symbol appear?" she enquired, "When I returned to my world, only then it wasn't silver." Sherrie replied, adding, "That happened just before we were brought back here.
While the Turaga started to discuss the quickest and easiest way to the Great Temple, Sherrie looked to see what Wotzit was doing, and smiled when she found that he was curled up against Hahli having a nap resting. Then Kopaka came over and handed back the cross-stitch, "Nice work." he said with a smile, "Thank you." she replied with a grin. Then she looked over at Aikane "Could you take care of it as I haven't anywhere to keep it safe?" she asked, "I'd love to. " she replied, accepting the cross-stitch as Sherrie offered it to her and placed it with her quarter-staff.
Tahu came over from where the Turaga had been quietly talking, "Vakama thinks the best way to the Great Temple is to paddle closer and then walk the rest of the way." He told us.
So as the Turaga rejoined us, they headed back towards the canoes and Onua explained to their human friend that as they were all going to be coming to Metru Nui the Toa and Turaga thought it might be a good idea to have a look round and make sure there were no nasty surprises lurking around before the matoran came back. After getting the canoes back into the water and a little shuffling around they got settled, Wotzit was fascinated and kept looking over the side, so Sherrie kept a firm hold of him just in case he wanted to go for a swim.
As the canoes moved round Ta-metru the Great Temple came into view, "Whoa!" gasped Aikane, Lewa, Hahli and Sherrie, as it looked stunning, even with all the damage it had sustained.
...
Landing the canoes on a beach in Ga-metru, everyone paused to let Nokama have a little time to herself as it had been a while since she last walked there. Then they began to make their way up to the metru. Though there was damage to the buildings it was still a beautiful place and they paused to look at what was left of a fountain.
As the group walked towards the causeway that led to the Great Temple, Sherrie heard Nuju whistle something to Matoro who then moved to walk beside the human then translated, "Turaga Nuju's wondering what's happened to your hair?"
"I was going somewhere and changed the colour for fun." she replied with a grin, Nuju nodded and added something else which Matoro translated with a chuckle, "It's certainly different and Nuju says with it that colour it's easy to see you're Aikane's sister."
A puzzled frown crossed Sherrie's face and she glanced for a reflective surface to look at her hair and smiled when Kopaka found a shiny piece of metal, before exclaiming with delight that it wasn't blue any more, it was a vibrant purple.
Setting the metal down where it wouldn't be in anyone's way, Sherrie wondered if it had been this colour when her friends found her and Wotzit,
Aikane smiled as she said something to Gali and they paused to let Nuju, Matoro and their human sister catch up, while the others carried on.
"Yes it was." Aikane silently said as we all resumed walking, "Oh wow," she replied, still grinning broadly, "Neat!" before laughing as the violet hued Toa ruffled her short, spiky hair.
Skirting round the damaged areas the group reached the entrance of the Temple; the pull on my hand was feeling stronger. They entered with the Turaga leading the way and they headed down the stairs to where the Toa Suva was, as the group approached it they were stunned to see it had been partially damaged by a fallen pillar, yet as he looked closer, Turaga Whenua exclaimed "Someone has tried to repair it."
While they stood there, examining the partially repaired Suva, a noise suddenly came from behind where Gali, Takanuva and Turaga Matau stood. Spinning around, the Toa pulled out their weapons then Tahu said, "Come out and let us see you." There was no reply then the noise came again and a Vahki moved into view, it had no weapons that we could see and was brass/black in colour. It moved towards them, then Tahu said, "That's far enough." it paused, came forwards a few more steps then stopped.
Matau glanced curiously at Vakama "Is it me or is that one not so tall-big?"
As they started talking about it while the Toa listened, keeping a cautious eye on the Vahki, Sherrie got the feeling that she should go and show it her symbol marked hand. The compulsion was so strong that she'd walked over to the Vahki before anyone noticed. When she reached it she realised that it was roughly the same height as her, around 5 feet tall.
"Sherrie, what in Mata Nui's name are you doing?" yelled Onua, who had just noticed where she'd gone.
Holding out her hand to show the symbol to the Vahki, Sherrie watched as it looked at it then back at her, and then to everyone's surprise nodded, and held its own hand out.
As their hands met, the symbol blazed so brightly that she was temporarily blinded and would have lost her balance had the Vahki not caught her elbow and steadied her.
When the light faded, the Vahki supported the human until her vision had cleared again. To everyone's amazement the Vahki had changed colour and was now light gold/violet. It now looked less mechanical and more like a living creature, it looked at itself and everyone heard it say, "Thank you," then he looked over to the equally stunned Toa and Turaga "It's been a long time, hasn't it Vakama?"
"What!" the others exclaimed as Vakama walked over to where the Vahki and Sherrie stood, "What do you mean?" he asked, looking puzzled.
"I first saw you when you and those who became Toa Metru first met at the Toa Suva." the Vahki replied. "But we didn't see you when we were here." said Nokama as the rest of the Turaga came over followed by the Toa.
"You weren't meant to, as you had Toa Stones I knew you were supposed to be here."
"Why didn't you let us see you?" Onewa asked intrigued, drawing agreement from the other Turaga.
"When I was made, Turaga Dume told me that I had two duties, one to watch over the prophecies under the Temple and the second to stay hidden and only show myself to true Turaga. As a time would come when the prophecies would have to be protected and if anyone else knew about me the prophecies could be endangered."
He then sighed, "I found out what Turaga Dume meant about true Turaga, as one who looked and sounded like him came here once, but when I went to greet him I found I was frozen in place which is what happened if I tried to show myself to anyone but the true Turaga Dume." "So how are you able to move-talk now?" asked Matau.
The Vahki leaned his head to one side thinking then said, "There are true Turaga in the temple again," he paused then continued, "And there might be something about what's happened in the prophecies."
"Will we be able to see these prophecies?" asked Whenua with interest as the Vahki began leading us towards the wall of the Temple, "Yes Turaga." he replied. "I've been wondering why you weren't affected when Makuta drained the power from the city." said Nuju via Matoro, "I was fortunate enough to be down beneath the Temple checking the prophecies, as there had been a strong tremor not long before and as there is no power supply down there, there was nothing for him to drain." The Vahki looked very relived as he said that.
While they talked, Sherrie glanced up at the stairs where Hahli and the others had been watching while keeping Wotzit calm, he had now settled down, rested his head over the edge and was watching with great interest
.
The rays of the setting sun were showing through some of the windows dotted around the Temple, the Vahki looked up at the angle of the rays, "Night will fall soon, would you like to wait until tomorrow as the prophecies are best seen by daylight?" he asked, looking at Whenua, "They have been safe for over a thousand years, I can wait a few more hours." Whenua replied with a smile.
Wotzit came racing down the stairs followed by Hahli and friends and immediately bounced over to check out the Vahki who looked surprised. "I've never seen a rahi like him before and any I saw after Makuta trashed Metru Nui were more interested in avoiding the Vahki squads and the Visorak." he said as Wotzit jumped up and wrapped his paws over the Vahki's arm to let him rub his chest.
"Well Wotzit's always been very friendly," Sherrie explained then giggled, "I've even seen him try to make friends with a tiger."
"A what?" enquired Matau intrigued, "It's similar to a Muaka." she replied, Matau looked at Wotzit, who's still getting his chest rubbed.
"Just when you think-guess he can't get any more strange-odd..." Matau started to say then began chuckling, it didn't take long before everyone joined in. Then the Vahki showed the matoran where some undamaged supplies were stored and everyone settled down and carried on talking. The Vahki was starting to explain why the Visorak hadn't done any lasting damage to the Temple when Sherrie drifted off to sleep.
…
Sherrie woke to Wotzit nudging her and whining, "Get off kipper features." she muttered rubbing her eyes, before looking around to see what her friends were doing.
The Toa, Nokama, Whenua, Matau and the Vahki were still asleep, while Vakama, Nuju, Onewa and the matoran were quietly talking, Macku glanced up "Morning." she said then nudged Hahli who stopped writing, looked up and grinned as Sherrie came to sit beside her, "Morning everyone." the human yawned and grinned.
Daylight was just starting to break so she asked Vakama if it would be alright to take Wotzit out, "Yes," he nodded "Jaller and Hewkii can go with you."
So they headed up the stairs with Wotzit racing ahead. The sky was clear, the stars still visible and there was a slight cool breeze blowing.
While Wotzit ran off his energy, Hewkii, Jaller and Sherrie watched the stars slowly growing dim when their attention was caught by one star shimmering close to the horizon.
It was brighter than normal for a star so close to where the sun was going to come up and had a violet tint to it.
Then as we watched it gave a flash and vanished below the horizon, "That was strange, I've not seen any star do that before," Hewkii said still looking curiously at the horizon "Have you or Sherrie? " he asked us, "No I've never seen a star act like that before." Jaller replied as the human added "Me neither, I think we should get Wotzit then tell the Turaga."
That ended up being easier said than done as Wotzit led them on a merry chase around part of Ga-metru, then back towards the Temple. He then raced inside closely followed by Jaller as Hewkii stopped beside Sherrie while they both got their breath back.
"Ye gods, that dog of mine's a little maniac!" Sherrie wheezed, "Are you alright?" Hewkii asked looking worried. "Yes thanks, it'll pass." she replied with a small grin as Pohatu came out and over to us.
"We're nearly ready to go and look at the prophecies, Turaga Vakama had a vision and says that you should come too Sherrie." he said as he stopped beside us, "What's that crazy dog of mine doing?" she asked as they headed back to the Temple.
Pohatu laughed, "He came tearing back in then flopped down panting like mad and Jaller's also getting his breath back."
While they headed down the stairs to join up with the others, Nokama was chatting with Hahli and Macku then they went and sat beside Jaller and Wotzit.
"Hewkii," said Onewa, "We would like you and the other matoran to keep Wotzit here, as after his entrance this morning, the Vahki thinks it may not be a good idea for him to come."
"Yes Turaga," he said, "See you later Sherrie." Hewkii added as he went to join his friends. "Don't let him drive you too crazy, if he gets too daft then ignore him, he'll get the hint then." she called to Hewkii, who glanced round and nodded.
Pohatu and Sherrie followed Onewa over to the rest of the Turaga, Toa and the Vahki, then everyone followed him as he led them towards what looked like a wall until he slid part of it over to show some stairs leading down under the Temple.
It would have been awkward but who ever built the Temple had cleverly put slits into the walls that caught and refracted the light. At the first open area they came to, the Vahki explained, "This is where I stayed when not checking on the prophecies or having a peek upstairs, they are down that passage way and past the centre of the Temple."
While the Toa, Turaga and human followed the Vahki through the narrow passage, Lewa behind Sherrie was muttering that he didn't go much on enclosed spaces and the Vahki replying there wasn't far to go. They were passing a carving of the Great Spirit when there was a sudden flash of light and when they could see again, Gali, Aikane and Sherrie found themselves in an area of intense light.
After the flash had faded Tahu was the first to realise that they were missing, turning to the Vahki he growled, "Where are our sisters?" as he backed the Vahki against the wall. "I don't know that's never happened before." came the Vahki's worried reply, "Wait Tahu," said Vakama as he moved between them, "Their disappearance happened for a reason," he paused then smiled, adding, "They will return."